Anyway, we got there and headed to Don Det, one of the more southern islands which until only a couple of years ago wasn't really accessible. Even now it only has electricity from 6 to 10 pm. It's a tiny little island which you can cycle around in an hour or so. An interesting morning was waking to Loz saying "there's a scorpion inside the mosquito net" and finding she was right.It took about 2 weeks and a lot of steroid creme for her bite to go down...
Very little shade and the little blue pipes running up from the mekong deliver water straight to your shower and tap. Being that it was rarely below 40 degrees even at night, you just pretend you haven't seen what happens to that water for hundreds of kilometres before it gets here. The people here were amazingly hospitable and we were cared for fantastically. We cycled around and saw plenty of rural island life, a huge set of waterfalls as the Mekong falls towards Cambodia, and even took a boat out to sit in the no-man's waters between the Laos and Cambodia to watch the rare Irrawaddy dolphins playing.
The crossing of the border into Cambodia was fun, 45 degrees and both officials trying to get a bribe out of you. The Laos officials had the better idea of refusing to stamp your passport without the bribe. Then it was into Stun Treng, a dusty little border town. It was here that we realised the rumours were true and the nearest ATM was an 18 hour bus ride away in the capital. This didn't help since we only had enough money for a nights accomodation and a sparse meal.
Some fancy Western Union work later (thanx to Hira) and we were heading out further into the 'wilds' to Ban Lung in search of an old volcanic crater lake and some stunning waterfalls. The far east region of Cambodia is one that is only just starting to open up to toursim and was the dustiest town we've ever seen!
Renting a scooter and getting about, we swam in the lake before resting up. The water falls around town were fantastic, as was the drive to get the them. The dust (read road) was so deep that it behaved like water as you drove through it. Our trip was given a bit of ethnic flavour as a funeral was going on next door which meant every speaker in town had been hired to play the prayer from 6am to 11pm. Whilst we enjoyed Ban Lung it was nice to be moving on.
We had planned to spend a couple of days in Kratie but as our bus never stopped in the town we found ourselves heading to the capital Pnom Penh. Unfortunately we arrived on Khmer New Year which meant that everything was closed, tuk-tuk's cost double, and there was no celebrations. Without the anticipated shopping spree we trekked on to Siem Reap and the Wonders of the ancient city of Ankor.
Ankor Wat is only a small part of an amazing legacy of the Khmer empire. We spent 3 days driving from temple to temple in a chariot-like tuk-tuk, sweating our way across the stones which the jungle hadn't yet claimed. This is truly a Wonder of the World and we were so happy to see it. There was also much more accessiblity to the temples than earlier years and we made full use of it to see all the temples in the Ankor region, even heading 40km out to Bantei Srei, locked away in the depths of the jungle.
Siem Riep itself has come a long way and is now a great contrast to the hot, slog involved in seeing the temples. It was comfortable and affordable enough to recharge us from each day of exploration. We would have to make a small reference to the excellent food we found there too! From here we took "the worst road in Asia" to the border, as we headed to Bangkok, a claim we would happily agree with. This was one of the longest days on the trip and we were very happy to crash down in our cell-like room in Bangkok.