Wed 27th Feb - Picked up by Sawngthaew from hotel at 8am to go to meeting point for VIP bus. What a joke....turned out to be an 18 seater minibus that was almost full when I got there, so I ended up with one of the fold-up seats in the aisle. Would have been more comfortable on a public bus at probably half the cost! Furthermore, half way into the journey it broke down and was steaming away like a kettle. We all ended up sat at the side of the road while it cooled down and could be made to hold water. By 10am it must have been in the lower 30's!
Go to my destination a 11:30, which is a natural marvel referred to as the 'Four thousand Islands', where the Mekong fans out into a delta 14km wide. There are many options of places to stay here, the biggest of which is Don Khong, but I'm aiming for 'Don Det' in the very south. To get there, the bus drops off at Ban Nakasang, from where you catch a small ferry for 15,000 kip that takes about 15 minutes. The sky today is a beauty, straight out of Toy Story with pure white cotton wool clouds against a crisp blue background. Set against the bright greenish blue of the water, it was a stunning welcome to the area.
You get dropped off on a sandy beach and the accomodation is straight up ahead, along one dusty road. Plenty to chose from and I felt like trying something basic with a view so chose one of the thatched bungalows overhanging the water for 30,000 kip with external shared bathroom (i.e. A toilet box with cold shower).
The village is a really chilled place to hang-out and there are plenty of facilities for backpackers. Electricity isn't everywhere so some places are on a generator in the evening. Internet is freely available as are currency exchange services and tour operators.
I will be aiming into Cambodia from here so will be checking out options. The cost of a 1 & 1/2 day trip to Siem Reap excluding overnight digs is $30 by minibus.
Hired a pushbike in he afternoon for 10,000 kip. Getting around is simple enough wih tracks easy to follow. A bridge links the islands together and costs 9,000 kip to cross. On the southern island of Don Khon, the Tat Somphamit waterfalls were well worth seeing as was a nice sandy bay furher south. Plenty of places to stop and chill. Met a few people who had been here for weeks and not seen anywhere else in Laos yet. It's easy to understand why. I'm reserving my chillin to when I get to southern Cambodia, so will keep on the move until then. Booked my bus ticket for tomorrow morning, so that's sorted. Will be interested to see if it works out as planned.
About 6pm the light started to fade and the generator kicked in, joined by the evening chorus of crickets and cicadas. I am struggling to eat at the moment, with no appetite. I guess that my system is still recovering and all I seem to be able to stomach are fruit shakes and soups with vegatables. Anything else just does not appeal. Worries me a bit as I have lost a lot of weight and don't want to lose any more and I feel weak.
Thu 28th Feb - Breakfast at Mr Mo's at 7:30am and time to get rid of any last Kip as there are no currency change opportunities from here into Cambodia. Change everything into US Dollars.
Set off at 8am by boat back to Ban Nakasang and then onto minivans departing at 9am for the border. The Laos exit post is a rickety blue wooden shack next to a dusty main road. First scam, as they charge $1 exit fee. Then walk along the road about 300 metres to the Cambodian immigration at Don Calor. Usual form to fill in plus 1 photograph and $21 ($1 for their pocket I suspect). Full page visa and a few stamps later, then out to the police check-point and more stamps plus an arrival card to fill in and $1 fee. That's $3 in backpocket fees on top of the visa, but still, I had been told the visa was $35 so was better off anyway.
By the time I had got through the visa stuff, the baggage had been offloaded and sat in a heap waiting for collection and then straight on to the waiting 25-seater bus to get to first stop. It is a belter today and must be in the mid to upper 30's, so very sticky.
The bus waited for everyone to get through immigration and worked out that there wasn' enough space, so brought in a small minivan to assist. We all had to sit there whilst it go sorted. Didn't set off until 11:45, so a lot of wasted time. First stop 'Stung Treng' and we all disembarked amidst confusion of talk of changing buses. What actually happened was that we walked behind our bus as it drove to a vehicle ferry. Once on the ferry, we got back on our bus while it crossed the river. On the other side a short drive to a rip-off hotel for lunch. Had to pay in Cambodian Riel and this was the first opporunity anyone had of getting local currency, so they rip you off with a bad exchange rate of 3,900 Riel = $1. Food was a crazy price. Welcome to Cambodia!
The next scam happened when the driver came around to exchange our ravel vouchers for bus tickets to our final desinations. About 15 of us had bought tickets straight through to Siem Reap and were told that we might have to overnight at Kompong Cham and then complete the journey tomorrow. Our driver told us that his was not possible and we must either change at Kratie or go all the way to Phnom Penh instead. This would add a few hundred kilometres to the journey and many additional hours in the bus. A bit of an uproar broke out in response. It turned out that he didn't want to give us much choice. Arrived in Kratie and the driver stopped ouside a guest house then promptly disappeared into town to have his dinner. The guest house owner then promptly appeared and tried to convice everyone to stay. Most of us refused and then had to sit there on the pavement until the driver re-appeared an hour later. He then hit us with another problem. 29 people and only 22 seats available as the second minivan had to return north to the border. The chaos that then ensued had to be seen to be believed. We eventually ended up losing three people and creating a human mountain inside the bus with baggage everywhere. Hit the road again at 6:15pm and the road immediately got worse. Bumpy and dirt track. By 9pm he told us we were going to have to go to Phnom Penh and wouldn't get there until 11pm at least, so stopped for a snack break. Right outside the petrol station there had been a motorbike collision and two bodies were covered up on the ground with drips going into them. Didn't look promising. I think one was dead. A bus full of tired disgruntled travellers who had now been on the road since 8am and going where we didn't want to go does not make for a happy bunch on top of that.
The cost of snacks here is average. Common ones are dried fruits at 1,500 riel for a tiny pack. Bottled drinks 2,500 riel.
Arrived at Phnom Penh after midnight and offloaded down a dark backroad with no obvious reference. Chaos as we all tried to sort baggage out and find out what was happening. A few guys then hailed to follow them and we ended up in what looked to be a seedy dodgy area. It was late and I was shattered. Three of us ended up sharing a dorm room for $1 each with shared cold shower (better than nothing). To get the bus to Siem Reap was going to mean getting up at 6am, so no much sleep. The others from the bus ended up with mattresses on the floor. Didn't trust the mattresses so covered up and out with the mosquito net. Must have gone out like a light.....
Fri 29th Feb - Leap year, so had to remember the extra day. This place is worse in daylight than when I arrived (called the lakeside GH). Breakfast had some Interesting 'happy' options. You can have drugs in many ways here as well as 'spiced up' drinks and food. It reminded me of a nasty story in Don Det recently....a 20 year old lad a few days ago had a 'happy' diet in the evening and never woke up the following morning! Could have been a weakness he had, but most likely a bad cocktail hat killed him....be warned! After breakfast the expected confusion. We thought we were to be picked up but time was marching on so some of us (me and a group of non-english speaking italians) decided to make our own way to the bus station by tuk-tuk. Everything here is in dollars. I confuses them if you want to pay in Riel!
The Siem Reap bus left at 7am ish and was fairly full (hard seats so not going to be a comfortable journey). The few who hadn't come to the bus station got on later and had to take the remaining few worse position seats, so glad I went to the bus station. PP on quick impression isn't on my list of must see cities. Motorbikes rule the road in vast numbers here and many wear face masks due to the pollution. Will only be coming back if necessary.
Doesn't take long to get out into the countryside along route 6, which for most of the way is tarmaced. Looks to be a major harvest time for sweetcorn as mountains of It along the roadside. Also saw a number of large ponds of lilies in bloom, which was nice. After a day like yesterday, I am looking forward to getting somewhere to stop for a while as not done that since I started travelling.
The bus stopped for a breakfast break about 9am and some really tasty treats on offer. A couple of women selling fried taranatulas and crickets! I am adventurous with trying this sort of thing usually, but I just didn't appeal this morning! Plenty of fruit for sale so got some pineapple and jackfruit instead.
One thing you see alot of on the roads are political signs for 'Cambodian People's party', 'Funcinpec', 'Sam Rainsy's party'. Cambodia is emerging from decades of trauma following the 'Pol Pot' khmer rouge era of the 1970's. They were drawn in to the Vietnam war and the US carpet-bombing strategy to weed out the vienamese and ally communists and it will take a long time for the scars to go away, if ever.
As is the normal...the bus station used to be in the town and has now been moved 5km out of town. What this means is that the tour and accomodation touts are there like hawks when you get off the bus. Here though, they are high pressure and crowd you to the point of annoyance. A few of us had an idea where we wanted to go, so picked up a tuk-tuk for free to get to the 'Popular GH'. Got a nice room with private bathroom for $7 for a couple of nights. This place also has good food and can organise travel too.
Off for a walkabout in town, an easy place to navigate on foot. Plenty of ATMs, which oddly give currency in US dollars. Apparently here are some that give local currency. The market is interesting for a wonder and eating and drinking, you're really spoilt for choice as there is so much of every nationality.
Sat Mar 1st - After breakfast and a chat with a few others, decided to hire bicycles for the day. Sounded easy as here are so many hiring hem here. The problem was finding bikes ha were roadworthy. Three places later, got one for $1.5 per day and that needed air in tyres. There are a couple of routes that take in many of the sights and started with a bit of a cock-up by following the wrong sign, so added about 7 or 8 km to the start of the day. Anyway, got to the ticket office eventually. This is about 1 or 2km south of Angkor Wat. $20 for a 1 day pass and $40 for a 3 day pass (they take your photo which gets printed on your multi-day pass). You can also get a 7-day pass for $60. Thought It would be worth going for the $40 as likey to want to do some more tomorrow. Maybe In hindsight should have gone for 1 day. The only difference being that if you want a second day, you have to go back to the ticket office to get another pass. You would think they would put a ticket office in town where everyone stays wouldn't you?
About 2km onwards to the Angkor Wat entrance and on foot from there. Plenty of people selling guide books if you need one. I was expecing a lot more tourists than there were. This is hailed as the maserpiece of the whole area, and it is stunning. Built from the 11th century onwards as a temple dedicated to the god Shiva and possibly as a mausoleum to Suryavarman II. You enter from the west along a causeway passing the lake to the main building. Postacard images leap out at you as you progress towards the central part with the tapering towers. Bas-relief images flow from left to right around the internal wall in story book fashion. There is major renovation work going on at the moment, so some areas are out of bounds.
Next around the circuit is to head north on the west side of Angkor wat to the walled area of Angkor Thom. You enter through a facinating faced gateway. This in itself is a day's exploration, but to be honest, the main parts are enough for me. Started with the 12th century buddhist 'Bayon' in the center. The main feature here is the 200 faces that adorn the sides of 54 towers. I found this more interesting than Angkor to be honest.
Further on north from here is the combined sights of the 'terrace of the elephants', and 'terrace of the leper king'.
It was steaming hot by his time and I decided to follow the 'mini' circuit and go to the buddhist Ta Phrom temple. This is famous for the roots of banyan and kapok trees that have engulfed the temple. This place is exciting! Postcard images again at every turn with tree roots surrounding doorways and images of indiana jones and lara croft jumping out of doorways or rolling along the ground being chased. This place has been used in films for both aforementioned characters and it's no surprise why as it's fascinating. The highlight of the day! The guidebook quite rightly mentions how exciting it must have been for the european explorers who discovered it. Nowadays, it's full of wooden walkways and arrows pointing which way to go.... Makes you wonder if there are any real discoveries waiting out there? Would love to think so as I get a bit fed up of the organised plod around some of these places that have made it too touristic. You have to keep dodging the numerous tour guides repeating their daily speil to another mass group of tourists (most of Japan is on tour somewhere in the world...the country must be empty!).
Bumped in to a couple of doctors I had met recently who reminded me of a guy we both had spoken to with a badly infected foot. He was in that much pain he had put himself on vallium. His foot had got that badly infected it had turned gangrenous but he was afraid of getting treated in the hospitals here. I first spoke to him when he was hobbling through the Laos border in his bare feet along the dirt road to immigration. He couldn't wear anything on his feet due to the pain. The reality was that his infection had got to the point he could lose his foot. The stupid guy would not see sense unil he was in that much pain he was taken to hospital by concerned people in the middle of the night in Phnom Penh. Not heard from him since, so don't know the outcome.
A long cycle ride of 12km back to Siem Reap from here. Tired, hot and aching.....
Dropped the bike off and straight for a cold beer ....just what I needed followed by a wonderfully refreshing shower.....aaaahhhh
