After one week of relaxing at Koh Chang the Swedish couple Jim Petersson and Maria Larsson are ready to roll again. Wednesday morning they left Samut Songkhram.
They started out in Chiang Mai the 16th January and until now they have been skating 12 days but there still is a long way to go. But they do not have any rush and are planning to stay some days in Hua Hin and later on in Phuket.
“We skate 3-4 days and then rest for next 2-3 days. And we skate about 60 kilometres per day, which we are doing in like 5-6 hours,” Maria and Jim tells.
Jim and Maria have been together for one year and in Sweden they still live separately. Maria in Skåne and Jim in Blekinge. But in this trip they are together 24-7 which is:
”So far – so good,” replies Jim when I ask how it has been to travel together as a couple.
The roads of Thailand
Maria and tells that the road conditions in Thailand have so far been very good:
“The highways have a lane only for motorcycles, bicycles and skaters. It feels very safe,” says Maria.
On the road the young Swedes often meet local people who want to talk to them. But since they do not speak Thai and the locals often do not speak English they most of the time use simple body language.
Why not backpacking?
The big question to be asked is why the couple wants to skate through Southeast Asia and not “just” backpack. And Maria quickly replies:
“We really like to challenge us self and we wanted to be the first in the world to do something special,” and Jim continues “I am the first to skate at a longboard all the way from Thailand to Singapore and Maria is the first woman to roller-skate the journey.
They also like to meet new people and that is also one of the reasons that they did not book anything from home:
“We have no bookings we just skate until we find a place to stay,” Maria says and continues:
“When you skate you see a lot of places and meet and lot of people. While the bus just passes by.”
Thai hospitality and spicy food
The decision about where to go was easy as Jim and Maria both had been to Thailand before and they both loved the food and the people and wanted to go back. Then Malaysia came into the route as they the final destination should be Singapore. The plan is to roll into Singapore in the beginning of June.
In Singapore they are going to visit some of Jims family who lives there and then finally fly back to Bangkok to get a flight back to Sweden:
“But first we need to go shopping in big scale, the shopping should be fantastic there I have heard,” says Maria with a big smile.
More than vacation
The trip is not only a big experience for Jim Petterson and Maria Larsson, they are also raising money for The Swedish Childhood Cancer Foundation.
From when they started planning the trip they thought about the the publicity their journey could get and decided that it should be in benefit of a good cause. The goal is to raise 50.000 SEK.
In the official homepage of Jim and Maria’s trip you can help them achieve their goal and donate money directly to the The Swedish Childhood Cancer Foundation.
Make your donation here (Swedish) and for all non-Swedish: Information in English.
