Kratie (Kracheh),
Cambodia
Friday, January 16, 2009
We took the bus in the morning to Kompong Cham, where we had assumed we would have to stay a night in order to get the bus to Kratie the following morning. But it turned out that there was an afternoon bus to Kratie so we took it, thinking it would be the quicker option. Unfortunately about 2 hours into the journey the engine cut out and we rolled to a halt. The driver seemed to think he could fix it but ended up just making it belch out black smoke, so the mechanic came. He could do no better and so they sent for a replacement bus. They told us it would take one hour. Three and a half hours later, in the darkness, the bus came. The driver sped all the way to Kratie and we arrived at 11pm when all the hotels were locked, so we had to go to a posh one where the night guard was sleeping outside and wake him up. We got an expensive room but at least we had a bed.
The next day we explored Kratie which turned out to be very small. There is a river, and um, that's it. We took a ride on a motorbike to Kampi, 15km away, and took a boat out to see the endangered Irrawaddy dolphin. They were very sedate and had large round heads. They did a bit of tail flapping but they did no jumping like sea dolphins do. But it was cool to see them before they go extinct :o(
The next day we took the bus to Ban Lung.
