Tour of Egat - Pre-amble and Day 1

Here's my version of the Tour of Egat. Kale's done his race report as an addendum to Jim's race report.. and I guess that'll be posted on the Cycleworx yahoo group site away from prying eyes. I'm going to give my account of it.. which will of course be the uneducated female water crew version.. but heck, I figure it'll give a different twist to the story.

Day 1 - Saturday

Kale and I had packed everything away the nite before.. I loaded in a couple of extra t-shirts and shorts for good measure and also threw in a bottle of travel wash for the daily "laundry" of his jersey and bib. The london cab came at 8:30am and we got to Terminal 2 without much incident.

A couple of the guys were already there and we waited for Yusoff and Mimi to come with the tix. A pretty orderly group check-in followed and the group resembled an overage school trip. Poh Ling (sp?) gave a pretty amusing recount of how Mimi's wife was now sitting at home with a still-running Renault cos Mimi had the smart key with him in his pocket (at Terminal 2) and we had a good chuckle. Jim said goodbye to Jessy, Boon Pin tried to reassure Jeanette's parents that he'd take good care of her and we lumbered through to immigration.

I popped over to grab my Chanel foundation from the duty free and then a BK ham crossiantwich and an iced milo later, we caught up with the rest of the cycleworx team and some anza guys at the kaya toast place in the departure lounge.

Flight passed pretty uneventfully.. we hung around the bangkok airport waiting for the philippines and malaysian teams to get in and then trooped outside in the sweltering heat to the buses and trucks. Loaded up and then headed off to the 1st hotel - De River Hotel (or smthg like that). The guys unpacked their bikes in the lobby while I watched over the bags in the karaoke lounge area. They took off for a short "bike-check" ride while Mimi, Jeanette, BP and I headed out to the 7-11 to get some snacks and while away the time. First impression of Bangkok was that it was kinda messy and very very hot.


At BKK airport

Jeanette buffing BP's nails in the bus from the airport

In the karaoke lounge at the 1st hotel


Dinner was at a restaurant down the street. Food was so-so.. I would soon come to realise that every meal would be pretty much the same - tom yum soup, green curry, some unidentifiable meat, veggies and fruit. We bought a bottle of drinking water to play it safe... and then proceeded to try and avoid getting sprayed by diesel from the water ferries plying the river next to our table and snot from Uncle Richard who was blowing his nose upwind. Eugh.

At dinner the first nite

The cycleworx table at dinner the first nite


Made our way back to the hotel.. everyone was pretty dang excited.. had a meeting in Mimi and Yusoff's room and that was pretty much it for the nite. The rooms were pretty nice.. the bathroom looked decent, and except for the "puddling" effect in the shower, the experience was better than expected.