From Trailguru
Overview
| Trip Title: | South Thailand Bike Touring - Kota Bharu to Narathiwat |
| Date: | Feburary 19th, 2007 |
| Trip Members: | Tpark |
| Points of Interest: | Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Narathiwat, Kota Bharu |
Map
Trip Report
It was safe to say that the trip didn't start in the lap of luxury. We promptly discovered at the Malaysian train station in Singapore at 6am in the morning that, in fact, the train we had reservations on didn't actually take bikes despite having asked for that 3 times when I made them. After a couple of levels of train station management, we earned the right to stow our bicycles with the stack of Fritos and Coca Cola just outside the dining car and we were off.
The train was empty for the 1st hour of the 14 hour ride to Kota Bharu, Malaysia but quickly filled up as we stopped at a number of cities in Malaysia until it was standing room only and then until it was impossible to move from our seats. The train we rode is nicknamed the "Jungle Train" and it quickly lived up to the name by getting tropical jungle hot - 40-45C hot. No ventilation to speak of. We passed the time by reading, watching the jungle go by, and dozing in our uncomfortable but reserved seats. (Note: Bring Malaysian currency if you take this train -- despite being an international train, they only took Singapore dollars at a bad exchange rate.)
If I did this trip again, I would certainly do it with enough planning to take the night train which 1) allows bikes, 2) is during the cooler night, and 3) you get to sleep through the trip. We weren't able to do this on this trip because we weren't able to buy tickets with enough lead time to get the overnight bunk reservations. The only advantage to the day train was the scenery, and while the scenery was nice, we would essentially see the same thing over the next 5 days of touring.
We finally arrived in Kota Bharu at 8:30pm. Kota Bharu is in the extreme northeast corner of Malaysia and was the last stop on the train that had hotel options for us. The train station was outside Kota Bharu by about 5km (in a "suburb" called Wakaf Baharu) and despite it being a fairly small town (at least according to the map from Lonely Planet) we really only were able to navigate to it through the generosity of the locals answering our directional finger jab + "Kota Bharu?" questions. Fortunately, everyone was very friendly and helped us without fail. This was common for the extent of this trip and there were a number of occasions where we would have been incredibly lost without this help.
We were greeted by the sound of the Islamic call to prayer as we entered the city proper (the majority of Malaysians are Muslim). We had some trouble finding the street that our hotel was on and perhaps it would have been better all around if we hadn't -- it was far from the "clean, comfortable" hotel that Lonely Planet had promised. I would describe it as "Chinese Truck Stop Chic." Or maybe not even that chic. The floors were filthy, the walls were dirty, and generally the room was pretty disgusting. But it was the height of Chinese New Years so we didn't have another option other than camping really. So we went out to dinner and then used our "sleep sacks" (a sheet doubled over and sewn up that I jokingly refer to as a "bed condom" and highly recommend bringing if you are going to travel outside of the 1st world) to at least avoid directly touching the bed.
Surprisingly, I slept well and we awoke at 9am in the morning. That was much later than I would have liked but well, it was what it was and we got moving. We walked into downtown Kota Bharu and set ourselves up with nice rice, egg, and pork breakfast dish at a stall and picked up some snacks for the ride in the market. In particular, we picked up some rice/chocolate balls that were the hit snack of the trip but unfortunately that we couldn't find after left Kota Bharu and Malaysia.
Finally in the saddle for the day at about noon, we headed out of Kota Bharu on the "side route" which was just as joyless and filled with cars as the main entrance. We backtracked to Wakaf Baharu and then rode in the direction of Chabang Empat with the goal of seeing two Wats before reaching the border town of Pengkalan Kubor. The Wats were pretty average -- the highlight of the first was a giant white Buddha that was clearly Hindi influenced. The second Wat had side by side gold and "regal" (for a lack of a better term) Buddhas. We didn't stay long at either.
The next town of interest that we reached was Tumpat after a number of highway miles. This town is notable because it is the terminal station for the jungle train from Singapore and the section from Tumpat to the border town of Pengkalan Kubar was great -- we rode close to or on the oceanfront and this stretch was really nice. In fact, if I were doing this trip again, I would take the overnight jungle train all the way to Tumpat and start riding from there. The overnight train arrives into this station at roughly 9am so the fact that Tumpat doesn't have any hotels would not necessarily be an issue as you could just start riding.
Immigration between Malaysia and Thailand was easy if a bit time consuming. At this border crossing you take a ferry over to the other side, which gave us a rest off the bike and a chance to chat with the locals (who are all very interested in strange foreigners dressed in space-age materials riding bikes).
After hunting down an ATM (which was never a serious difficulty in medium to big towns on the extent of this trip), we headed up the main highway which was well paved and not too busy. However, it was also straight as an arrow, and after we absorbed the road side farms and villages, got a bit boring. So when we spotted side roads we would jump over and attempt to take them a bit. Some of these would piddle out in short order but on one we really hit the jackpot (see the map below for where we cut over) and we rode along the ocean for a fair stretch and it was gorgeous. It turned to dirt and I was really glad to have my mountain bike to be able to do these sections. Shannon had her touring bike so we had to keep this to just the most hardpacked fire roads but I am converted and I am bringing my mountain bike for the rest of my touring trips where off-road or even bumpy road is expected. Besides the ability to handle these surfaces, having suspension just made the riding a lot more comfortable.
But all good things come to an end and we found ourselves back at the highway. We checked out Ao Manoa beach near Narathiwat that Lonely Planet raved about but wasn't worth the extra riding as far as we were concerned -- it was just a boat dock (maybe we missed the actual beach?). In general, Lonely Planet didn't impress us on this trip -- the sections on the more obscure towns that we visited seem to need a pretty solid revision.
So we hightailed it the rest of the way to Narathiwat (it was getting later and as we are near the equator the sun goes down at about 6:30pm). We stopped at a fantastic bed and breakfast called Baan Burong Guest House that we expected to be booked out given it was near Chinese New Year. But surprisingly (or maybe not, given the insurgency in Southern Thailand -- but more on that later) we found it completely empty and we were able to rent the whole top floor for US$15 overlooking the Mae Nam Bang Nara river. It was fantastic and redeemed Lonely Planet a bit which had made the recommendation. Owner Natini gave us the scoop on the area and the insurgency in southern Thailand (more on this later). We showered and enjoyed the sunset colors over the river with Beer Chang in hand and after heading out for dinner, a good night's sleep as well.
Next Day: Day 2: Southern Thailand Bike Touring - Narathiwat to Pattani
Statistics
Photos
Submitted by: Tpark |
Submitted by: Tpark |
Submitted by: Tpark |
Submitted by: Tpark |
Submitted by: Tpark |
Submitted by: Tpark |
