How a 25-year-old rollerbladed down the length of Thailand
The 25-year-old owner of a roller skating and roller blading rink has traversed from Chiang Rai to Yala province on his Rollerblades, covering 2,051 kilometres in 55 days.
Jitruek Narat reached Betong, the border town of Yala, on Monday afternoon.
He had left Chiang Rai’s Mae Sai district, which is the top part of Thailand, on March 1.
When he skated into Betong, Jitruek was welcomed by officials at security checkpoints and local residents. They congratulated him for being the first person to be able to travel with Rollerblades from the topmost to the bottommost points of the country.
Speaking to reporters after his arrival, Jitruek said he loves extreme games, and he especially loves roller blading and roller-skating sports. He is now teaching rollerblading and roller-skating at his own training rink in Nakhon Pathom province. He is also a coach for children and youths of the Skate for All Academy in Bangkok.
Jitruek said he wanted to set a record with his Rollerblades, so he decided to rollerblade from Mae Sai to Betong.
He said no one has travelled from the top to the bottom of the country on skates, although there have been people who have run or biked along the route.
Jitruek said he travelled about 15 to 30 kilometres a day, and on average took about one or two days to pass through a province.
Jitruek recounted that when he skated past a sightseeing or tourist destination, he always took pictures to promote the provinces that he had passed through.
The skating trainer said he loved the southern border provinces because there are several beautiful sightseeing spots in the provinces, including waterfalls and seasides. He added that residents of southern border provinces were also kind and treated him with foods and drinking water with smiling faces.
He would later travel by bus to Yala downtown to meet people who love rollerblading and he would travel by bus to the Hat Yai airport in Songkhla province from where he will fly back to Bangkok.