The worst boarder crossing so far!

Trip Start Oct 01, 2007

Trip End Dec 20, 2007

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Where I stayed

Rambuttri Village Inn Bangkok

(Bangkok hotels)

Flag of Thailand Bangkok, Thailand
Friday, November 23, 2007

The trip across the boarder was completely not what we had expected, let alone pad for! We woke up nice and early. Our first problem of the day we encountered was when we went to check out. We got charged for using the mini bar, which every traveler knows is a big NO NO when staying at any hotel. It was only a dollar for a coke but it was the principle of it that annoyed us. I would like to point out that neither of us had used anything from the mini bar and we stick to that claim!!! Anyway back to the journey. We waited and waited for the bus that was supposed to pick us up at 7:30am. By 8:30am Bob had already gone to raid The breakfast buffet and the bus still hadn't shown up. We had booked the tickets through the 4 star hotel thinking it would be ok - yea right. As we waited in the lobby, all the people who checked out after us also suffered the same fate of being charged for the mini bar - sounds like another scam to us. One American lady was not happy and even got the bottle of water out from the room to prove she had not drunk from it

Cambodian Highway

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A mini van showed up at around 8:45am that took us to a bus full of bewildered backpackers. There was no air conditioning as promised and our bags were scattered about on peoples seats or laps. We spent hours and I mean hours in The mid day sun on that cramped, steaming coach only to be told on our toilet break we would have to pay an additional 3000 baht to use the hole in the ground. We were still in Cambodia and did not have any Thai baht yet so we just had to cross our legs. We had at least an hours break whilst the driver washed the coach. The roads were just dirt tracks full of craters and diversions where the road disappeared. It was horrible. Apparently a certain airline has paid off the government so that the roads don't get built in order to encourage every tourist to go via plane to Cambodia. Funny that seeing as only one airline goes to that airport in question.

We finally arrived at the boarder crossing at around 3pm in the afternoon. It was surprising quick at the Cambodian side. There was a large casino and market in neutral zone. Both of us got through the Thai boarder ok but some of our group we not so lucky. We sat around chatting to some of the other back packers for a good hour before the others got through customs. We had been issued with boarding passes for a coach at the Thai boarder and to our relief, we got onto a nice air conditioned coach (with luggage in the luggage hold). But after only 20 minutes of driving on a decent road (on the left hand side) we all stopped for dinner. Hour later and we were on the move again.

Neither Weeble or Bod were cleaver enough to book accommodation so we were panicking a little when we arrived in Bangkok at 9:30pm! We were originally told we would get there for 4pm in the afternoon. However, lick was on our side. We got dropped off within walking distance of the backpacker haven - Khao san road, where most of the hostels can be found. We chose to go a bit up market and headed straight to the Rambuttri Village Inn. We got a double bed, en suite and the place had a roof top swimming pool, all for 800 baht a night! (approx 12 pounds a night).