Early start today, up before 06.00 for final packing before a little breakfast and pick-up by the visa run minibus. By way of background, visas are very important in Thailand, and for most visitors this is gained on arrival. However, given the pretty cheap cost of living there are a lot of westerners (farang) who almost live out here permanently on tourist visas, and these people need to renew their visas from time to time which involves a trip over the border: from Pattaya, the nearest border is with Cambodia which is just a few hours away, hence the reason an entire industry has sprung up to support this. From our point of view, this is great - there are loads of buses to the border from Bangkok but none from Pattaya, so we've been able to sort a couple of one-way seats on a visa run minibus to get us to the border over to Cambodia.
It's an early start, but all good as the minibus is pretty good. There's also very few of us on there - just the pair of us and a couple of eastern European girls (who looked ill-prepared for the border crossing with their big wheely-suitcases and teeny-tiny shorts. Still, each to their own. The trip itself is actually surprisingly quick - three hours maybe, including a couple of stops. The big advantage with the minibus is it drops you right at the border, whereas the buses from Bangkok go into Aranyaprathet and from there it's a 6km tuk tuk ride to the border. Well, this is what we thought anyway...
Background: the border crossing from Thailand to Cambodia at Poipet is legendary - it involves negotiating areas which have zero in the way of signage or help (western Europe this is not) and where everyone (official or otherwise) is trying to scam you. Plus the ubiquitous beggars, hawkers and 'afflicted' - this creates an overall experience that can generously be described as interesting...
SCAM#1: The minibus pulls up outside a cafe in Rongkluea Market (the border area on the Thai side). We're still 6km from the border. The cafe has visa signs on it, but, well, it's evidently just a cafe. The scam is that the proprietors get you to complete the visa forms, they then take your passports over the border and get your visas for you, charging you through the nose for the privilege. But they hide this, pretending to be the official visa place. Because, of course, the official visa place looks just like a cafe... We spot the scam instantly, the two girls don't and start scribbling away at their visa forms. Meanwhile, we're trying to get the driver to take us to the border while the owner of the cafe tells us of the wait we've got ahead (thanks ladies!) Fortunately, we eventually win and the driver take the girl's luggage from the van and drives us to the border.
We've been to some real shitholes in our time, and Rongkluea Market is right up there. We're accosted as soon as we leave the van, but quickly head to where we assume the border is - fortunately we're right, and we clear Thai immigration easily. From there we enter Poipet proper: ostensibly it's part of Cambodia but really it's a no-mans-land of casinos where the usual rules don't apply. While not quite as bad as Rongkluea Market, it's not far off, and people actually STAY here!! We pass quarantine and head through the Khmer gate. After some slight tribulations we eventually find the visa place...
SCAM#2: Visa on entry for Cambodia is $20 (Cambodia uses the Riel as currency, but don't bother, US$ is king over here). The immigration officials want an extra 100 baht each to expedite our visas (this is AFTER Linda's passport is back with us...) I start asking what the 100 baht is for. Chai comes the response. I wonder if this is like east Africa (where chai is a small fine to oil the wheels of bureaucracy - just enough for tea, hence the name). I ask further and it becomes a little intimidating when we realise we're the only ones in the visa hall and there are several immigration officials wanting cash. We eventually give in and give them the 200 baht. I'm gutted, it's only four quid but it's the principle...
The rest of the journey through passport control and over the border is actually fairly painless - we're really not given too much hassle, and we're on the transfer bus to the bus station pretty quickly. We're constantly expecting scams and they're not forthcoming - maybe we've been a bit cynical? Even the bus station is quite nice, and after a 45 min wait we're on a shared minibus down to Siem Reap for $10 each. Admittedly, there are still a few attempts to get us to part with our money before we get to our final destination, but it's all good-natured which is fine with us!
We finally arrive at our hotel, Angkor Spirit Palace, just outside Siem Reap and a bargainous $35 per night. The room is huge (3 beds!), the beer ("Angkor: my country my beer") and food (Cambodian veg curry) is excellent, and we've got a guide sorted for the morning - time to start seeing some of the real southeast Asia!
