Day 1 - South Thailand Tour 2016 Hatyai - Songkhla

I decided to join Andrew & gang for a bicycle tour at the last minute and this is my third time doing a South Thailand bicycle tour where this time I hope to see new places in this beautiful land of Thai. The date was 11 April 2016 and with me were Andrew, Hui Min, Joseph & Wai Kiat. The tour will take 12 days and this is my story

We met at KL Sentral to catch a train to Hatyai, all of us were anxious and cannot wait to start the journey. 

The train was a midnight train "Express Peninsular" which I think is not an express train especially now that we have ETS train service. The fare is RM59 for a sleeping berth. Thanks to Andrew for booking this limited berths.

The train did not move on smoothly it encountered a 2 hours delay due to a breakdown at Chemor. I just wish we could just travel on the ETS train instead of this old train. Anyway we had ourselves the lower berths with our folded bicycles secured next to us. All of us were using Brompton bikes and the foldability is undeniable to most portable I have ever seen.

Finally we crossed the border via Padang Besar where we have to wait for nearly an hour before the train resumed its journey into Thailand. We arrived Hatyai about 1.40pm instead of 11.30am.

It has become a common practice that we purchase a data plan once we enter Thailand. Since we were going to stay for nearly 2 weeks we opted for this 599 baht plan.

Andrew & myself have been here at Keat's Boat Noodle shop before and we simply love his noodle. Roi Mak Mak is what we needed to say (which means "very delicious"), it is located at Preedarom Road GPS: 07.00194, 100.47098. Happy hunting folks.

All set with our data plans all signed up and tummies satisfactorily pampered we then rode to Songkhla.

Upon reaching Songkhla we checked into the same motel we visited during our previous bike tour, freshened ourselves and went hunting for our first Thai dinner in the town center. The name of the restaurant is something something Thai 2528. The food was good and yummy.

The route we took on Day 1 as we rode towards north east to Songkhla for a distance of 32km.

A video clip of the ride.