We started later today than we would have liked to. Our hostel offered breakfast with the room but my request for vegetarian food broke the system. After taking away Flo’s food as well, we were left waiting for over 30min with nothing happening because the staff person spoke very little English and seems to have thought that we simply didn’t want breakfast. Without dinner last night and a delayed breakfast, I was getting hangry real fast. Luckily, I only had to complain once for things to move in our favour…

Getting to the border was only a matter of about 50km now. So we prepared as best as we could with a full gas tank, a passport photo of each of us and US$20 for the visa on arrival. Trucks started to queue but the border for “normal” people was moving very quickly on a Monday morning. And then it turned out that Cambodia should be my least liked border crossing so far. For some reason, there is a rule that only one person can accompany one vehicle. Thus, Flo was going through the “vehicle” lane and had to deal with his visa and the bike stuff while I was left to my own devices going through the “passenger” lane. Of course, there are not a lot of cross-over opportunities between the two which made me nervous.

Getting out of Thailand was no big deal at all (well, I can only speak for myself). They looked at the passport, took out the departure card, stamped it and off you go. Then you leave through a special exit, get herded through a pedestrian lane with a wall at one side and a fence at the other and arrive at a tent on the Cambodian side. While walking around confused, I was called over to a desk inside the tent that said “Quarantine”, was sat down to fill out the “Visa on Arrival” form and had my passport photo stapled to it. Armed with this form, I moved into the building on the other side of the road to pay my fees. Costs for the visa have gone up to US$30 now which was all well and official but then a “stamp fee” of 100 Thai baht was collected, too. While the US$30 have even been stamped onto my visa as the cost, I am pretty sure that the 100 baht are a form of systemic bribe. Or a way to get a better wage. However, there was no way around it so I paid it; it’s the equivalent of NZ$4.

When I met up with Flo again, he was still fuming about the “stamp fee”, even if it isn’t a lot of money. I guess that’s what you get for crossing at Poipet which is the main throughfare from Bangkok to Angkor Wat. Many tourist buses cross the border here as well so it might be more tempting.

Anyhow, we made it to Cambodia! Wohoooo! With a visa for “30 days”, from February 1st to March 1st. *lol*

From the border, it is a mere 150km to Siem Reap, the city which is sustained by the tourism at Angkor Wat. Many differences to Thailand became apparent straight behind the border. For example, traffic is slower, overloaded trucks and bikes are common and the landscape is very dry and savannah-like. All in all, it reminded me a lot of the Indonesian islands in the East that we have been through. Also, very noticeably, Cambodians are interested in our travels which wasn’t the case in Thailand. So people ask us where we come from, if we have ridden the bike all the way and are just generally excited that we are visiting. This makes them genuinely NICE. 🙂

With roads being worse again and traffic generally slower, we stopped at a tourist diner along the road for lunch. Two tourist buses were having their lunch break here, too, so we overheard some of their itineraries. Seems like the loop Bangkok-Angkor Wat-Laos-Bangkok is very popular. It is also weird to suddenly be travelling in the high season of a country.

Arriving in Siem Reap, every accommodation (in our price range) that the Lonely Planet suggests, was fully booked for the next couple of days. Booking through agoda, we still found a range of free rooms and decided to go with the cheapest one for US$13 including breakfast. Of course, it was not as cozy or stylish as the recommended ones but it was solid with everything we need: bed without bugs, big fan to keep us cool, enough space to store our luggage and even our own private bathroom. Being cheap on the sleeping front, we went out for dinner at the Ivy guesthouse. This guesthouse is where we would have liked to stay, not least because it offers a range of vegetarian foods on the menu. On the way home, we sorted out the Cambodian SIM card so that we will have mobile internet in this country as well.