Our bus journey from Vieng Vang took us to Vientiane, from here we had 2hours before we caught a night sleep bus (with beds) to “Pakse” south Lao. A little bit disappointed we didn’t get the flashing “King of Bus’s” bus we jumped on and left on the mark1 version, supposedly to “sleep” during transit. It was difficult…

Depart: Vientiane Bus station @ 20:00

Arrival: Pakse Bus station @ 06:00

Cambodia

The border crossing at “Veun Kham” was coming up. As we got dropped off by the entrance, I was thinking was this going to be simple? Signing out of Lao and walking through 50m of no-man’s-lands to the h1n1 check point, then up to the hut to get the visa sorted, surprisingly this was a really quick and straightforward process, $20 and $3 of so called bribes and we were through.

“No man’s land“

Across the border

There was some discussion with a bus driver and we found out we would need to go to “Kampong Cham” for the night, there was no direct road to “Siem Reap” so after a 30min wait we headed off in a mini bus and an hour later were herded out at “Stungtreng” where we changed vehicle.

Minibus Journey

Getting less and less leg space each time we changed transport.

From Stungtreng we headed towards “Kratie” the roads here were very straight and smooth with random stalls and houses spread out each side. We hit Kratie @ 15:45, fairly quickly the whole dynamics of the country had changed, the centre was a bustle with activity, people busy doing things, shop sellers, and general milling around etc. Once again we were dropped off from the fairly spacious (in comparision) Merc people carrier and moved to a beaten up Honda, cracks in the window, an aircon unit in the roof with the cover hanging off and full of people, off again towards “Kampong Cham“, trails of dust as we cruised along the brick dust topping in-between muddy sections all over the road avoiding potholes, kids fixing the bumps and dips with spades and mud, random cows just wandered around, motorbikes, people and kids walking with a purpose. Everyone seemed to be active and on a mission (even if they weren’t). We kept heading away from the city and onwards with the bus journey, meanwhile the horn sounding every time we passed a biker to let them know we were coming through!

Finally at 17:30 we arrived at “Kampong Cham” 6h away from our destination of “Siem Reap” (we were told we would be there at 21:00 the same day! Fat chance!)
As soon as the bus stopped we were surrounded with people, all trying to find out where we were going, my big bag was grabbed and asked my destination… We had found a cool cheap hotel in the Lonely Planet. So jumping on the back of a mo-ped with my massive 20kg bag on the crossbar we headed two minutes away to the Mekong Hotel! $12 (£7) a night and a massive room with air-con, TV & hot shower.

Kampong Cham

The ticket system is random, from one minibus to the next, tickets get changed for new tickets on each leg, from Kampong Cham we had to find where to get the new ticket from, it was a random guesthouse that we would never have found without asking for at the hotel. The chaos atmosphere seems to work and although waiting a short time for buses before leaving each time they were pretty smooth and efficient! Money rarely passed hands between drivers (or I didn’t see it) so I guess they trade the old tickets for cash at some stage when they meet the appropriate people.

It was Food & ‘Anchor’ beer later on in a bar/restaurant (Lazy Mekong Days) before a night’s sleep and up at 06:50 for another short scooter journey and dropped off at the bus stop and on the 07:30 to Siem Reap (5h)
… The prices were fairly cheap and mainly in US Dollars $$ £1 a beer and £2.50 for a plate of chips, rice, beef, egg and green beans (random combo!)

Evening food & drink

Next days bus journey from Kampong Cham to Siem Reap (6h)

At 15:00 we arrived at Siem Reap where we were picked up by a tuk-tuk driver and taken straight to a local guest house ‘Aroma Daily‘