Golden triangle

A morning searching for a scooter, no desire to head over the border, not much else to do. Drink coffee,watch the street? Not that kind of place for me. Eventually finding a bike, head out of town, follow the river, diverge, concrete gives way to wood, to fields, to hills rising ahead of us, straights give way to curves, a main highway through slow country.

And then signs proliferate with the traffic and we've arrived. A strange place. An arch, a big Buddha, elephant statues and school groups; groups of tourists passing huddled by guides, the sense of the seaside out of season or captured grainy on old film. The Mekon flows by, another three country point, Laos awaiting us in a day or two, Myanmar stretching off into fading hills…

Further south through crossings and checkpoints, back along a wonderful road flanked by fields of pineapples and small hills until emerging into the flatlands, fields of rice drenched and verdant green stretching out to where hills begin to form of mist, closer as they solidify into stratas of tone beneath angular peaks, another range firming closer, wild shapes deeper beyond the angled sun…

And tomorrow south, destination still uncertain, but, time...