Day 20 it is and we've just touched down in a place called Inburi which is in Singburi province and Ros actually managed to park up right next to an Internet shop instead of doing her usual trick of forcing me to walk another couple of km in order to find one. And yes, the CAT connector is STILL not working! Here's a review of the last couple of days;
Monday, 22 September; Up early to make sure we got our fair share of the free breakfast (well, toast and coffee as it turned out!) but we needn't have bothered as apparently almost everyone else in the place had checked out the day before and we had the restaurant all to ourselves. Unfortunately, our stay at the Preuksasiri Hotel ended on a sour note when the manager, Khun Bor, first informed me that the 'machine' he needed to process my Visa card so that I could pay the bill was "no good" and that the bill for two nights accomodation and two evening meals was 2,900 baht. Now the first bit of bad news was BAD as it then meant that our early off was off and that I had to go find a bank that would give me a cash advance on the card and that can be rather tricky when off the beaten track. And the same guy had told me that it would be "no problem" to pay with my visa card when we checked out on checking in on Saturday evening. The second bit of bad news was worse than bad. It was outragous! Anyway, I got Ros to go through the bills with him and, what do you know? "Sorry, 2,700 baht." "Check it again!" "Sorry, 2,070 baht" "That'll do!" So off we went to find a bank and we cleared our stuffand checked out of the hotel as soon as we got back. Nice place, good value for money re the rooms, good food and service in the restaurant but that was as blatant an attempt to rip people off as I've come across for a long time. Beware if you use this place; best pay as you go I suppose. Having got that out of the way, it was time to start pounding the tarmac again and head for Lopburi city, still about 15 km away. When the motor cycle lane became part of the main road, it got a bit hairy and as we got into the more built-up part of the city it was time for me to get off the road altogether. Now Lopburi really does look like it's a nice place to visit when we have more time to spend there and I'll definately head back through there and stop somewhere overnight, though probably not at the Preuksasiri Hotel, when I go back down to Chonburi at the beginning of November. I found an internet shop easily enough to do the blog during the afternoon break when it really did get quite warm. Finding the road we wanted to use to get to Singburi was more difficult than we thought it would be as every road we went down seemed to lead to either Bangkok, back down to Saraburi or north to Nakhon Sawan. But we found it eventually and there was plenty of time once the sun had gone down a tad to get another 7 or 8 km in before I found Ros parked up in what was to be our base for the night.
Tuesday, 23 September; A good night's sleep for a change as the service station we slept at closed up at 10 and almost all the lights were switched off. There was a security guard on site as well. Up around 6.30 after it re-opened and a big thanks to the lady in the shop for the hot water for our coffee even though she hadn't even opened up for business! A couple of important numbers came into play today; 500 being the number of km I'd clocked up so far on the sponsored walk by the time I got into Singburi just after 11am and 29, as it was Ros' birthday and in just 3 years time, I'll be able to trade her in for a couple of 16 year-olds. I wish!! Now, because of the latter, I decided that we should have half the day off and try and find somewhere to celebrate. I must point out at this stage that Ros did not object! Unfortunately, easier said than done in Singburi town centre apparently so, having had a look around and sent some more photos to Grant in Chiang Mai to process and publish on the sites during the afternoon, we went back in the direction of the main highway to Nakhon Sawan and found a place that was just opening up for the evening and was, most conveniently, next to a rather large service station off the north-bound highway that we could park up for the night in. So, having parked up and locked up, off we went to celebrate and if we hadn't have shown up they'd have had no customers at all! Not one soul showed up in the 3 hours or so that we were there and I think it unlikely anyone would have turned up after we left given its location. Still, we had a good time and thanks to the two guys in the place for looking after us. I'm sure that they'll be able to replenish their stock of Chang and Leo before they open up for business later today. Ros put in some calls back to Lamphun to speak to the kids during the evening though she'll have to wait a month or so before she can get her hands on her birthday cards and any presents she might have waiting for her. I did buy her a cake for which she was truly grateful as you'll see for yourselves and there'll be a picture of that on one of the sites shortly. Doing the maths, we've covered 500 km in 17 walking days so we're just under our target of 30 km a day. The road we're on takes all the way to Nakhon Sawan and is both flat and fairly straight. If the sun is out as it has been the last couple of days, it'll be a challenge to get into Nakhon Sawan some time on Saturday afternoon.
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