29th December 2016<\/p>\n
We had a long way to go in order to reach out first nights rest. the contrasts between Thailand and Myanmar soon became apparent once on the road. The lack of every road safety device had disappeared. The road which was promoted as being an improvement on the old road was now 2 lanes but in very poor condition. Roads are constructed by dumping piles of larges pieces of granite on the side of the road. These are then broken down by hand into smaller pieces. Graded by size into smaller piles. the roadway is then “levelled” with mattocks and the first layer of the larger rocks are laid down by a team of mostly girls placing each rock one at a time using a string line about 3 meters long. Some sand is used to fill in the gaps. The process is repeated with a layers of smaller rocks. This this then rolled and a layer of bitumen applied with a final layer of crusher gravel. This results in a road, although paved, is a rough a all crap. \u00a0Just shakes you and your bike as if you were riding on a corrugated gravel road. So I was very stuffed by the time we reached Kyaik Hto and home of the Golden Rock, 278km and 7 hours later. We very quickly booked into the hotel and headed for the “bus station” in order to get the last of the transportation up to the rock. This was a matter of squashing into the back of a truck 7 people across and in about 12 rows and siting on the very narrow pew whilst the truck hurtled up this very steep and windy road flat out for about 40 minutes. Bit like the thrill you might get in a rollercoaster ride. Made it to the top in one piece and proceeded through millions of pilgrims, past all the souvenir \u00a0and foods outlets, even a couple of exclusive hotels, up stairs and along promenades until we got our first glimpse of the golden rock at close to sunset. pretty bloody amazing sight. We wound our way through the masses who had set up camp for the night, and there was masses. until we got to this gold covered massive round piece of granite, balancing on one square foot of contact at the edge of the precipice. \u00a0 Back to the trucks to take our hair raising ride back down the mountain. by the time we had taken our evening meal and got to bed it was late. Sleep, however, was a bit had to maintain as the outside music and parties went on till well after 4 in the morning.<\/p>\n\n\t\t