After three nights in Bangkok, I'm now in Siem Reap, Cambodia. Bangkok was hot, loud, smelly and busy, but you don't exactly go there for quiet and tranquility. Didn't really do that much 'touristy' stuff in Bangkok; I've been here a couple of times already, so I explored the shops (and then sternly reminded myself that I'm supposed to be in cheapskate mode) and planned my route to Cambodia.
On the last night in Bangkok I went out with my friend Miriam and some of her friends, some of whom work in Bangkok. I met them at a bar called 'Face', which is very swanky, but unfortunately I got off at the wrong Skytrain stop, and by the time I arrived at the bar I was a little, erm, sweaty. Actually for all you geeks out there, think Odo from Star Trek DS9. I could have been carried in in a bucket...
We left the bar and went to a very nice restaurant called Maha Naga, which is a Moroccan-Thai fusion restaurant, which sounds a bit, WTF? but actually works really well. I've got to stop going to expensive eateries, or I'll be living on beans by next year, but it was worth it, especially for the conversation. During dinner I was describing my trip plans and explaining how much I wanted to do as much of the trip overland as I could. One of the women I was with, Angela, a very well-spoken Chinese girl, couldn't quite work out why on Earth I wanted to get a bus to Cambodia when there are perfectly good aeroplanes available. "People like you really get on those buses?" "Err, yes". Blank look. It just didn't compute, although in hindsight she might have a point...
After dinner and a few beers at a great bar called AdMaker, which featured one of the best cover bands I've ever heard (Bohemian Rhapsody with harmonies, effects, the lot, looked very odd when sung by a band of Thais, but it was genius), I said my goodbyes (thanks again Simon) and staggered back to the hotel. Problem was it was about 2.30AM and I needed check out at 5 to get the 6AM bus, so I stayed up and watched some cheesy action movie that I can't remember a single thing about. At 5 I checked out and headed for the next part of my adventure, The Road to Siem Reap.
The Bus Station for the Cambodian border is the Mo Phet (Northern) Bus Station, about 15 minutes by cab from Sukhumvit Road (15 minutes at 5AM that is, about 100 years at any other time of the day). There's also a Skytrain station called Mo Phet, but a word of warning, it's about a mile away from the bus station across a park, and you really wouldn't want to walk it with all your gear. Taxi or tuk-tuk are the only practical propositions (there Bangkok bus system is OK but dog-slow). Got there with 15 minutes to spare and bought my ticket to Aramyaprathet. First Class is 150 baht (just over 2 quid), and you get a reclining seat, a box containing an unidentifiable sandwich and a drink.
I'd love to give you an in-depth description of the journey from Bangkok to the border, but I took advantage of the reclining seat and was asleep within about 30 seconds of departing Mo Chit. I woke up about four hours later, wiped the drool off the window, and the guy sat next to me (he was remarkably sanguine about it), apologised for my snoring and got off the bus. Unfortunately the bus doesn't actually stop at the border, so you need to get a tuk-tuk the last 6KM. My tuk-tuk was held together with string and the power of prayer, but we made it. At first I thought I'd been Shanghai'd by my tuk-tuk driver as we seemed to be in a big outdoor market, but this is actually the border area. The actual border seems to be a secret designed to make big stupid farangs wander around aimlessly for a bit but I eventually found it and girded my loins for the visa process, which just about every website had said would take an hour or two. Piece of piss. I was through in about 30 minutes from start to finish. Apparently, if you get the early bus and get there around 10AM as I did, you beat all the tourist buses coming from Bangkok, and so things aren't too difficult. Its also not high season yet, so the vast majority of border crossers are Thais heading over to gamble in the Casinos of Poipet, and foreigners have their own queue. Pretty much every other foreigner I was with were people living in Thailand coming over for their periodic visa renewals.
After crossing the border there is a free transfer bus that takes you to another mini-bus depot by a big roundabout where you get you're first sight of Poipet. What a shithole. I'm struggling to come up with any better adjectives. If anyone's seen the TV show Deadwood, its like that, but with mopeds.
Siem Reap is approx. 140KM from Poipet, and on the web the general view is that if you have 3-4 people, get a cab as it takes half the time of the bus and costs about $50. As it turns out, it cost $80 because the taxis had a monopoly that day; heavy rains had caused "some problems" and the buses weren't running. I found an English couple, we agreed to share a cab and off we went.
In Poipet, the roads aren't paved and you bounce through town on a rutted dirt road avoiding mopeds, cattle, bicycles, kids and oncoming traffic, then you get out of Poipet and...it gets worse. It took about 5 hours to get the 140Km to Siem Reap on one of the worst roads I've ever seen. Our driver spent most of the time on the 'wrong' side of the road (an arbitrary distinction) overtaking trucks, tractors and the inevitable mopeds. I think he used his horn solidly for five hours. The whole journey was like a giant game of 'chicken'. After about 100Km we discovered the reason for the buses' "problem"; the road had washed away and the paddy fields on either side of the road had merged into one mini-lake. The answer? A team of enterprising tractor owners were dragging cars and trucks across the mini-lake, while mopeds were being rafted in true Huckleberry Finn style. The tractor hooked us up and off we went. At this point we discovered something our driver had forgotten something; his floor had more holes than a Labour Party Manifesto promise. The race was on between the incoming tide and the tractor's pulling power. The tractor won, just, and our feet were only a little damp. A few hundred yards later, another taxi had been slightly less fortunate, and was slowly sinking into a rice paddy, its passengers morose by the side of the road, our driver laughing his head off. We finally arrived in Siem Reap 5 hours later. My spine was like a pretzel, my feet were damp and my fillings had all fallen out. It was the best car journey I've ever had! A five hour rollercoaster ride through some of the most beautiful scenery I've ever seen. Jeremy Clarkson should do it in a Ferrari.
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