Hi all,
Hit the delete button on your mail program if you don’t want to hear me ramble on about life on the road in South East Asia – you must be sick of these updates…..sorry, whats that you say – “we want more updates of you having the time of your life whilst we work our arses off in this dreary-arsed country we live in”….oh, ok then.
Oh well, I’ll carry on (sigh). Sorry – my lethargic manner is probably due to the early 6am start this morning to wearily mount a bus sans suspension to take us from Pnom Penh (Cambodia) to Ho Chi Himn (Vietnam). 9 hours drive – 300km – kak!
We decided not to go to North Thailand after visiting the south, but headed east into Cambodia. We thought we would be clever and miss all the tourists entering the well used Thai/Cambodia border crossing in the east of Thailand. So we used the new and deserted border crossing in the Northeast. Large, enormous error. There is a reason that its’ not a popular crossing. This became apparent as we rode out of the Thai customs offices and into the Cambodian immigration. The lovely tarmac smooth road that saw us covering big miles in Thailand quite suddenly dissapeard into dust / gravel / sand ahead of us into Cambodia, accompanied by dessertland for miles around. I’m pretty at that exact point I heard a vulture cry out from the direction that we were going. I never thought the road would disintergrate so quickly from one country to the next. We laughed.
“Oh well, just 140km until the next big town”. MMmmmmm, that 140km took us 6 hours. I’m still amazed that we didnt come off the bike in all that deep sand and bridges with more holes in them then my socks (memo to me: must get new socks).
That road was memorable and the accomodation in the dessertlands and food that evening. What made it more shocking was when we turned up in Siam Reap – the most important town outside the capital. Siam Reap is basically Las Vegas compared to what we had just seen. Just amazing. Huge hotels towering over the famous nearby temples catering to the western tourist.
We bumped into Adam and Danny in Siam Reap – two brits going around the planet on their bikes. We met them in the Himalayers 3 months ago. Had a great time with them both – good laughs and food in Siam Reap.
Anyway, yes Cambodia – amazing temples, real Indiana Jones stuff – Pnom Penh was superb also – just the best food – big French vibe in the cooking. Goddam yum.
Now we are in Vietnam and are going to do a spot of tailor hunting tomorrow – we bought some beautiful silk in Cambodia and are going to make a wedding dress for Fie. It’s very exiting and its so nice to have a story behind the dress.
Two very sad places so far on this trip – the brigde over the river kwai (the death railway) – Thailand and the killing fields – Cambodia. The stories behind these two places defy description – its just very very sad and upsetting.
Right, my eyes are heavy and I can just about make out the keys on the keyboard, so better stop, eat and go to bed.
The new pics for Month 6 are on flickr and below:
[slickr-flickr tag=”Month6″ align=”center” border=”on”]
The new video for Month 6:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-1NI9g0zIs