Koh Kong and my two minute experience of thailand!

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The adventure began at 6am packing for the weekend in Koh Kong. Anna, Rachel, Cindy and me got on the bus after stocking up on supplies (sweets, crossiants and crisps) at the station!! The journey was such a lovely one to watch out of the window, the scnery was full of lush greens and wild vegetation because the rainy season has arrived early in Cambodia.
after about 3 hours of passing time eating, sleeping and talking, the bus stops for a break in the middle of a field. the men clambour off and we remember the horror story of one of the other volunteers, who told us that her bus only had one toilet stop and it was in the middle of a field. we disembark quickly and head towards the bushes!! however, less than 10 more minutes of travelling the coach stops at a service station with pristene perfect toiliets...not squat toilets...actual toilets...i was busy picking grass spikes from my trousers from the bushes to go to the toilet...i cheered myself up with an ice coffee and mango!! service stations really do sell the best coffees and cheapest fruit!

after only 5 and a half hours of travelling we arrive at Koh Kong town and we jump of the bus to be almost mobbed by a squabble of "tuk tuk lady" "moto! moto!" fate plays a hand as i refuse to talk to anyone until i get off and catch the eye of a driver. he waits patiently and approaches me to ask where i needed to go.cindy and i need to cross the border and return back to koh kong the same day, and he offers an awesome deal of $5 which includes waiting while we cross the border! i hop on to his moto and cindy gets on his brothers and we zoom towards the border leaving anna and rachel to scout out a guesthouse!!

Koh Kong is a newly developing eco-site, which is becoming popular with the tourist and backpacker scene since it possess a very easy alternative border crossing with thailand; the crossing in poipet is becoming more notorious and the more northern crossings are very dangerous with troops fighting over the disputed preah vihar temple.

driving over the bridge and heading towards the border was suchh a fun ride, my driver's english was really good and i found uot alot of interesting facts about koh kong and the new developments they are instilling. there is a new site called mangrove which is promoting the rebuilding of rainforest areas and the various waterfalls that scatter the surrounding area. upon arriving at the border we get shown where to go by a uide, who i soon realise will want tipping at the end! instead of pushing him away i let him...in the end we only paid him a dollar (reinforcing to him that we were volunteers) and everything was done so much smoothly...he even filled out the paperwork!!! our expereince of thailand was short lived and consisted of seeing the outside of the immigration department and getting two stamps to say we entered and then left!! i wish that they could stamp the time but everyone on the border did not seem surprised by what we were doing, i guess they'd seen it all before!

arriving back in cambodia and taking many pictures of us in no man's land between the two countries, we get called into the immigration office and i relay my story of why we were doing this (cindy didnt get the wrong visa given to her upon ehr entry, but she needed to renew it and fancied a trip to the border, i do love her alot for coming with me, it was such a great experience after what could have beeen a potentially rubbish weekend!!) i told him that we were volunteers here for three months and could only extend the tourist visa for two months. they then tried to get us to pay in baht, which we didnt have so then said the fee would be $35!!!! i was proud of my powers of persuasion and the guy conceded by admitting it should only be $20! he then tried to get more money out of us when i gave him a $50 for mine and cindys visa and he claimed he didnt have change!! we stared at each other until he pulled uot a breifcase full of money from under the table and sulkily gave me my change!! our two motos were waiting and we hopped back on them before the rain came crashing down!!!

reaching the geusthouse, the rain was starting to come down faster, what started out as a drizzle was turning into a monsoon!! but being the typical bristish tourists that we are, we opted to not stay at the guesthouse but head to the big big waterfall about 20km from the town!! me and annd rejoined my lovely driver from the border and cindy and rachel got on another moto driver who befriended them at the guesthouse (the other guys brother wasnt allowed to come, he got told off by his brother because he wouldnt wear his helmet because he was trying to impress cindy!!).

so off we drove, wrapped up like little sperms in rainjackets and braved the monsoon! the rain hammered like bullets on our legs and anna had her eyes shut the entire way (i however looked super cool wearing my sunglasses perched on the edge of the seat!!). arriving at the entrance proved fun as we splashed through puddles on the moto and along muddy tracks until we reached the parking area. the place was deserted and a pang of fear arose when rachel and cindy took a long time to get there and we all realised that noone had a phone because of the rain! we later found out taht they were late because their moto driver didnt go through the puddles but made them wade through them! cindy lost her shoe and rachel went chasing after it!!

reunited, we set off down the steep...very slippy path, being held up by our cambodian guides! i found my moutaineering legs halfway down but soon lost them when we reached the bottom and saw the most spectaculor site i have ever seen! the rain was easing off and a mist was lifting from the surface of the water! we were all in awe watching the cascading water and took off out jackets and dove into the steamingly hot water for a swim! we went from plateau to plateau and perched on a rock to bask in such a gorgeous sight!! after a while we started to feel cold and the rain steadily fell again so we decided to head back up to the motos!! my hands actually went blue...i couldn't believe it! cold in cambodia!! but there was a promise of a hot shower at the guesthouse!! back on the bike our driver went quit slow so we wouldnt get too cold (poor guy was also shivering) and we learnt khmer all the way back and stared at the lush countryside!! rachel and cindy however (going back through the same area of puddles) fell off, luckily no one was hurt but rachel ahs now fallen off two motos and is starting to get a bit shaken by them. she washed the mud off in the rain and by the time they got back, all eveidence of scratches or bleeding had dried!! the twist of fate is that i knew the moto driver that i first caught the eye of would be a good driver, even in the horrendous conditions, i felt completely safe, more safe than i have ever felt on a moto!

arriving abck at the guesthouse we tipped our driver, got his number for when anna returns and then dived for the shower...it was FREEZING!!!!!!!!!!!!! it was a horrible expereince of beign cold and showering off rain and leaves in even colder water!!! it wasnt even room temperature!!! brr!!! so me and anna cheered ourselves up with a beer while we waited for cindy who had to buy a dress from the market because all her clothes were wet!!!! meeting up again at about 8 we headed for dinner at a lovely thai restaurant, over ordered because we had forgotten about lunch in the excitement and ended up eating three times our body weight in pad-thai, shrimps, curry, soup and s[ring rolls! it was amazing, but the bill wasnt!! waddling back to the guesthouse we let our food digest and tried to get to sleep!!!

koh kong really was stunning, i wish i had more time to visit it again. my time in cambodia is rapidly ending...i only have about 12 proper teaching days left and a holiday, where i think me and anna are heading to kampot and kep! we were sat on the roof reflecting last night (of course with our beers) and we all cant think of anything worse than leaving, i love cambodia and i know already it hasnt seen the last of me!!!

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