Various country bridges found on our runs in Chiang Mai

When we go out to new territory in the "jungle" we will frequently encounter a way of life that is very different from our own. Often this involves being on farmland that is not public property so we are technically trespassing every time we use the land. Because of this we try to make sure that we do not damage anything while we are there but sometimes the bridges can seem as though something that the lard-asses in our crew would go straight through. While this has never actually happened, if it did we would make sure to compensate the owner of the land and of course, apologize.

These water-crossings are often not very sturdy, and were never meant to be crossed by masses of people all at once. We worry whenever we encounter one that our 200 lb participants are going to be twice the weight of the farmer that uses it on a regular basis. Thankfully, no one has ever broken through one of them. We have had a couple of people that have fallen off into the water though... that is always funny.

When we encounter a sturdy bridge that is made of metal this is normally a fantastic sign that the government got involved since these are meant to be semi-permanent structures that are for all of the community to use and at some point or another an engineer or at least a professional of some sort got involved.

Most of the time these bridges in the middle of nowhere are made entirely out of natural materials and because of this, they can easily break. This wouldn't be a big deal if it happens under the land-owner's watch, but they weren't exactly expecting a crew of overweight foreigners to descend upon their land uninvited. To this day we have only had a couple of run ins with angry landowners who wanted us off their property. It's unfortunate when this happens but when it does, we apologize and promise to never come back... then we never do go back even though we had no bad intentions by coming in the first place.

This particular land hasn't been used for anything real in a long time though and the dilapidated and abandoned house in the background of the above picture is proof of that. This location is quite remote so I am guessing the people that lived there got tired of the rural life and decided to move somewhere with a little bit better infrastructure.

It all works out for us in the end. One man's trash is another man's treasure! We are just out there to socialize, get a bit of exercise, and drink some beer after all. We aren't too fussy about much else!