Day 90

Out of the guest house at 7am I met up with Gabi and we made our way to the bus station. We weren't after a bus though, we were after a share taxi to the Thai border.

1 The Share Taxi

A share-taxi is generally a Toyota Camry with (on this route especially) modified suspension. It can do a decent speed along the terrible road surface whereas the bus pootles along rattling everyone's bones in to the bargain. The share bit comes when you can't afford to hire one yourself. You really just turn up and hope that other like minded people are about so you can get along without too much delay.

We got to the station and started to ask about the share taxis - no one seemed to know what we were talking about until our tuk tuk driver figured out what we wanted and got on his mobile phone. He drove us on to another guest house where we were greeted by a bloke with a Toyota Camry who put our bags in the back. Another tourist had paid the premium price for the front seat and was just "finishing his breakfast". Our ticket therefore would be split three ways with the mystery late-starter paying extra for the front. That meant $10 for me instead of the $5 for the bus.

2 Inside the VIP bus

We left at 8.30am and I knew the bus had left at 7.30am. So far we'd paid double and left an hour later but I had faith in this car even if the front window had cracks from side to side. "That just means she's battle hardened" I thought. I had also dragged Gabi along and didn't want to make a balls-up so soon in our acquaintance. I had convinced her to spend extra and I wanted to get it right.

I've read all about the Siem Reap to the Thai border road. It's a terrible mess and if you come in the other direction there are all sorts of scam operations to avoid too. Before long the pot-holes and dirt began and I was inspired by our driver's haste and competence at swerving to avoid pot-holes and over taking slower traffic. When he did make mistakes the car's suspension came to the rescue and we bounced up out of the holes to carry on without losing too much speed.

At around 9.45am vindication came as we over took the tourist buses that had left Siem Reap before us. It was going at a slow pace and misery was on the faces of several tourists gazing vacantly out of the window. We were around half way to the border so I guessed we'd arrive a good hour before them. We could clear customs without the tourist queues and get along to Bangkok in good time. It had been a comfortable ride and we arrived 100 metres from the border at 11am.

After the formalities of the border crossing were done we entered Thailand and searched for a bus to Bangkok. I had intended to get the 1.55pm train to the capital but we were doing so well for time we elected to take the bus since one left at 12 noon. It was a VIP bus with all the trimmings you would expect including TV etc. The four hour trip went ok and we were back on foot in Bangkok at 4.30pm. I've been to Bangkok before and was impressed that the smog I remember from September 2002 had cleared and the sky was really clean. The traffic wasn't as bad as I remembered either. We went into the T.A.T. tourist office and asked about train tickets to Chiang Mai. We were told that they had all sold out and none were available until two days time. They had a (pretty expensive) bus going overnight with two places left on it leaving in 40 minutes. I didn't believe a word of it as we had been pulled off the street. We left the T.A.T. office saying we'd take our chances at the train station. It just felt like a scam and that was soon confirmed as we were able to book tickets for a 7.20pm departure! They weren't the sleeper tickets I'd hoped for but seats on a train are 100% better than seats on a bus so we were ok about that.