Koh Chang, Thailand to Siem Reap, Cambodia
Since I've done this now, I can honestly say, this is the most dangerous thing I've ever done, specifically the portion of the trip from Aranya Prathet, Thailand to Siem Reap, Cambodia. These pictures pretty much chronicle our journey. If you follow along the map, it goes something like this. Starting on Koh Chang, you take the ferry to the mainland and catch a truck to the taxi terminal in Trat. At the taxi terminal, you find a truck taxi that will take you to Aranya Prathet (or Aranyaprathet). Since we started late, and our driver took us to the wrong border (Palin), that is where we stopped for the night.
We arrived at dusk and went to the Aran Garden 2 hotel. The manager, whose name I don’t recall, told us that the hotel was full and all the other hotels were full also. He said this was due to a youth festival in town. We were skeptical, but believed him as there were lots of teenagers hanging around the Aran Garden 2 and we had noticed another hotel with no vacancy.
The manager then said we could stay for free in his room out back, in what could be best described as a room in a bungalow. He had the maid come out move his stuff out and change the bedding. We of course we skeptical of this, but we felt we had no other option, but to “trust but verify”.
We went up town for dinner, to check email, and for a couple drinks came back and went to bed. They came out to the room and woke us up at 6:00 the next morning and we hit the road. So, the manager let us stay in his room for free, so hassles, no strings attached. I can’t comment on the condition of the hotel, but I can say that we had a very pleasant experience with a very nice honest manager there.
Poipet, Cambodia
The undisputed scummiest town in Cambodia, which
places Poipet high in the running for scummiest
world-wide. A border town with casinos, money changers, spoon benders,
thieves, scammers, 3 foot high pickpockets, amputees, and no paved roads.
"Poipet rhymes with Toilet and the two are virtually indistinguishable" (from
www.talesofasia.com).
Enough said. We knew it was very, very bad from our research, so we were not
surprised and prepared. You will notice
here, that Francis has wire mess cage around his backpack to deter
anyone in Poipet who might get the wrong idea.
In Poipet, we eventually got to the taxi depot where we would procure transport to Siem Reap. We got to the taxi depot and no taxis were going to Siem Reap yet as they had not return. The road was real bad. After a 30 minute wait, we got in our Taxi. All Taxis in Poipet are Camerys.
Cambodian National Highways 5 and 6
Francis and I had heard that these roads were real bad. I didn't
find any part of "bad road" to be true, as it was not a road, more of path.
And the road wasn't bad it was a fucking disaster. The path through the
jungle is mud with potholes the size of tank traps. And it is busy both
directions, with huge trucks, Land Crusiers, Camerys, motorbikes, bicycles,
tractors, other vehicles that defy description, stuff, cows, dogs, children
and other moving objects. We still have not figured what side they drive on
in Cambodia. I think the answer is the side with the least amount of
potholes. This is a road 140 km (87 miles) long and it took us 5.5 hours and
I felt fortunate to make it at all. At one point
a truck got stuck in a pothole. No other trucks could pass it, so the
truckers in both directions had just parked there trucks and left. There was
a half mile of trucks parked two together. That only left about 5 feet of
road left to get our trusty Camery by. This was the same 5 feet of road
traffic coming from the other direction was using. Now the reason that this
journey is so dangerous, is there is no way to get you out if you are in an
accident and there are no hospitals in Cambodia you should go to. We did
eventually made it and found our way to
Molly
Malone's in Siem Reap.
