Shambodia

I spent a total of 9 days in cambodia and despite the glowing reports i had heard beforehand i didnt find anything of great interest with probably the least friendly money grabbing people i have ever met thrown in. Crossing the border from vietnam and going from tarmac to knee deep mud gave me an inkling into what lay ahead.

Crossing the border turned out to be much more simple than expected and the earlier problems with the bikes for the time being seemed to have resolved themselves. Our first port of call was Kampot, described in lonely planet as a charming river town with excellent backdrop of the local mountains and amazing pepper. Maybe they should rewrite this as what the two of us found was anything but charming and the scenery left alot to be desired. I have never before entered a guesthouse or anywhere else for that matter where every resident is over 55 and single male. Lets be honest its well documented why they are here. As i saw it written on one guide "Cambodia has two attractions Angkor Wat and Lawlessness." Basically if you have the means to back it up you can do anything you want and no-one cares in the slightest. After 5 weeks of warm smiles from very welcoming people in vietnam, cambodia was a bit of a shock. As soon as we stopped we were surrounded by people begging, but begging forcefully demanding money. This led to us beating a hasty retreat and meant we were sorely tempted not to rest anywhere as our second stop yielded the same result.

I understand that cambodia is a developing country and all the rest of it but Laos and vietnam seem to manage where cambodia doesnt. We took off the next morning chased out by the rats in the room and headed to the capital. The main road from Kampot to the capital Pnomh Penh was an experience i dont really ever want to repeat. 160km of single track road covered in loose gravel, and clouds of dust flung up by the trucks that come hurtling by. It could well have been the least pleasant day ever spent on a bike ever. After reaching Pnomh Penh 10 hours later it was just a relief as the worst of it was over and the ruts and potholes hadnt completely destroyed the bikes.

The capital was pretty much empty due to a festival, and the wide immaculately paved boulevards were empty. Literally no atmosphere whatsoever, as every building is either a ministry, department, institute or some other arm of the government. All these buildings are huge and beautifully designed but i just cant understand why they didnt spend it on something more useful.

There are three main tourist attractions in Cambodia, two of which are in Pnomh Penh and these are where we spent our time visiting. These are both unfortunately also two genocide museums relating to Pol Pot and his mental Khmer Rouge regime. His ideas of turning cambodia into an agrarian utopia turned foul and ended up in the slaughter of 2 million citizens at various death camps(cambodia at the time only had a population of 8 million). The first museum was the biggest prison in cambodia which was essentially a converted high school. There wasnt a great deal to see but walls of portrait photos of faces of men, women and children was pretty harrowing as only 7 people ever survived being sent there. The next stop was the Killing fields where the murders and burials took place. The field is dominated by a pillar containing all the bones and clothers of over 8000 people dug up from the surrounding pits. Its not great to see and pretty depressing especially as it was only 40 years ago and most of the old people all lived through it.

Two days was plenty in Pnomh Penh as there is nothing else to do and anything other than the three or four main streets were pretty gross. This meant that our final journey with the bikes was about to begin, the 330km ride to Siem Reap and Angkor wat. I was pretty excited about seeing the temples as everyone i have spoken to said it was amazing and it would be a great finish for this part of the trip on the bikes. The road to Siem Reap turned out to be pretty good although for large parts Josh was limping along at 40kph as his bike seemed to fill up with water everytime it rained. Siem Reap is a pretty nice place to hang out although is built solely for the hoards of tourists. Unfortunately we found out motorbikes are banned from the temples so that first evening i sold mine to some guys outside the hotel for $60. I just wanted a quick sale. A congratulatory drink followed although i think both of us were pretty gutted about losing our independence and the fact that the most amazing month had come to a close.

Its the wet season now in cambodia and the next few days disappeared in torrential rain storms with the water in the streets coming up to our knees as the river burst its banks. We managed a day trip on push bikes to angkor and i will say it is pretty cool but theres just so many temples. We did maybe 15 temples in a 10 hour day and for me that was plenty as they really are that much different from each other, plus the exceedingly pushy people selling tat are so so irritating it just ruins the experience.

By now i was pretty fed up with cambodia and was looking forward to leaving. We had to take the bus to Kratie which is over the other side of the country in order to connect to a bus the next morning that would take us onto Laos. I had forgotten how much hassle public transport here involves and it wasnt helped by the fact that we paid for a VIP bus but ended up being dumped off at the local bus station. We then had to change after being assured that we wouldnt have to, and then when to top it all off that bus didnt show we had to grab the crappiest minibus you have ever seen. The 6 hour journey turned into a nightmare 10 and we only just had time to grab a boat out to see the river dolphins before it got dark. There are only 70 irawaddy dolphins left in the mekong and it is reconned that they will be extinct in the next couple of years. It was pretty nice watching them in the mekong which is currently at full flood and the sunset over the surrounding jungle was immense. This brought the end to what i can only describe as a really disappointing stay in cambodia and am now in Laos. Its still really wet here, bring on november and the dry season!!!