Northern Thailand Experience

This is RIDE Adventures' Thailand trip, offered as a guided group or self guided ride, and it is a genuine dual sport itinerary rather than a road tour with a gravel section bolted on. The operator gives the total as approximately 2,500 kilometres, split into nine riding days, two rest days, an arrival day and a departure day, with an average of six to eight hours per riding day including lunches, fuel stops and photographs. The loop runs anticlockwise from Chiang Mai. Day two climbs the Vachiratharn Waterfall road and the summit of Doi Inthanon before descending to Mae Sariang on the Yuam river. Days three and four follow what the company calls the tiniest backroads it knows down to Mae Sot, a gateway city to Myanmar, then east past the Friendship Bridge on the long sweeping turns of Route 12 to Sukhothai, where twenty six Buddhist temples survive in the heritage park. The northern half opens with the ride to Nan, taking in the world's largest teak tree in Ton Sak Yai National Park, estimated at over 1,500 years old with a base circumference approaching ten metres, lunch near the Sirikit Dam and a short ferry crossing. After a rest day at Nan the route runs to Chiang Rai, then to Thaton on the newly paved road the company nicknames Paradise Road, and on to Pai for a second rest day. The last two riding days take in the Mae Hong Son Loop, which RIDE Adventures counts at 1,864 curves, a boat trip to a Kayan longneck village, and then the 80 kilometre mixed surface Elephant Track back to Chiang Mai, weather permitting. Terrain is given as roughly seventy percent pavement and thirty percent dirt, gravel, sand and mud, and the trip is graded Level 4. Bikes are BMW F750GS, F850GS and R1250GS, with the Triumph Tiger 900 GT Pro as the base price machine, all prepared for the Asian market with suspension and ground clearance reduced by about five centimetres. Twelve nights, all breakfasts, nine lunches, ten dinners, fuel, a bilingual guide, a support truck and trailer, permits, park entrance fees and airport transfers are included. Six bikes are needed to run a guided departure at the published pricing.

RIDE Adventures runs this thirteen day dual sport loop out of Chiang Mai, covering roughly 2,500 kilometres across nine riding days with two rest days built in. From the city the route heads southwest over Doi Inthanon, Thailand's highest peak at 2,565 metres, to Mae Sariang on the Yuam river near the Myanmar border, then works down the border backroads to Mae Sot and east on Route 12 to the UNESCO temples of Sukhothai. The northern half is the wilder one: Nan by way of the world's largest teak tree and a river ferry, Chiang Rai and the Golden Triangle, the newly paved sweepers into Thaton, and Pai. The finish is the Mae Hong Son Loop and an 80 kilometre mixed surface track back into Chiang Mai.