30/01-31/01: Two last days in Cambodia

Yesterday and today we did the same things as we did the previous days in Kampot: relaxing. Only now we didn't relax next to a river, but next to a swimmingpool. That is, I did, Ardan sat most of the time in the shades surfing on the internet (although he enjoyed a dive in the cool water a couple of times to). I'm kinda getting used to this relaxing mode, so tomorrow will be a bit hard I guess. The first day of biking in a long time, since we're leaving Cambodia behind for Vietnam. Luckely no 100 km for the first day. Or we hope... Ha Tien is only 35km from Kep, but as it is the start of the TET-holiday in Vietnam and we didn't book ahead, we hope that we will still find a hotel/guesthouse there. If not, we have to keep on biking until we find one. So let's cross our fingers...
Goodbye Cambodia, we will miss you, you were a fantastic country with lovely people and beautiful scenery! Off to Vietnam!

29/01: Leaving Kampot behind for Kep (+36;2492km)

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After a good night sleep, breakfast with a fruitshake next to the river and some reading in a hammock, we set off to Kep. It was 11 'o clock when we got on our bikes and it was very hot! Luckely we only had about 25 km to bike. Maybe because my legs were now used to relaxing and swimming (in combination with very hot weather) that they objected, because it felt like a lot more. On the roundabout before Kep we stopped at a bakery called Salt & Pepper and treated ourselves with a coconutcake, an applecake and a marsepan cake.
Our guesthouse here has a hammock and two good relaxing chairs at every bungalow, nice! Swimmingpool is still under construction, damn. Then we'll just go to a nearby hotel with swimmingpool. If you eat or drink for 5$/person, you can use their swimmingpool.
Kep is famous for it's crab, so we just had to eat some crab for dinner: fried crab with green Kampot pepper. It was good! (it was a bit above budget... 7,5$ for a (big) plate, but we've been economical for almost everyday, so once in a while, this is alowed).

28/01: Why not another day of relaxing at Kampot?

Not much to say... same as the days before: RELAXING (reading, swimming, internet, watch a movie, drinking a fruit shake...).
We booked another guesthouse in Kep for tomorrow.

27/01: Kampot Kayak

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Another day at Kampot, another day of relaxing. Again we did some swimming, some reading and some kayaking. Ardan is getting to feel a bit better. But let's not say this to loud. We'll just wait another day and stay here for one more day. Maybe some 'jeux de boulles' tomorrow, and some more dives into the river :) After that, we'll go to Kep where we will, yes, relax a bit more ;)

26/01: relaxing at Kampot

Some reading, some swimming, cleaning the bikes, playing with the dogs, some more reading and some more swimming in the Kampong Bei river: good restday which Ardan needs (still a bit sick).
Before we forget: yesterday we were halfway our trip.

25/1: Feelin ow so bad....sweet we found a nice place to rest (+85km;2448km)

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Ooow I (Ardan) was feeling bad again today...yes, the shlits, they lay low for a day but came back with a vengence. Not nice, certainly not since we had a good bike day planned (a little over 100km from Sihanoukville to Kampot). The highway 4 & 3 though weren't busy and have good pavement, additionally you get nice views towards the steeply rising bokor plateau, it is good biking.

Anyway today it got hot, sizzlin & bakin in the sun acutally. Ardan also needing regular shitstops, some stops for drinks & snacks...quickly followed by...yup, more shitstops. So after 85km Line decided it was time to flag down a truck (while ardan was takin another shitstop ;-)) & we got lucky. An empty! (usually everything is overloaded if riding) flatbed truck going through Kampot and he was happy to take us along. I quickly pulled up my pants & biked down the road to where Line was waiting with the truck. We were now barreling down the highway at 65kph to Kampot, with a minor stop at a police checkpoint where the driver 'donated' couple thousand riel to the officer and on he was again...it's all about the money...dumdumdumderredumdum...

We didn't really want to stay in Kampot town for a few days, so biked up north along the eastbank of the river towards some guesthouses...really, keep heading on the dirt, potholed road until you reach the left turnoff to Villa Vedici & Mango Trees! We are now stayin at Mango Trees, a bungalow room in a garden along the river with riverside patios. Kajak's for rent, bikes, wifi, hammocks...swimming in the river. Honestly, we are gonna sit back for a few days. Sorry Willem, no Bohdi Villa, they are renovating their rooms :-( Still, the view is still pretty sweet from this side of the river too.

24/01: another day at Sihanoukville

Today... We slept until 8.30am (which has been a long time, most days it was 6 'o clock), got up and went for a breakfast on the beach. Got back to our guesthouse where we checked our planning for Vietnam. Apparently the distance is longer than we thought :) So we'll not take the Ho Chi Minh trail through the mountains (because that will take us longer since it's harder work) but we'll follow the coast. We've read on several blogs that this isn't the nicest way for travelling by bike. But we will try to take the little roads in the south until Ho Chi Minh, and we will take a bus to skip the part between Na Trang and Hoi An.  From Hoi An to Hue is a little bit of Hw1, but in the end not so much biking on highway 1 anyway.
After the planning we had dinner (hmmm mashed patato with tomato sauce and meatball... mum, I think you came here already and learned them how to make mashed patato, because it tasted damn good and quite the same as your famous mashed patatoes :) ). After we filled our tummies, we went to the beach. For me: relaxing and reading, for Ardan: killing time and reading. Yeah well, after 3 months on a bike, it's time for my kind of thing. Although I must say, I'm getting into the biking as well (sometimes ;) ).
A good BBQ for dinner again and an early night sleep since our alarm clock will go of at 5.30am tomorrow. Early biking 'cause here on the coast it's much hotter than the rest of Cambodia. We'll bike to Kampot.

23/1: Beaching, feelin a bit sick & blog not responding

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Last night, every 15 minutes Ardan got up to go to the toilet. You wouldn't think that after 10 times one could still go to the toilet, but he could. I don't have to make a picture to tell you that it was a case of very very bad diarrhoea. Poor Ardan! I only had to get up twice and it was nothing compaired to him. Still... after 3 months, this is the first time we really had 'problems'.
After what was a short night for the both of us, we got up and biked to another beach where we looked for a new guesthouse. This time with working internet.
In Phnom Penh we discoverd that our blog isn't responding. That is, to us. Apparently other people can read and react on our blog, but we can't. Strange... But we can not open any 'blogspot' site for that case. Is Cambodia suddenly blocking all blogspot websites?
We ended our day of chilling at the beach with a BBQ for 3$/person. We had a little table right in front of the see: the waves only 4 metres from your feet. Nice....

22/1: Bussing to Sihanoukville

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We wanted to leave the big city of Phnom Penh as soon as possible, so we got up early & headed for the main bus companies around central market...an hour of biking across to different bus companies we settled on the main one (Sorya) who didn't charge a too hefty surcharge for the bike. Still a solid 2,5USD (halve of a normal ticket price to Sihanoukville from PP!) Anyway, we need our bikes, so pay up, its still just 2,5USD so not that bad. Bus ride itslf however is f***** horrible. We weren't feeling all that well today (especially Ardan feeling a bit sick for some strange reason) so this probably made it a bit worse than it really was. The bus doesn't seem to go forward at all, moving side to side the entire time & making stops anywhere & everywhere gets quite anoying at some point. All this complemented by some loud cambodian idiot picture on the telly..."yeah". Am I glad we usually just get places by bike instead of this kind of transport all the time...bullet through the brain, seriously.

In Sihanoukville we decided for the first night on Victory Beach which should be a bit less touristy than the others hoping for some relax ambiance...it is relax, but: 1) Old white guys & high heeled chicks everywhere (get the picture?) 2) Bars with lots of red/green neons (get the picture?) 3) No internet anywhere, something we actually really liked to have.

So after a couple of beers in a local bar, where Line got a free massage; Ardan was called "very handsome" numerous times & Line heard she shouldn't be jealous because she is beautifull & the waitress explainning us that when she likes something she just has to touch it (as she was touching us the entire time) we headed back to our basic bungalow for a good nights sleep.

Tomorrow? To the touristy bit. Hoping for internet, not just ladybars & a more upscale bungalow/room.

21/1: Follow the Mekong to the big city

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Todays task was simple again, follow the mekong down to Phnom Penh. We could avoid the highway until the last 40km which was good & hoped the road along the mekong would be allright...it turned out to be super, good & just allright. Complemented with some stunning views & really nice locals in between! To anybody considering the ride between Kampong Cham & Phnom Penh, riding along the west coast is good, so do it! Some bits are dusty & rocky, but at some places the locals live really at the waterfront & on one point there is a small track seperating their houses with the banks to follow instead of the main road. All this complemented with bars serving cold drinks & snacks!

After that we get onto Hw6A...not too bad at first, getting busier & more chaotic nearing PP...roadworks start, lanes disappear together with the small bit of sensible traffic conduct. We hitting the 100km mark & we need to push our focus up a bit more for this bit...pffff, tired. In the city things really get busy, mopeds, cars, everthing & everywhere...we manouver our way (Line even yelling at some driver for cutting us off) to an area of guesthouses where we quickly find a room, shower, wash clothes & lay down for some afternoon rest. Tomorrow we're off to Sihanoukville by bus (let's see how much they will charge us for our bikes). From there we'll be biking along the coast to enter Vietnam on the 1st of February.

20/1: Kampon Cham says relax

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Totally uneventfull day in which we walked around town for the minimum we needed to get some fruit, water, cakes & extra food. Toady was lazy day. Figured that was OK after 5 days of riding & another 100km's tomorrow. Planned the rest of the trip some more, especially trying to pinpoint our route for vietnam a bit more...coastline highway frenzy or inland highlands tranguility? Still not completely fixed, but we tend to the highlands...work those legs ;-)

Most "remarkable" events must be when we ordered a bacon/fish sandwich...yes, we did, yes it was good & when two kids with scales came round the restaurant we where having dinner to earn a bit of money? Yup, the don't beg for it, they ask for money and then tell you how fat you are! Or is their scale tricked to always make you feel good? Then money can make you feel better...perhaps it's just to measure how much kilo's of money you give them? Don't know, don't really care, we didn't find out.

19/01: Down to the mekong

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111km. 111km!! A very long ride if you ask me, but we made it. Although it was a good paved road, it was hard work today. My legs didn't want to. I must say we did it in a good speed, so maybe if we do it slower next time, it will be better.
We arrived in Kompong Chom at 1pm and looked for a guesthouse. Loads of guesthouses and hotels here. Today we're paying 5$ for the room. Expensive! Not ;)
I had a good sleep, Ardan did some computerwork and after that we walked around town, had a nice fruitshake and a noodle dish. The Mekong looks beautiful here, by day and by night.
We decided to take a day of rest tomorrow so the day after we will be ready to face another 100 km back to Phnom Penh on the road next to the Mekong. It will probably be a nice view, but the road isn't paved, so hard work again.

18/1: Phnom Dek to Kompong Thom

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Curry noodle soup for breakfast & fried bananas for on the road and off we went...

A good thing we bought dustmasks because we really needed them today. Every car or truck that drove by made a HUGE dustclowd. When we arrived in Kompong Thom, everything was brown (face to toes) accept our nose and mouth :)
Some reading in our books, passing at the bakery for something to eat, some more reading, stopping at the market for some fruit, dinner and an early night sleep sums up the rest of our day.

17/1: Pushin hard on Route 66

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Ta Seng to Phnom Deik, a mere 35km but it took us a really hard 4h to make it! Sandy, single track through the Boeng Peae Wildlife sanctuary. If you plan on biking this rd, consider deeply if you are looking for very offroad biking or not. If so, its great, if not, find another way. In any case, it certainly isn't good enough to make it on the map with an actual rd number...Anyway, we pushed, pedalled, pushed some more...crossed a stream, pedalled, a lot more pushing...Line screamed all the frustration out of her when her pedals slammed into rocks yet another time...Ardan enjoyed finally some good 'oll off the beaten track riding...finally Phnom Deik! Food, a beer & some rest.

Natalie & Gonzage continued on, we found a guesthouse and stay here for the night since we don't have a tent & cooking gear to stop whenever, wherever we want. However this small taste of offroad cambodia has lit a new fire in Ardan's mind...enduro riding through north cambodia must be a trip in the future...these tracks are really superb for motorcycle offroad riding. When? We'll see.

We truly enjoyed sharing this offroad adventure with another biking couple, I guess it made the task a bit easier, knowing you are not the only one swearing & working hard at that time :-)

16/1: Down the Angkorian Route 66

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After a cold and hard night, we woke up at 6am, ate some rice and chicken soup and off we went, hoping to catch up with Nathalie and Gonzages (the belgian biking couple we met yesterday). They had a good headstart, so we biked very hard. And what better way to celebrate our 2000km mark than for Line to fall hard on the rocky road? Some deep scratches on my hand was luckely the only dammage. After cleaning it with water and and putting on some bandage we went back on the road, leaving the cambodian crowd behinde us.

They weren't at the little village anymore where they said they would sleep, so we just went on. Once the outback road through the nature park started, Ardan recognized the traces of their wheels. So we knew they had taken this road. We only didn't know when, so we asked the few people we saw 'pii barang' (two foreigners) and pointed forward. In the meanwhile, both Ardan and me tried to match my first fall quite a few times, but the first was to spactacular, so it didn't work :)











Finally after biking two hours (ans seeing a lot of burning forest), we catched up with our new belgian friends. After another 3 hours biking, very very offroad, we finally got to the temple. We ate a rewarding watermelon and convinced the ticketguy to let us in for 3$/person in stead of 5. We said we didn't need a ticket, so he could just keep it all himself...Oeps, not really helping to rid corruption out of cambodia that way...At this temple, Preah Kahn, there were a lot of things stolen only 15 years a go, a pity! When we came out of the temple the ticket guy said we could stay at his place (for a few dollars of course). So we went with him to the next village. A long negotiation later we could eat at his place for 5$/4 person and sleep for free in a tent. Nathalie and Gonzages have their own. A misunderstanding concerning the food left us with only rice to eat. We spiced it up with some cucumber we bought ourselves and some spices from N&G. We ended our day playing cards and having a laugh by candle light. It was a nice, although hardworking, day (except the falling)

15/1: Nature always wins

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Siem Reap to Beng Mealea. Not wanting to take the highway to DamDek and up the asfalted road we decided on using smaller roads along the old angkorian road 66...good plan? Yes & no...beginning was fine roads, followed by a good oll "bunker" through rice fields which wasn't planned at all! (to the horror of line feeling a bit desperate & lost) we ended up on a rideable dirt road...which took us to another rocky rd...to another...to finally rocky Route 66 & on to our destination.

Beng Mealea temple is impressive...it is mostly the combination of nature & the old remains that make it beautifull. The temple is huge, as it is build along the same lines as Angkor Wat, nature has completely taken over the remains with tree roots growing through the walls & ceillings making it a very nice place to walk around indeed. If not for others walking around, it would certainly give a good indiana jones experience.

We will be sleeping in a very basic homestay, but it has all we need. It is a room with a musquito net, no matress, mirror, shower etc here...same price as fancy hotel rooms we had before though ;-) Another proof that quality really doesn't have to relate to cost. By luck we met another Belgian couple on the road in front of the temple (www.tourdesreligions.wordpress.com) which we talked with for a while since they are planning to do the same (difficult to judge) trip (Rt66) as we planned...They push on to 'Ou' today already (I guess a good 20km down a decent rd) so we will meet up with them first thing tomorrow & then push through the wilderness together...if it wasn't for them probably we would have taken the detour route along Koh Ker after all, since this is more "calculated".

Anyway, last mission of today is go look around for some food that doesn't set us back a fortune (temple side restaurant golddiggers...tourist = ATM machine? Do you see a powerplug or money coming out of our arse?) Well, looked around for food, there isn't a lot in this town...meaning nothing. Negotiated food down to half the original price (still paying a solid 2$ for a plate) & getting a bad chicken noodle soup so ordering a third dish to have some dinner. She only charged us 1$ for the bad soup...what a gesture...at least there was one.

14/1: The case of temple-itis

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We got struck by temple-itis today. 3 days of temples, althouhg really nice ones, proved to be just a bit too much for us. We aren't huge historybuffs seeking archeologic thrills so after seeing 2 more temples today we decided to call it quits, sit along the river and read our books. Tomorrow morning we head out of siem reap into the more rural part of cambodia, hoping to ride the ancient angkorian road (cambodia's route 66) eastwards from Beng Mealea (jungle temple) passing 26 ancient angkor bridges on rt66 visiting, yet another, remote temple of Preah Khan to end up in Phnom Deik.

13/1: The main Angkor temples

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Tackled the main temples today. Angkor Wat, Angkor Thom etc. A lot more people than the temples we visited yesterday, but not completely over the top. We did not find these to be nicer or more intrinsic than the less famous ones from yesterday but all together it does show how grand the temple sites around siem reap are. You can easily fill 2 days of visiting & hardly see all of them.

Knowing that they build them by hand, dragging blocks from 50km away down the tonle sap river is a incredible feat, in the same scale as the egyptians with their pyramids...imagine the scale of these building projects...insane!

Anyway, to cut it short, is angkor wat the best? Nah, its big, real big, bigger than the others and its nice, but so are the others. When visiting the angkor temples it is clear you just need to get out there & see a lot, angkor wat isn't enough. Tomorrow is our last day of temple visiting. After that its back on the road towards more remote...yup, temples! :-)

Siem Reap Temple Tour & "Wandollah"

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After a good night sleep and breakfast we set of for our first day of temple hopping. We biked to the ticketboot where we got our three day ticket (40$/person). They take a picture of you and a minute later you have your three-day pass with photo in your hands. A well organized machine we would say.
To get to the first temple, which was rather remote, we had to do a bit of 'offroading'. The temple was on a mountain where, according to the lonely planet, you could see Ankor Wat from the top. So after a drink, being touched on the face and arms again by an old lady and a good climb we arrived totaly sweaty on the top. A lonely army guy explained us some things in Khmer about the ruins of the temple (so we couldn't understand a word ;) ) and then we wanted to see Ankor Wat from the mountain. Nothing to see (lonely planet should mention you need a good pair of binoculars). Nevertheless the view was beautiful.

Biking to the other temples we heard a lot of "wandollah" from the children. Only after a while we recognized "one dollar" in this strange word. Quite frank to ask for a dollar like that, but we think that a lot of these children don't even understand what they're saying.

At every temple you can see children selling things. They really don't stop asking/begging. It's kinda enoying. You say no, and they just keep on going. When you get out of the temple again and you buy a cold drink they come to you and say (first with a sad then with a angry voice): "first you say no, now you buy cold drink". We said: "yes, well, you didn't want to sell us a cold drink but a scarve". Then they say: "we also sell cold drinks, I told you". Which of course they didn't, but other children then say the same thing. So the girl put on an angry face and I said "don't be angry, I want to see a smile". Her reply was "no smile, you buy, no  smile". This funny way of trying to sell you something quickly got enoying when they didn't stop. So we just took off.
At another temple we wanted to eat something. There were 10 foodstalls next to each other. Imagine this: When they see a foreigner coming out of the temple they run out of their foodstall and all yell and wave at you to come and eat at there place. Really really funny :)
In total we saw 5 temples today and bike 65km to do this.
Tomorrow we'll visit Angkor Wat, which is closer.

Ow yeah, yesterday we got to the 'Chrisostomos' of our trip ('only' 100 days left, which in our case isn't even halfway yet ;) ).

11/1: Tonlé Sap Riverrun

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We opted for a riverrun towards Siem Reap from Battambang instead of a 2 day bikeride to, according to lonely planet, the not really worthwile town of sisophon. The boat itself is a simple wooden bark on steroids, aka you drop a big 6cyl Hyundai diesel thundering loudly in the back of a wooden dingly, with lots of people & luggage on the roof...lots of creaking & cracking on the ride that seemed to trouble Line a bit at certain moments ;-)


Anyway, It proved to be a nice boattrip with some nice views, but! It lasted a bit too long (+8h!), we only had 1 mech failure (old fishnet in the prop), a coupe of miss turns hitting the riverbanks, 1 landing on a shallow patch (causing antoher boat to strand aswell), 1 fishermen got bounced off his really mall boat by our wake & the boatguys make a rip-off riverdiner lunch stop. We brought lunch. Suckahs! (2 months on the rd we learned a few tricks as well). Rest of the time got filled up reading our books.

Biked the small 12km from the quay to Siem Reap town, found a guesthouse for the night & went out for dinner. The part of town we saw today (Pub Str) seems like the Cambodian version of Khao San Rd in Bangkok, albeit its a lot quiter & has a much more relaxed vibe to the whole area making it better if you ask us. It has a certain charm, but it is still mostly ment to part you from your dollars. Tuktuk galore, touting for restaurants,...I actually had a dimsum cart guy trying to sell me a dimsum at 4x the price the cambodian paid just before me...Fine, in that case you can keep your fr**kin dimsum.

Didn't try the sign along the road that advertised "Unique experience, if our fish can't make you happy you don't pay" We will be here 3/4 nights so we have enough time to play with the idea...;-)

10/1: On the Battambang tourist trail / tuktuk

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Yesterday we were approach by a tuk tuk driver and we said it was okay! Strange, we know...
We just wanted to do some sightseeing aroung Battambang, the guy spoke rather good English, it was only 15$ for six hours and as we biked 100km/day the two previous days, we wanted to let our 'behinds' rest for a day :-)  so we thought 'why not?'. We drove around town, we were told the story about Battambang and then went to the bambootrain.
You're not obliged to take the bambootrain, but they're very persuasive... In the beginning we didn't want to do this, because it would cost us another 5$/person. But then we thought again 'why not?'. So we took the little train and it was very fun indeed. Sometimes it felt like being on a small rollercoaster. The funny thing is there's only one track back and forth so when there's coming a bambootrain from the other direction, one of the two has to take his bambootrain of the track to let the other pass. There is a rule though... the one with the most passengers wins, accept when you have a motorbike on yours, then you win. I think we got a bambootraindriver that was higher in rank than the others, 'cause we always won, eventhough we were only with two on our bambootrain. Going back to the trainstation, we stopped at some fishers. They had a funny way of fishing: they drained one side of the pond and then just took the fish by hand. Ardan got to taste some homemade wisky and freshly catched fish: 'aaaah the real life' was written al over his face :-)
After the bambootrain the tuk tuk driver took us to some temples (they looked like they came from 'jungle book') for which we had to pay again (2$/person), some more driving through the countryside and then to some temples and the killing caves. Yeah well, on the bottom that is... we could take a moto for 3$/person to get up the mountain. No thank you... we just walked up there. Which was not so far as the tuk tuk driver tried to convince us from.
It was not so fun feeling like walking ATM's: the tuk tuk driver should have told us in advance that we still had to pay for the things we would visit. But after all it was a very nice ride (tuktuk and bambootrain) and a nice way to visit Battambang and around.

And the legs go round n round

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Pursat to Battambang, 105km of pedalling without anything really worth mentioning. This is really a typical "just another day on the road". You start early with a fruit/baguette/palm sugar spread breakfast, bike 58km, stop for lunch & drinks & then bike another 50km before you settle down in a guesthouse/hotel for a shower & some rest. The only thing perhaps worth mentioning is we biked along a tractor pulled cart with 2 kids on a bike hanging on to it for a good 25km...as I said, perhaps worth mentioning :-)
Once again we're staying in a very 'chique' hotel for very little money (10$).

08/1: Over 300 "Hello's" & 1 "I Love You"

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Kampong Chhnang to Pursat along Hw5. Traffic isn't too hard, but it seems all busdrivers are still assholes as they keep thundering by at insane speeds, not even trying to dodge cars, motorcycles, bikes or lifestock. KC to Pursat is about 94km, an earlier stop is possible at Krakor (close to kompuong long floating village) but we left early at 7am to bike a bit in the cooler morning sun so we pushed on to pursat in 1 go. Along the way Line counted the "hello's" we get from kids & others...she stopped at 300! Ardan got 1 "I love you" as well...hey, I look like Brad Pitt, what do you expect? ;-)

Pursat, cambodia's orange county. The fruitbasket of the country (especially oranges) & emerging gateway to the northern part of Cardamon mountains...actually considering if we should visit them or not. Tasted something new today, a root thing found in the woods that tastes like a mix of patato & chestnut. A gift from some stall for on the road snacking.

A quick rest in our luxury hotel (7usd/night ;-)) and we set on a walk through Pursat. A small, sleepy riverside town with a artificial island in the river alla sentosa island in singapore, except its shaped as a huge tanker?? Strange...but lots of people go there for their arobics & gaming. Very relaxed vibe.

07/1: Kampong Chhnang Exploration

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Yesterday a guy with a motorbike approached us (like usual) to ask if we needed him to drive us around Kampong Chnnang. We decided to do this because Nina (our couchsurfer from yesterday) told us that she did this last weekend and that is was very nice. So this morning at 8am the guy and his friend stood at our hotel. We hopped on and started our adventure on the motorbikes. It turned out to be very nice indeed. They drove us to the 'countryside' of Kampong Chnnang, to the floating villages, to the pottery village and to a temple. All this took 4 hours and it cost us 8dollars/person. Very cheap!
We really had a good time: morning sun (so not to hot) with a soft breeze, sitting in a little wooden boat on the water between the floating houses, bright ricefields along a sandy road, and getting greetings and big smiles from everyone we passed (on the road and on the water).
     
The rest of the day we stayed in our hotel to plan a bit ahead... We are already looking what we will do in Laos (and that's only in March) 'cause in Cambodja we already know what we will do and Vietnam is simple: from south to north :)

06/1: Enter Cambodia!

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Today we really began biking cambodia. We joined Nina (where we slept yesterday) to the orphanage she volunteers at. Very nice place, very nice kids! Played a couple of games with them & practiced their english. Very good job they are doing there. Afterwards we set off to ride through the country side towards Kampong Chnang, eliminating riding Hw5 for the entire stretch...but would we find our way?? ...Well, yes we found our way, but luckily we have a gps/compasse/map & Khmer phrasebook. We used all of them :-)

Passing on red dust roads through dry rice fields & palm leaf shack farm villages that don't seem to see a lot of foreigners. Stopping for a drink somewhere took just 5min, but we found ourselves surrounded by peoples, seamingly coming out of hiding from everywhere to stare & touch us :-) Tried to ask them the way, but that seemed to be just too confusing...

At a certain point an old man on an ox cart passed us yelling french phrases out with a big, no teeth, smile. "Eh, Tous vas bien? Comme se promaner dans la campagne!" Haha, memories from the past i guess.

For the rest we get stared at a lot, seriously a lot! Strange, because most cambodian have seen foreigners before, but it seems to still be special...

05/1: Salalek 5 or Ou Ruessei?

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Biked out of PP along NH5, yeah, its busy...but not so terrible as we read on some blogs. Maybe cause we already biked bangkok, kuala lumpur etc nothing scares us anymore? It is clear that there are no traffic rules here, opposite lane driving, honking for any reason, ...You name it, they have it! You also absilutely have to get the maximum out of every drive. A taxi takes 12person as standard (no shit, driver seat is 2, passenger is 3, Rr is 7) So if you want to sit alone in the passenger seat you pay double :-). Also trucks, mopeds...anything is packed to the max! (see pic for a pretty good example)

Goal for today was Salalek 5, a town in between of PP & Kampong chnang where Nina (german coursurfer) is volunteering. Google maps knows where it is, but my map has "Ou Ruessei" instead?? Lets hope its the name...Luckily she is here, cause otherwise we had had to bike the 100km in 1 go. Realy lucky actually cause Line wasn't feeling that great either today, probably from the poor nights sleep the last days. Top Banana guesthouse is a nice place, but NOT if you intend on sleeping. The rooms are 1m away from the bar which blasts music till early hours (don't believe you when they say it goes out at 11pm...it doesn't!)

Lots of traffic, "hello's", waving & some fruit eating later we biked through Udong (big city on the map, easy to miss city in reality ;-)) where we crossed a large group of bikers. Stopped & talked to their guide to see if he had some tips for the rest of the trip. He had a few: 1)Do you know Khmer? 2)There are small roads everywhere, do you have a tent? Easy answer to both of them "Nope" :-) anyways, he showed us some smaller routes on the map, told us what roads are actually paved (on the map its a carttrack, actually its a paved road)

Arrived at Salalek 5 (which seems to be the same as Ou Ruessei), easily met up with Nina at the market, had some drinks, more fruit & now we are relaxin for the rest of the day. Maybe go with her to the orphanage she volunteers at tomorrow or make an early start towards Kampong Chnang.

04/1: Tuol Sleng S-21 prison, Silver pagode

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S-21 prison... made my stomach go sick actually. There are some pictures of the tortured and dead people. It's a really horrific part of history of Cambodia. The prison was an old school, so now it looks kind of okay, but the pictures remind you what went on there.
Horror, but the S-21 prison and killing fields are a must see when you're in Phnom Penh I guess.

At 11.30 am we went and pick up our visa for Vietnam (they just put your visa anywhere in your pasport in stead of taking the next page :) ). Then a nice and cheap meal somewhere on the road and of to the royal palace. Okay, I get why the ladies need to cover up their shoulders, but here a scarf wasn't good enough. So I had to put on a t-shirt from Ardan with long sleeves, hot I tell you, hot! :)
You also can pick out the russian ladies here: they cover up their shoulders, but you can see the halve of their breasts...Russians...

Strange thing that Cambodian money... They pay with riel and dollars at the same time. But the ATM's don't even give you riel (if the banks don't even want their own currency...). The funny thing is that we always count back from riel to dollars to euro to baht, it takes us a while :-D.

By the way, the tuk tuk drivers aren't only with a million in Bangkok, they're here also... Although we must say, we find them funny here, and we didn't anymore in Bangkok.

03/1: Vietnam visa, PP back area, killings fields & russian market

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First 'real' day of visiting PP, yesterday was more just wandering around tired from the arrival in Cambodia. Started by a visit to the vietnam embassy to apply for a visa we'll need in 1 month. Easy paperwork followed by paying a solid 45USD processing fee a head. The days of the lonely planet writing talk about 30USD...right...world economics there you go. At a small increase of "only" 15USD you can even get your visa on the same day...no thanks, we'll wait 1 day, with a 50USD budhet a day for the 2 of us, 30USD carries a big punch. Whatever the LP says, you need to put fixed entry & exit dates on the visa...not all that flexible, but we are planning on using all the days we have in cambodia anyway.

A short ride through the outskirts of PP to the Choeng Ek killing fields later we had the first real taste of cambodian roads...and yeah, it rocks...really. Rocky & sandy with a good amount of holes to dodge (now without bags to make it a bit more easy) Line her arms already started to itch again! Reminds her of our loved cobble belgian roads :-) For some reason line's arms itch when it gets bumpy..? She's in for a scratch the coming months! Note: kids love to pose for a picture, but then the "money?" question easily came out of this one afterwards :-) walking atms? maybe...

Killings fields are a memory to the, very fresh, attrocities commited by Pol Pot & his comrads. A plot of land with numerous mass graves (more than 20,000 dead) of prisoners from the S-21 prison in Phnom Penh. A quick read through our lonely planet tells us we can find a lot of these throughout the country. A grim reminder of what happened only 30y ago. S-21 or Tuol Sleng prison is another visit for tomorrow, enough horror for the day.

On the return trip we visited the "russian market", the cambodian outlet centre for goods that "fell-of-the-truck" (i can understand with those roads) but we don't need anything & we can"t carry it, so a quick stroll later, through shops selling everything from north face bags, kalvin clien underware, tires, carburators & fake antiques we where heading back home to our guesthouse for some relax'in. And how did we relax! Reading a book, sipping from some juice & beer (affordable!! one's more in comparison to malaysia, damn those muslims) laying flat down on a matress with our feet in a pool...cambodia rural...not yet.

02/1: #4; Phnom Penh, Cambodja here we are

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Boarded the early (7am) morning flight from KL to PNH after spending a sleep-depraved night in the low cost terminal. Air asia was super for bike checkin. 50rm = 12,5€ and that was it. No weight, dimension etc shit..just pay and check in, no problem. British airways & qantas can learn from this low cost liner...so can ups for that matter, cause the bikes arrived in pnh with boxes in perfect condition. Had a lot of strange, although encouraging, looks from tuktuk drivers waiting in front of pnh airport while assembling the bikes again :-) Some of them actually wanted to buy the bikes when our trip was over. ("small price for me offcours" they said)

Cambodia traffic is certainly something else than thailand & malaysia: The biggest on the road has priority always! (so bikes are 2nd down the list, mostly beating the pedestrians), there doesn't seem to be a real directional side for driving...right, left, middle,...traffic lights are merely there as indicators, certainly no rule. Good speeds in the city are low, everything zigzags around eachother & from the looks it seems we get some sympathy from other road users ;-) 1st Lesson on the road: You can always fit more goods & more people on a motorbike (top of today is a family of 5 on a honda cub = "camino")

Walked around the tonle river front & some old french collonial boulevards, it really feels like the people in PP managed to keep the old collonial feeling. Relaxed & enjoyable for sure! Couple of stupa's, temples later we strolled through the central market square back to our guesthouse rooftop terrace. Tonight we just lay back & enjoy our 2nd "beginning" of the new year & the trip.

01/1: Planing cambodja & kiling time

Today was mostly about killing time & we'll be killing a lot more of that the coming 10h (waiting in the LCC terminal for our 7am flight to cambodja). So in the morning we slept out (a bit), waited a long time for our breakfast which was a bit hard on Line cause she was hungry (don't mess with a hungry woman) and then began packing our stuff. Spend another couple of hours on the hotel porch looking into our trip for cambodja (km's, hotels, roads,...) We have a rough plan for the moment, a tour around tonle sap lake and a discovery trail along the mekong. But the previous part of the trip has changed a lot from the original planning so this could well change to the same degree....keep ya posted.