One evening back in january 2014 I arrived in Phetchaburi and I ended up in a hotel I don't remember the name of.
After checking in, I got in a bit of a panick as all scooters at the hotel were rented out, severely jeopardising my plans to go out looking for Spoon-billed Sandpiper the next morning at Pak Thale. I already booked an evening flight from Bangkok to the North the next day, so I didn't have more than that one morning and I didn't have margin for error, or, in this case, bad logistics.
I was very lucky though as in the last hour of daylight a couple arrived at the hotel on their scooter. I knew them. They were Belgians and birdwatchers, and it was a great coincidence meeting them there! Moreover, they already spent 2 days in the area and found no less than 5 spoonies, AND they were going to turn in their scooter they rented from the hotel so this one would me mine! You won't believe it, but my wife send me a message to say she was pregnant or our first kid.
With all of that good news and the possibility to enjoy a good evening meal and company at the hotel's restaurant, we were very soon trying to flush our dry throats, after a hot day, with plenty of beer. Things got a bit late and around 3AM I was severely drunk and stumbled into my bed. The next morning, I just couldn't wake up in time (planned to wake up a bit before 6AM) and due to the lack of sleep in the previous week combined with the excess alcohol, had one of the most severe hangovers anywhere while travelling. I raced on my scooter towards the salt pans, arriving there around 9AM, 3 hrs after daylight started. I met a famous Scandinavian flat earther living/guiding in Thailand leading a group who told me, when asked about the whereabouts of the spoonies, that 'they saw them, but I arrived too late and it was getting too hot + waders all went to the seaside with low tide'. I felt suddenly very, very depressed, with his group of birders leaving, giving high fives, while I was only starting with a seemingly impossible task at hand, scanning the salt pans with a tiny travel scope and a severe headache, resulting in burning eyes in the bleak sun.
It took around an hour and a half during which I got sunburnt, I tried to walk on the small levees between the salt pans as waders were moving constantly, and many were sleeping so I had to check the same flocks over and over again. But finally, I managed to see spoonie, and such a big load came of my chest. I even managed to include a visit to Laem Pak Bia and scored all possible target species that morning before taking a minibus to Bangkok.
That minibus was driving like crazy, and once we reached Bangkok, I saw traffic jams coming. The minibus kept its speed oblivious to the traffic, and suddenly traffic in front was standing still and some in the bus were shouting. No way the minibus could brake in time. I was wearing no seatbelt, seated on the back row in the middle, ready to get catapulted towards the front in the central ally through the window. I thought this would be it. At the very last moment, the minibus managed to swerve to the lane on the left where traffic was halted yet so it had about 50 meters of braking space. From that moment, I took it easier on that trip and skipped my previous plans to rent a car in the North, given the deadly Thai traffic.
