We rode for about seven hours, and five of those involved being rained on. You get used to reduced visibility and steep slopes with slick pavement, but it’s dangerous coming around hairpin turns every hundred yards, especially facing trucks who don’t stay on their side of the road. When we first started to climb out of Samoeng, on the back road to Pai, I noticed there were great gobs of animal shit on the highway. I assumed it was horses. Then I noticed a smell like the zoo. I guess it was elephant shit, though I saw no elephants during the ride. Seems like maybe someone had brought elephants through here a few hours earlier, as the shit had already been smeared by passing tires. They use them here as we used tractors and trucks.

In Iowa you have to be careful of hitting deer, here it’s elephants and water buffalo.