Travel time from Singapore to Chang Mai?
 

We're contemplating the possibility of attending the HU meeting in Chang Mai on January 11 and 12, 2013 but our boat with the bikes doesn't arrive in Singapore (hopefully) until December 17. Assuming we get everything sorted by the 21st of December that would give us 3 weeks to get to Chang Mai from Singapore.

Is this even remotely do-able? About 2,700 km would mean averaging less than 150 km per day but we've never been to SE Asia so have no clue if that's possible. If it is possible, we'll head up for the meeting and then get all the information on touring the area from local experts before really starting the tour. If it isn't possible we'll start our tour of SE Asia from Singapore and take it easy from the get go.

Thanks for any information!

in Malaysia, there's a 2-3 lane motorway, that goes all the way from Johor Bahru to Kuala Lumpur to Thailand border... in Thailand, the roads could be a little slower, and getting by Bangkok (no 2-wheelers allowed on its tollways)can be slow, and I for one always get lost at least once! But in general, the roads are fine, and your timing should allow for some sightseeing along the way. Cameron Highlands in northern Malaysia quickly come to mind.

Ekke

I'll be leaving Kuala Lumpur on the 1st January, aiming to get to the HU Meeting's venue by late afternoon on the 11th.

So that's 11 days for the whole ride up. I'm planning to see plenty on the way up too, staying over for a couple of nights at a time in at least two stopovers. Here's my preliminary route, which I'm still refining: LINK

Sing to KL is just a 4-hour journey, so you have loads of time on your hands.

See you in Chiang Mai .. :thumbup1:

All the best

Keith [& Ellen]
.

Excellent!

We'll register for the HU meeting then. :D

i will be there too, setting off from singapore on the 6th january 2012. will do some camping at the national parks instead of the usual motel.

Hi,

Will be also on the way to the HU-meeting.
Will fly to KL middel of Dec. and then slowly go up to CM. But if you are in a rush 5 days is possible.
Meet you on the road or in CM.

Heiko

see yuo al thear then iff the rain dosent mealt mea BEFORE I GEAT THEAR SUMATRA AND ITS PISSSING DOWN AGAIN
:rain:

Ekke,

How'd the tubes hold up from UB ?

Yeah, SE Asia's infrastructure - excellent. Take your time and enjoy the ride.

Kurt

Hi Kurt,

Yeah, the tubes held up great! Audrey says the bike ran perfectly, even on the expressways.

Are you coming to the HU meeting? If not, hopefully we can get together at some other time while we're in the area.

Sorry this goes a bit away from original topic. And if you go to the Chiang Mai meeting, I´m sure you will hear something similar.. but one of my best trips in that region was like this (in Nov/Dec 2005):

From Thailand, south from Bangkok along the coast to Cambodia (the road east from Koh Kong was an off-road riders paradise, but unfortunately they paved it!) and then Sihanoukville, Kep, and Bokor hill station on the coast. Although I´m not sure, if you´re allowed to ride up to Bokor any more, as they started to build some fancy hotel there. And then to Phnom Penh, a really nice capital, even though I usually don´t care so much about big cities. Then head northeast to Laos border (check if you need Lao visa from PP, at least for us it was not available at the border) – but if you haven´t visited Angkor temples, then well worth making a detour around Tonle Sap lake first, there´s the floating villages on the lake, too. They also sell huge spiders fried as snacks near Skuon, north of Phnom Penh! If time permits, you´ve got many nice side road options to take in that region as well. Mondolkiri and Rattanakiri provinces close to Vietnam border offer some challenging riding, too, especially if you´re on big bikes.

In Laos, chill out with backpackers at Si Phan Don, very nice islands on the Mekong river, then north to Vientiane, then Vang Vieng (the road goes through some REALLY fantastic mountain scenery!) and Luang Prabang, with lots of beautiful temples... And from there, charter a river boat, ´slow boat´, to take riders & bikes on a 2-day cruise north on the Mekong (it requires some hard negotiating at the boat landing, I think we payed about 250-300 USD, we had 5 people and 4 bikes – just remember loading/unloading of bikes to those boats is tough work, and must be included in price, or they´ll charge you extra!) Boats stay overnight at the small, remote village of Pak Beng, then reach Huay Xai the next afternoon. From there you´ll be able to cross into Thailand (Chiang Khong)... and then there´s still the mountain roads of North Thailand, surely among the best in the world.

We only had about 3 weeks for the whole tour (only some 4000 road kms, but spend at least double that time, if you can!) and especially the main road through southern Laos was not the most interesting... and I´m sure we missed a lot of fun in the northernmost part of the country as well. But I still think that river cruise was really something else, and overall the route went through some amazingly different and beautiful areas. Should be do-able the other way round, too. I did this on a rented bike, but the bike was actually rented from my friend, who lives near Bangkok, and he was with us on this tour, so he handled basically all bike paperwork at the borders. My understanding is that this should be possible on your own bike.

But this trip was 7 years ago already, so will be good to get more up-to-date info about the whole scene from others.

Yep, we did it on our own bike the other way round 8 Month ago... and we will do it once again some time (close in the future hopefully). Time is running fast there and if sbdy wants to do it, do it fast... soon all roads will be paved and it will be different all together. There are major projects going on, mostly Chinese driven as far as we could see.

:funmeteryes:

:offtopic: :D

Thanks for the "off topic"! We're thinking of a couple of months in SE Asia, depending on our next destination so we should be able to incorporate those ideas.

Ekke,

I'll be at the meeting !

Glad the tires/tubes did well. Very glad.

You're welcome to visit in Mae Rim, too. IF we are finally an empty house, you're welcome to stay, too. (Sam & Dave were just through, Fabio & Dino coming, and the "giant Swiss Army truck" is, apparently, to appear sometime in January.)

Kurt