Si's Year Out! (Plus Europe! Plus Morocco!): A journey and a half!

Our visas had almost run out so we needed to go over the boarder and come back to get another 30 day Thai visa. This was a great excuse to go over to Cambodia and visit the world-famous temples of the Angkor period. We booked another cheap bus ride to Bangkok (expecting a big air-con bus) and were surprised when we were picked up by a rickety little minibus. We assumed that it was just taking us to a bus station....but after being on it for an hour we were starting to get worried that this was how we were doing the whole 15 hour journey!!

Luckily it was just taking us to a bus stop, it was just that the bus stop was 2 hours drive away! After that it was a fairly relaxing night ride on the air-con bus back to Bangkok. Again people went through our bags but there was nothing to take so we didn't lose anything.

After reaching Bangkok we looked into the journey to Angkor. The border is about 500km from Bangkok and the temples are about 130km from the border. Amazingly, the price for a tour bus there was a ridiculous 800 baht. What with people going through our bags again and the high prices of a tour, we decided to be adventurous and do the trip ourselves using only public transport. This was not as easy as it sounds....

First we had to get to the main bus station, which meant bartering a tuktuk driver and hanging on for dear life as he tried to set the record for the fastest speed on three-wheel transportation! Next we had to find our way through the biggest transport center I've ever seen when everything was in Thai writing. We were actually the only white people at the station! In the end we figured it out and got a bus for 207 baht to the border. We spent the night in a cheap guest house and walked over the next morning. The security was so lax and there were people running around everywhere, it was complete chaos! We got through the Thai departure bit and were directed to the Cambodian visa area. The officials are completely corrupt so they overcharge everyone for the visa by about 30%. We tried arguing but it was impossible so we paid up and went over.

The next step was the 130km ride to Angkor, easy huh? Think again.... The journey would be done on, I quote, the worst road in South East Asia - 137km of dirt, mud and potholes bigger than your average swimming pool! Another story of corruption, it is rumored that Bangkok Airways is bribing the Cambodian government to keep the roads in poor condition so that people are more likely to fly the journey! Even more annoyingly, the government has recently 'regulated' the transport system at the border. This means that there are two ways to get to Angkor; an expensive government bus; or an expensive government taxi! We took the taxi option as it was only slightly more expensive than the bus once we had found another two people to share with.

Words cannot describe the terrible condition of the road! We had an average speed of about 30km/hr and were forever swirving around huge craters in the road. The Cambodians are even crazier than the Thais when it comes to driving and that's saying something. It took us about 15 minutes of driving to figure out that the Cambodians drive on the right side of the road (they actually drive on all sides of it). I didn't need to be so worried about being car-sick as being decapitated as my head was banging against the roof of the car the potholes were so bad! The journey took an amazing 4 hours but all in all it was quite fun and we got to a nice guesthouse in Siam Rep (just by the Angkor area) in time to get a beer to calm our nerves....tomorrow was temple visiting time!

I took a short video of a bit of the drive, we nearley crash a couple of times! See it here!