And on to Cambodia! our first border crossing! (08.07.12)

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Sorry for the delay, quite difficult to get enough time on the computer to do this!

So up at 4am for the train as we couldnt get the tickets until the day of the journey and had been advised it would be busy. The train cost 48B each...about a quid! Got ourselves set up on the big old fashioned train and were feeling a bit smug that we had lots of space. Then the train got full....really full and throughout the 6 hours, we stopped everywhere, just seemed to randomly stop in the middle of nowhere to pick people up from the side of the tracks, but it was a lovely way to see the country and a real experience, people hopping on and off just to sell food and drinks. Nothing like a squat toilet on a train to put you off drinking anything!

The border crossing into cambodia is notorius for being full of scams, and we thought we were prepared! It started with the Tuk Tuk driver to the border trying to get us to buy a visa from a man in a restaurant en route, we dodged that one! We managed to get though the border only parting with an additional 2 pounds in "admin fees!", paid to the genuine immigration staff at the visa office.

Having crossed the border into Cambodia, we faced the challenge of getting ourselves to Siem Reap. It turned out that at the border one company has a monopoly on all the buses and taxis, so you are completely at their mercy! Should have seen this as a sign of things to come in Cambodia! we were taken to an out of town bus station where we were sold a ticket for a mini bus with 10 people to get to Siem Reap. This ended up having 11 people in it and stopped 3 times at the side of the road to just swap drivers with people standing at the side of the road and people driving other buses, including one who couldn't actually work the seat belt or gears! Not dodgy at all. It seems on Cambodian roads, as long as you hit the horn before you move, you can do as you like!

We were then dropped off out of town at a bus stop where Tuk Tuk drivers were waiting to mob us as we got off the bus! We were helped by an American girl who had previously volunteered in Cambodia and could speak fluent Cambodian. With her language at bartering skills we managed to successfully get to a hotel we were planning to look at, thinking we had side stepped all of their pushy sales techniques!

We looked at the room which was lovely and so went to check in, after a few minutes checking in we were asked to sit down for a chat by someone who we thought worked for the hotel. 5 mins later as he asks us how many days we want to spend at the angkor temples, and what time he should pick us up, the realisation hits that he is a tuk tuk driver!

Welcome to Cambodia, where everyone wants to sell you to someone else!!

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