I don't know how to start this post.
If someone had driven the route we took, I would have so many questions for them. Why? Why? There are so many beautiful places in the world. What reason could there be for anyone to fly to Saigon and then head to Cambodia? After all, Saigon (now called Ho Chi Minh City) is portrayed as the world's epicentre of traffic chaos. There aren't even convenient flights there.
And I know full well I'd be asking these questions. We were already planning a similar route last year, though Malaysia won that time, somewhat spontaneously. By some twist of fate, just before our departure, there was a lecture at NGE. @mic_pawlik and @pigeon about the route along the Mekong River, which is exactly what we had planned. And I went there with precisely those questions in mind. And I returned with a bad taste in my mouth, because online analysis had led me to abandon the idea. Anonymous people on the internet unanimously claimed that Cambodia was a hotbed of evil, drunk drivers, roads without shoulders, and generally everything that was worst. The lecture somewhat challenged these claims, and the idea returned this year. It wasn't the first time, nor will it be the last, that the internet had deceived me. Since there aren't that many Asias where it doesn't rain in November and the temperature is above freezing, we decided to take a risk. It turned out that the temperature was more than a little above freezing, and I wouldn't exaggerate about "it doesn't rain."
Because on the day we left, was much of Saigon under half a meter of water? Possibly, the worst flood of the decade was just ending there. The 12th typhoon of the year was also just beginning, even though statistically there are about ten a year. As I write this, the 15th is ending. Generally, this year, news about Vietnam is dominated by flooded cities and missing people. Instead, I became an expert at browsing Google Flood Hub, observing on the map how much of our potential route was currently flooded. Since it was supposed to be along the Mekong River, it was a surprisingly large section.
So our plan was very flexible. We'd land in Saigon and then it would all work out.
It's worth noting that this post is neither a guidebook nor a text about Vietnam or Cambodia. If you're familiar with hills and beautiful landscapes in Vietnam, they're likely from the north of the country, which is definitely more touristy than the south. This doesn't surprise me at all, as I can't say what great things we saw on our trip... even though we really enjoyed it, and from what I remember, I saw a lot of great things. The northern tip of Vietnam is separated from the southern tip by the same distance as Siedlce and the country called Georgia.
There are two scenes in the 1987 film Robocop that depict our first impressions of Vietnam.
The first of them, when the police officers at the station see Robocop strolling for the first time, and one of them, watching him closely, gasps in shock, "What is this shit?!?" It's us when we leave the airport and are hit by a wave of humidity and heat that, from the very first second of being outdoors, casts doubt on the possibility of comfortable cycling. Not yet afraid, but already with disbelief that it could be possible. And I know what I'm talking about; I was there quite recently, after all. on the African equator, where it was much colder.
The second is when Robocop grabs Emil Antonowski And moments later, the guy flies out the window, screaming, "What the hell is this?!" Before that, he'd only mentioned something about waiting, that he was protected, and that he had some rights. This was us, trying to merge into traffic for the first time. Accustomed to classic concepts like traffic lights, right-of-way, and so on.
Our very flexible plan, written only in my head, involves getting on our bikes in Saigon and riding along the Mekong River to the Cambodian border and then north. After crossing Vietnam and then Cambodia vertically, we'll somehow make our way to the famous Angkor Wat, explore it, and somehow make our way back to our starting point. As usual, there's a lot to this plan.some kind"You could call it a voyage to the Heart of Darkness, because Benjamin Willard sailed along the same route in Apocalypse Now. Which, of course, isn't true, because his expedition along the Mekong River wasn't filmed on the Mekong River at all, but in the Philippines, many kilometers away, and there's no Mekong River there. But that's a bigger scandal, because even "Good Morning Vietnam" was filmed in Bangkok. So, by writing a post about Vietnam after having traveled through Vietnam, I'm breaking away from the canon of outstanding work.
This does not change the fact that, thanks to watching a sufficient amount of American cinema, Vietnam is associated with only two things.
First: the conical nón lá hats that stick out in the rice field and at one point pop out with a small, screaming Vietnamese man attached to the bottom. The Vietnamese is obviously holding a rifle and is doing tratatatata, usually missing anyone. It's worth clarifying the phrase "little Vietnamese" here – the "Big Size" men's stores we passed were stores selling clothing for people weighing over 80 kg. Before arriving, I'm not yet "big size," but after returning, mainly thanks to chips and bubble tea, I am. big size.
Secondly: with the rain that one day it started raining and didn't stop for 4 months – small drizzles and heavy downpours. Rain that lashes from the side and rain that seems to fall from the bottom up.
Generally, if someone learns about the world from movies, Vietnam won't have many fond memories. Cambodia probably won't either. In my head, it's a kind of Bangladesh. And I know this not from movies, but from the labels on my clothes – especially those from Rapha.
They're sending us to Vietnam... It's a completely different country.
We check in at Tan Son Nhat Airport in Ho Chi Minh City in the morning. I'll repeat: Tan Son Nhat in Ho Chi Minh City. Because the only words I recognize that sound Vietnamese. It's not the most organized airport in the world, so it takes us well over an hour to leave. The upside is that our folding bikes arrive in their original form. This time, we're flying with hard-shell suitcases, and to save money, we decide to walk to the hotel with them instead of taking a taxi. Back then, we didn't realize that bills in Vietnam are ridiculously low for everything, and thanks to this maneuver, I'm left with 10 złoty. On the other hand, ten złoty here, ten złoty there... I'll skip the taxi about eight hundred times and have to pay for more plane tickets. As for the prices, I could have guessed when I booked the first hotel. A night at the Hera Luxury Hotel, a kilometer from the airport, costs 150 złoty, making it one of the most expensive hotels in the area – with a rooftop pool and breakfast included.
IF I KNEW WHAT I KNOW
I definitely wouldn't have chosen that walk. The heat and humidity after leaving the terminal are unimaginable. Although, let's face it, you could walk a kilometer, probably without breathing. However, we quickly discover that the practice of walking hasn't reached Vietnam yet. Truly, people don't walk there. Just as Forrest one day discovered that instead of walking, they one day discovered that instead of walking, they could ride a scooter everywhere. From that day on, probably no one ever went anywhere again. People always drove everywhere. So, sidewalks exist, but they're used for everything other than feet. And if you think you can step off the sidewalk and onto the road and avoid obstacles – well, cross to the road. If we had to cross the street we were walking along that day, we'd still be standing there. I suspect no one in Saigon knows the joke that asks, "Why did a chicken cross the street?" Because there may be plenty of chickens everywhere, but even they know that's simply not the way to go. Unless you're craving Pho soup. The street is a constant stream of scooters. Stretching from horizon to horizon.
In the evening, we try to explore the area on foot, but the city's pedestrian tradition hasn't made it here either. We reach the first intersection, a place where we have to cross one of two dual carriageways. After a few minutes, we return, resigned. Frogger is a piece of cake compared to this; we see no chance of getting to the other side, and we're down to our last life and zero coins to continue.
There's a 7-Eleven, though, which may not be particularly well-equipped, but the bills in my head don't add up at all. I received so many millions of Vietnamese dong at the airport that the bill seems close to zero. We could become kings of chips and tea from plastic bottles – my secret dream. If you want to be well-prepared for such a trip gastronomically, I suggest starting today with fried oil and sugar dissolved in water. We never make it to the rooftop pool because it's on the 11th floor, and the elevator only has buttons for 10. We still have our annual experiment – whether we can eat any "Chinese noodles." We always try to choose any, without the big, red "HOT" sign. It doesn't change anything; each one is like "very spicy kebab for the doctor on a thin base” from the movie "Hamster".
To console herself, Sylwia conducts an experiment: she goes to bed early in the afternoon while I, taking advantage of the time shift, am still at work. I interrupt her experiment in the morning, at the fifteenth hour of her sleep.
Leaving Saigon fills me with a certain apprehension. Wikipedia says that: Saigon in Polish is "a synonym for intense action based on chaos and confusion." Although this originates from past lost wars, it's most often associated today with motor traffic. Or not so much with motor traffic, as there are very few cars, but simply with street traffic, meaning scooters. And indeed, it's hardcore, though only at first.
Merging into traffic and navigating the first few intersections and roundabouts seems to be possible only by saying the Hail Mary, closing your eyes, and driving at full speed. Surprisingly, however, it quickly becomes clear that the traffic here simply works. After a few minutes, we feel much safer there than in Polish cities. What's more, we decide to see a few things along the way—like the Pope's monument to popes.on.a.bike – we could drive out of a city of over 7 million without stopping even once, for over 20 kilometers. Well, maybe once, because there was a single traffic light that generated the only traffic jam we saw. It looks like chaos, but there's absolutely no aggression in it and seems to result in achieving the maximum possible capacity. A form of individual, private communication that can't be optimized by even a single person. It's astonishing. When turning right or merging into traffic, you just do it – without stopping, without looking, without stress.
I'll mention it here, because you're probably wondering: yes, spring rolls originated in Saigon, and they're only called that in Poland. This stems from the fact that in the 1980s, we knew they were made by the Vietnamese, and Vietnam was associated only with Saigon. It's also worth noting that most "Chinese" restaurants are actually "Vietnamese" restaurants, and Pho soup is one of the most popular dishes we pass along the way. We're simple people: Asia is associated with the Chinese, so we say "Chinese," Vietnam is associated with Saigon, so we say spring rolls, and Cambodia is currently associated with patostreamers, so we say pathology – I guess.
After less than two hours and one ferry ride, we're out of town. It's amazing how quickly and efficiently we can leave such a large city. The only discomfort, in fact, is the heat and the stuffiness. Although I'm not sure we've ever been "out of town" on our route through Vietnam. It's a multi-day festival of driving through endless countryside, on roads without curves, along rivers. Seriously, it's not hard to find stretches of several dozen kilometers where the driving angle changes only once or twice. The highlight, for example, is the stretch between Rạch Giá by the ocean and the Hau River – 50km without a single turn. Avoiding the country's main roads, there are practically no cars – only scooters, and the roads are mostly good. Our tracks look as if the GPS was recording our position every few minutes and then connecting them with dashes.
Our day is punctuated by a thunderstorm shooting lightning on the horizon. We spend most of the day simply waiting for it to arrive. At the time, we don't yet know that rain here usually consists of a fleeting, complete cloudburst, and that the locals have some kind of built-in sensor, because a minute before it begins, they either put on a raincoat or take shelter under the nearest roof. So we often encounter them at gas stations, restaurants, garages, and so on. Since the rain, as mentioned earlier, sometimes falls from the side, we often find ourselves crammed together like smokers at an airport, as the roof provides very limited dry space.
During one of the stops, this time a slightly less civilized one, in someone's open garage, I start to wonder if driving along the canals during such heavy downpours is a good idea. Google Flood Hub It shows that we're at the edge of the area marked in red, and the water is actually rising quite quickly. So much so that we have to jump out of the garage during a break in the rain.
Besides the canals, we're surrounded mainly by rice fields. What catches our eye are the tombs. Yes, the fields are dotted with family graves and coffins, resembling shrines. Most of them are flooded – enjoy! This is both a result of tradition and the desire to keep the deceased close to home, and a practical aspect – land with a corpse supposedly belongs to the family. I probably wouldn't want to buy a plot of land with a full coffin either. Traditional cemeteries don't seem to be very popular outside of larger cities. And even in those larger cities, I'm not sure we've seen any. Interesting, considering Saigon has over seven million people.
By the end of the day, it also turns out that finding accommodations isn't trivial. And finding a decent one isn't. So we head south to the city of Cai Lay, with a population of over 100,000. The only fact about this city I can find on Wikipedia is its location – in the Mekong Delta. We end up at a local chain restaurant pretending to be KFC. The most popular dish is chicken spaghetti bolognese. It's not that we're KFC fans – it's just that for half an hour we can't find anything better. In fact, nothing worse, because we simply can't find anything. I'm also pretty sure the vast majority of the customers here are under 12 years old. And that this is the only place within a 100km radius where you'll find obese children. It's easy to guess that since this is our only decent meal of the day, we can't satisfy our hunger. Or rather, we pretend to be, while we're eating, but by the time we get back to the hotel, we're hungry again. There's no such thing as a restaurant in the city. By restaurant, I mean a place with food, a table, and somewhere to sit. The closest thing to that are small carts with a frying area and two plastic seats. We're not ready for that yet. We saw the conditions in which meat was being sold hanging by the road, and it didn't look like it would guarantee a comfortable ride the next day. I mean, riding is fine, but not on a bike.
Luckily, there are two large supermarkets right outside the hotel. By large, I mean the largest we've seen on this trip—roughly the size of four Żabkas. There's nothing to eat in the supermarket. This is a situation I'm familiar with from Africa, and a bit surprising for Sylwia. You walk along shelves full of things, including edibles, but at the same time, you can't find anything to eat. Or at least nothing containing anything more than the simplest carbohydrates. Maybe if we had a full-fledged kitchen, we could make something out of it. But we don't, so it didn't work out. We usually eat chips, bottled tea, and, at best, luxurious yogurt. If you ask me, "How can there be nothing when there's so much?" I'll throw up my hands and say I don't know. If we decided to eat cereal and baby powder, life would be simpler. These are available almost everywhere. For me, the best thing to quench my hunger is rice water—1.5 liters has a little over 800 calories and a few vitamins.
We're staying at the Khánh Du Hotel – a very pleasant hotel, in keeping with my favorite Vietnamese buildings – disproportionately narrow compared to the rest of the building's dimensions. These are called nhà ống, or tube houses. The internet claims this is due to taxes in the past, which were assessed based on the width of the street facade. Such a house is typically 3 to 6 meters wide, but has five stories and is 10 to 20 meters long. We paid about 65 złoty. This is a standard price for a good hotel on our Vietnamese leg of the route. Hotels over 100 złoty can be considered premium – sometimes even the most expensive in the area. Breakfast, however, is a bit of a problem, as the institution of a store-bought sandwich is nonexistent here, even a homemade one. There's no cheese, no ham, and bread is an exclusive find. In the morning, the usual fare is noodles with meat and vegetables.
In the evening, the receptionist brings me my wallet, which I'd left on the counter earlier and forgotten about. I'm starting to treat this as an experiment repeated in every country I visit. So far, someone always returns it to me undamaged. The hotel has two drawbacks. The first is the bathtub, where the shower head doesn't work, and I have to perform some serious balancing acts with my tired body to wash under it. bathtub The tap – especially since the housing infrastructure isn't particularly well-adapted to people who are 190 cm tall. I'm reminded of this several times as I bump my forehead against doorframes between rooms. I'm afraid of a stupid death, and I'm almost certain one of these impacts will be fatal. My friends will say, "He was a nice guy, he cycled halfway around the world, and he died from hitting the doorframe." Although I can forgive the downside of the bathtub, because right after getting out, I discover there's a full-fledged shower on the other side of the bathroom. Good for me. The second downside is that my bike, parked in the entrance gate, gets a flat tire during the night. It's a good thing I only discover this in the morning, because after 110 km on a folding bike, leaving Saigon, and an entire evening searching for food, we're quite tired. Not only would I not have changed it, but I would have fretted about it all night. At that time we don't know yet that practically every day out of 11 we will end up with such a result.
Day 1 - gallery
On the second day, I don't even turn on the navigation on the handlebar. It's pointless, because the route I planned for that day (counting from the exit from the city) has one curve and three turns in my head. If I were really determined, there would be one turn, but I tried to diversify it a bit. So if you've spent the winter on a trainer, I highly recommend this place for a leisurely start to the season.
Of course, I start the day by removing the tire. Initially, I blame it on my worn-out Chinese inner tubes, but in reality, I find a small piece of metal in the tire that nothing could resist. If there's one thing I dislike about Brompton service, it's changing the rear wheel. Therefore, I mount and remove it three times. Once the tire didn't seat properly, and twice the wheel doesn't spin as it should. The first fix, consistent with my IT habits—removing and reinstalling it the same way—to my great surprise (and the surprise of no one else in this situation), doesn't work. It takes me a moment to discover that the wheel should be tightened much looser than I'm doing. Well, with great strength comes great responsibility. This is the only flat tire we'll get on this trip. Whether it's the only malfunction—it's hard to say. After several hours of riding through puddles, our derailleurs stop working as they should. They're working well enough that I don't want to bother with servicing them, but poorly enough that it's a bit of a nuisance. Our route probably has about 100 meters of elevation gain over 1000km, so let's be honest – changing gears isn't a priority.
It's like something out of Vivaldi's "The Seasons"—we have it all. Every possible surface: from gravel, to very good asphalt, to asphalt that looks very good but is so rough that a small Brompton wheel feels like sitting on a spinning washing machine. It's also, once again, unbelievably warm. I was probably dehydrated before we even set off, because while changing a tube, water poured from my head as if someone were holding an inverted water bottle over me. Our destination is Tram Chim National Park—one of the very few landscape parks in the south of the country. You've probably never heard of it, because, objectively speaking, it's as big a treat as a visit to eastern Mazovia.
Our more specific goal, and perhaps even the pretext for this destination, is a place to stay overnight right next to the aforementioned park. It's a traditional bamboo hut on stilts, nestled in the middle of a rice field. It's worth noting that, according to Strava, our 110-kilometer route is probably the longest climb of my life. Steadily, throughout the entire 100 km, we ascend from around minus 10 meters to an impressive 30 meters. I remind you that I live in Warsaw.
The day is very similar to the previous one. We continue along the canals, the sun continues to burn our skin, and we continue to wait for the afternoon's half-hour of rain. Although rain is too small a word for what's happening here. It catches up with us, as usual, around 3 p.m., and we spend it under the roof of a small gas station with a dozen or so other people. During such a downpour, any road life practically ceases. For us, this kind of rain is a godsend – it may not bring a significant change in temperature, but it does temporarily block out the sun. This is a lifesaver, as there's very little shade along the way. Just an hour earlier, we were sitting in a tin can, sipping lemonade, or rather, sugared water, wondering if it was even possible to continue driving in this heat. From this place, I'd like to sincerely thank Decathlon for their invention of stick sunscreen. Not only is it stain-free, but our skin never left our bodies during the trip.
When we arrive at our exceptionally pricey Việt Mekong Farmstay in the evening, our faces soften slightly. We remember that such a farm is, after all, a bamboo hut. There are no windows, no toilet, the air conditioning is poor, and bugs and mosquitoes are just waiting for us. I feel guilty all evening, because we booked a place to stay (probably the only ones that day, but it feels like a month), the guy took our passports and started preparing rooms, and we went shopping in town and never returned. Generally, all the hotels and accommodations look as if they hadn't had a guest in ages.
During our unsuccessful search for food, we discover that there are also premium (local) hotels for the same price, less than 100 złoty. They're also much more comfortable, and after an eight-hour drive, our only dream is to lie down with a full belly and emergency chips at hand, in a clean and comfortable bed. And with a toilet less than seven steps away. We decide on the Wildbird Hotel, located right next to a nature park. So close, in fact, that we set off on a boat trip in the morning. The hotel has an excellent restaurant, but we don't know it yet. Even if we did, I always feel an unimaginable fear of waking up hungry in the middle of the night on bikepacking trips. So I always buy in advance and always have to carry it back because it's impossible to finish it. It happens with every candy I eat, and I can't shake it. Or maybe I just don't want to.
In the evening, we bike back to the city, about two kilometers, because the receptionist tells us there's a shop a kilometer away. It doesn't matter that we've already traveled that route and haven't seen it. Maybe the network has reset in the last hour. Perhaps we're using the wrong word in communication, because when I say "shop," we can't reach an understanding. However, when I say "market," the narrative changes, and after consulting with a friend, she tells me how to get there. I can't imagine how this conversation went, since the woman, who speaks some English, had to consult with her about the nearest shop. But I understand a little. I would say that the nearest decent shop is about 100 kilometers away as the crow flies – in Ho Chi Minh City. There are plenty of shops in the center of our tourist town. If you want to buy baby food, you can buy sawdust, cabbage, a bra, sardines, or soy sauce. Or maybe a chicken – alive, dead, or half-alive. So we end up at the market stall, buying a supply of chips and sponge-flavored cookies. And, of course, tea and juices, because we can't find out if they have 1.5-liter bottled water for sale. They do have 5-liter bottles, but every attempt to communicate ends with asking how much that 5-liter bottle of water costs or how much our juices cost. The salesperson has money on his mind. He looks at our purchases, which probably consist of 10 or 15 different items, and says about 40 złoty.
In the morning, taking advantage of the fact that the hotel doesn't finish washing and drying clothes until around 9:00, we check in for breakfast at dawn and then board the boat immediately afterward. The marina is about two meters from our window and four meters from our table in the restaurant. It's hard to say whether a boat ride, which costs almost as much as an overnight stay for an hour and a half, is worthwhile. The cost isn't an issue, of course, but you spend 90 minutes on a very noisy boat. pyrpyrpyr, which causes all the birds we're supposed to be watching to fly away before we even get close. I know this because they lent me a pair of binoculars at the front desk. My eyes are particularly incompatible with them (insert embarrassing joke about being designed for slanted eyes here), but I see the winged suckers flying away as soon as we enter the area. It's not even a boat – our captain is sailing the boat, and we're sitting on a raft of a dozen or so, being towed behind him. The route is nice, though, because you paddle around the park, but in a square. I don't know if they say "we paddled in a square," but that's how it was. It would be great to do it by kayak, although the Brda is better anyway. So if you're a kayaking fan, Kashubia is your best bet.
Day 2 - gallery
On the third day, we should finally see the Mekong River and reach the Cambodian border. The day is divided into three stages:
– beginning, very pleasant. We drive through villages and rice paddies. The village is, of course, an endless row of houses along the street—nothing deep. As you might imagine, it follows canals, without any bends. There are no second rows of houses, nor any other roads.
– middle, or the blazing sun. As we approach the larger city, Châu Đốc, and the Mekong River, the crowds increase significantly, and the views become somewhat monotonous. At the climax, we find a bench in the shade and decide to slowly die there. This doesn't work out, as I still have a few things to see, and I have to stick to my plan. Even if it just means following a bearing.
– end of the day, for the first time, the terrain was slightly hilly. Five hills simply emerged from the completely flat terrain, and the road ran between them. This final section is the most interesting, so I'll focus on it. It always amazes me how just a slight undulation in the terrain transforms cycling into a completely different experience.
I get the impression that on Saturdays, Vietnamese people have two things going on: weddings or karaoke. And most often, both. We regularly pass large halls erected on one side of the road, used as wedding venues. We also regularly pass people enjoying karaoke: in pubs, in front of houses, in backyards – basically everywhere. It's hard not to smile, because from a Polish perspective, most of the songs sound like they came straight from a "world's worst performance" contest. Although we don't know the originals, as they're usually Vietnamese. In any case, it's very cheerful and very positive. I don't know the rules, but it seems to me that one rule prevails: louder is better.
We reach the aforementioned town of Châu Đốc after about 60km, a four-hour drive. It's around 2:00 PM. I've even chosen a place to stay overnight, a very luxurious one, as it's located at the top of a hill accessible by cable car. I can see myself looking at photos from the hotel. A high-rise restaurant, an unobstructed sunset, as the horizon is flat, and us romantically eating rice with chicken. But it's probably a long way to the store, and what do you do from 3:00 PM until evening? An Instagram photo takes about 13 seconds. Worse still, I usually eat Instagram-worthy food from a luxury restaurant in 13 seconds. So we stop at a local, air-conditioned café for, of course, an iced Matcha Frappe. I'm afraid I'm addicted to it, but as long as it costs between 3 and 10 złoty, I don't mind. I discover that about 40 kilometers away there's another hill with a ski lift, and more importantly, a large Buddha at the top. At its foot lies a hotel—a large one, with a swimming pool, a restaurant, and a shop nearby.
And here's where something unexplored arises, as our original route leads north to Cambodia, along the Mekong River. The next day, we were supposed to cycle 120km to Phnom Penh, the capital. Instead, we head south, and then probably west. This doesn't quite fit with the plan. Was it a good decision? In retrospect, it certainly made our lives more interesting, but more on that later.
I notice on Google Maps that near the Cambodian town of Kampot, there's a thousand-meter-high mountain, accessible by one of the greatest climbs in Southeast Asia, and at its summit sits a gigantic Buddha: the Bokor Buddha Statue. It looks impressive, a fitting culmination of our trip – 108 meters high, nestled within 84,000 smaller Buddha statues, a pilgrimage site for millions of pilgrims – one of the largest in the world. I am a simple man: I see a hill, I go up itI don't even need to see it, it's enough that I know it exists. It's just surprising that I've never heard of any of this. Remember this paragraph, because from this point on:
The main goal of the trip is the great Buddha
We enter an area that, after many kilometers, can finally be called much more interesting. It's the same as before, but with the addition of numerous Buddhist temples. Every so often, we stop to admire the large statues and colorful buildings with monks. I'd even say it's amusing, but I'm afraid of going to hell.
We arrive at the hotel around 5:30 PM, about 10 minutes before sunset. I try to negotiate dinner with the receptionist, as the kitchen is supposedly open until 6 PM, and we're trying to use the last of the daylight to get to the store. Besides, there's no way I'll be able to get on my bike after eating, and we won't be able to walk from the store to the store. We're completely alone in this huge building. I tell the nice lady that we can order now, have the kitchen ready, and we'll be back in 20 minutes. No problem. I ask what we can get. She says no problem. I ask what she recommends. She says no problem. So I say slowly, "Anything, anything, in 20 minutes." The lady says no problem, and can we have chicken? I say no problem, and that there will be plenty for four people. No problem. When we arrive in 20 minutes and sit down at the restaurant, the lady brings us the menu and waits for our order. It must be some local custom, because everyone, everywhere, stands and waits, watching us browse the menu – no pressure. I remember how, during every evaluation, after a half-hour conversation, my boss would say, "Maciek, repeat what you understood. What will you take away from this conversation?" From now on, I'll probably tell him, "Yes, boss, no problem."
That evening, as I collapse into bed, I see a lizard crawling across the ceiling. We can't get it out. Sylwia takes a picture and goes to the front desk to ask if it's a problem, hoping everything is "no problem" here – just like the food. I think it's not, but I change my mind when I see her hurrying back with a security guard. Later, I read the message on my phone:Pack your bags, we're changing rooms, it's dangerous.” Strange, the internet said it was just a regular gecko.
Day 3 - gallery
Monday is a bit of an adventure, and a bit of a lack thereof. In the morning, we head to the funicular that takes people up to the Buddha Mountain. I'm sure I don't need to explain how long it takes us to negotiate with the security guard, and then with the lady at the ticket counter, that we want to get on with our bikes and that we only want a one-way ticket – up. There's asphalt down, after all, so we'll manage somehow. Only after folding the bikes and demonstrating that they take up as much space as a backpack does the path clear for us. We're completely alone, of course, with no one in sight. During the entire, not-so-short funicular ride up, we don't pass a single person either. I don't take any photos, although the view is quite good. One hill, and in every direction, flat, all the way to the edge of the Earth.
Buddhas under construction
Up there, there's actually a Buddha, a pagoda, a bridge, people feeding carp, and a few shops and stalls. It's amazing because everything looks like it's prepared for huge crowds, yet it's practically empty. The most impressive of all is the Buddha's navel. Of course, I have this vision of going up there and pretending to be a turlak, but I don't want to spend the rest of my life in prison.* We're trying to buy a little Buddha, but the salesperson says they only sell sets of four. I make a poker face, looking around to see who else might buy something from him today. I don't know, maybe you're not allowed to have just one little Buddha because it would make him sad. You could buy a little turtle in a cage for that. Specifically, you could pay a store to release one.
The Buddha was supposedly already built, but the surrounding area wasn't yet finished. Back then, we didn't know that all the temples we'd see during our trip weren't ancient monuments. They were buildings and statues being constructed on an ongoing basis. Well, maybe except for Angkor Wat, but that's still a bit far away. And even Angkor isn't as old as you might think – we have older churches in Poland.
The Buddha was supposedly already built, but the surrounding area wasn't yet finished. Back then, we didn't know that all the temples we'd see during our trip weren't ancient monuments. They were buildings and statues being constructed on an ongoing basis. Well, maybe except for Angkor Wat, but that's still a bit of a distance away.
*after writing this paragraph, I googled that a turlak isn't belly button dust at all, but something completely different. I take back my statement about being a turlak.
We loop around the lake and turn around – time to melt the brake pads on the descent and admire the views. After about three kilometers, a policeman on a scooter catches up with us and orders us to stop. He says the descent is too dangerous. We negotiate, so he calls a second one, then a third. They order us to turn around and get in the car. There's no way we're going up the same road we were going down. Deadlock. It would certainly be much easier if the Vietnamese dictionary on my phone worked properly, or at all. It works by generating random words that form sentences that make no sense whatsoever. None. It probably doesn't help that when asked where we're going, I say from Ho Chi Minh City, which is very far, to Siem Reap, which is unimaginably far. Or that I can't say where we're staying because I don't know. So the police save the day by calling a taxi for us. The only problem is that the taxi is a scooter, and they want to put us on it with a bike in our hands – supposedly, it's safer that way. The whole thing probably takes about 15 minutes, and we're saved from our shared predicament by an SUV that stops and hitches a ride. I suspect it was some kind of "permit" to travel on this route, which only local transport has access to, to make money. It worked, and we continued on, albeit with Strava paused.
Then there are a few temples where, of course, we have to stop. Each one has large statues of deities I'm completely unfamiliar with, but I'm impressed by the idea of erecting something like that along the road. Our papal statues can hide. It seems every village here has its equivalent of the Jesus of Świebodzin... only more colorful.
And just when we think life is about to get interesting, we reach a road (along the canal, of course) that has one curve for 30 kilometers. And for the next 40 kilometers, two curves and one turn. It's incredibly boring, but I've discovered that stopping for bubble tea or iced macha can make up for it somewhat. And there are stands selling them every few kilometers, or in the case of larger villages, every few hundred meters. A larger village differs from a smaller one in the size of the buildings. In a larger village, the houses are smaller, so there are more of them. And there's a school attended by thousands of children, and I have no idea where they come from. I mean, I know roughly where the children come from because I have internet, but I don't know where those thousands fit in those tiny houses.
Now I'm certain that, regardless of the distance, my calorie balance will be positive. I mean, you know – it's nice, although perhaps "interesting" would be a better word. But if it's exactly as interesting as the last dozen or so hours of driving, it all seems a bit long. Especially since the asphalt seems rougher, everything is flat, and there are absolutely no curves. And on top of all that, there's the blazing sun. The worst part, though, is that cars, buses, and trucks have started appearing, and there's no hard shoulder. We haven't had a single dangerous situation, but the fun isn't exactly pleasant. As Kazimierz, Stanisław's son, sang:
This road was long
This road was endless
The horizon was still running away
And the asphalt was slippery from the sun
Besides bubble tea, another drink dominates – available in most shops and positioned directly on the road. It's worth noting that almost every house along the road has a shop of some kind. These are mysterious 1.5-liter glass Coca-Cola bottles, filled with something resembling urine. It takes us a while to decipher this mystery. Everything becomes clear when I see a vendor pouring the urine from a canister into bottles. Indeed, since almost everyone rides scooters, this makes more sense than a gas station. Although, of course, there are gas stations too – usually with very well-maintained and stocked restrooms.
The situation improves towards evening, as we reach the coast. Not only is the road minimally curved, but it also feels a bit holiday-like. It could even be said that it's very beautiful. On one side, the Gulf of Thailand, and on it, Phu Quoc, the Vietnamese Hawaii, on the other, flooded rice fields, and finally, some new vegetation. On this trip, we probably pass about a million banana trees.
We're sleeping in the last bastion before the border – Hà Tiên. It's a typical tourist town, as it's where ferries to Hawaii depart from. It's so touristy that we meet two elderly white British men there, and we realize they're the first white faces we've seen since leaving the airport in Saigon. The area looks like Kołobrzeg in the middle of the pandemic, only with good weather. Nice, small hotels, promenades, stalls… but there aren't many people, and it's almost peak season. We have dozens of hotels to choose from, and they're ridiculously cheap compared to how they look in photos – most are between 50 and 70 złoty for two people, including breakfast. We go all out and get a room in one of the most expensive ones. One right by the port, a tall, luxurious hotel.River Hotel Ha tien"We pay 120 PLN, but without breakfast, because it seems a shame to open a restaurant just for us. It's a 7-story building with a swimming pool, a large restaurant, three receptionists, and underground parking, and yet we don't see any guests inside.
We're still trying to figure out, as usual, where to eat. This time I'm clever and I approach with Google Maps fired up. After a minute, the nice lady, when we manage to agree on food (because I'm pointing out a closed hotel restaurant), simply points in the direction of the main street. And I have to admit, the city is very pretty – in terms of cities, probably the prettiest we've seen on this trip. It's not without reason that it's called the "jewel of the Mekong Delta" in guidebooks. A jewel named after a particular stone, not a body part. There's even a regular, large grocery store. We can't make sandwiches there anymore, but the yogurt selection is decent. We sit down at a local restaurant, the owner somehow seats us off to the side, and never comes back. It's a shame, because it's the only one with pictures instead of text. If there are no pictures, Google Translate says we can eat things like: "Vu Pig War", "Call Your Mouth", "The Heart-Shaped Meat Affair", "I'll Go to Father Bong", or "It's Over for Father Cotton". I remember why I couldn't communicate with anyone using Google Translate there.
So we move to another one – we manage to find the one, the only, touristy one: Làng Nướng Hà Tiên. We're saved – the spinach with garlic is, as always, the champion – if you're after something else matcha frappe I miss him, it's him.
Day 4 - gallery
In the morning, I try to be a sensible, well-prepared person and check our Cambodian visas – purchased two weeks ago, for $40 each. This time, I took care of everything in advance. But to this day, I'm afraid that one day someone will stop me and say, "but you haven't left Tanzania yet or Lesotho." I won't deny it, I could have read what's written on them beforehand. Especially since it's one page and only has six points. Firstly, it clearly states that you should have two printed copies: leave one upon entry and the other upon exit. However, that's a minor problem; the bigger problem is that one of the points clearly states: the e-Visa is only valid at six border crossings, and of course, these aren't our current ones. I remember actually reading about this once and why I originally posted the route this way and not another. Well, I've crossed borders illegally, so we're going there "to Johnny." If they tell us it's impossible, we'll make a silly face, look at the bikes, and stand there until someone comes up with something. So far, it's always worked, although it was sometimes uncomfortable, as it was Kenya/Tanzania crossing or in Lesotho.
We push through some local market that's set up in the street below our hotel and head north along the coast, towards the border. Along the way, we even pass a paid beach – I don't know how or why. A guy stood in the middle of the road, there was a ticket booth, and since that's the route I had in mind, we paid, probably 2 złoty each. I'm a simple person – someone comes up to me and says "pay," so I pay. Maybe that's why I still have to go to work. Why and how we paid when there's a parallel, free road 50 meters away – I don't know. Fortunately, if you don't think too much about it, it doesn't bother you. What I do know is that, apart from the shopkeepers, we're completely alone on the beach. Looking at Google Maps now, I see a crowd of beachgoers. Maybe it's because it's Tuesday, 9 a.m.?
We continue north, along a small road that leads to the border, but not to a border crossing. We arrive at a fence, a barrier, and a terrified border guard who has jumped out of his hammock. It's worth noting that hammocks seem to be a national pastime for both the Vietnamese and Cambodians (I had to look that word up in the dictionary). Hammocks are everywhere, always. You'd sooner starve than die without a hammock... although perhaps that's a truism. Now that I know how large the puddles can be in this region, I understand why. The guy had probably been hanging in that hammock for 17 days, playing Candy Crush. He explains that there is indeed a border, but not a crossing. We turn back to the main road and head for the legitimate crossing.
We reach the actual border over 400 kilometers after setting off. That's not much longer than the length of the film used to record Apocalypse Now. In the case of the film, about one percent of the footage was used. In the case of this post, reading it so far has taken over 30 hours less than our drive—so, percentage-wise, the same. It's clear that great minds think alike, Mr. Coppola. This includes the drive itself, of course, without any stops.
The exit from Vietnam goes smoothly. We leave our bikes and head to the building with the guards. There, we encounter—be warned—a group of Czechs, who are lining up like a bull on my visa, pointing to the list of border crossings that accept e-Visas, and pointing out that it won't work here. He has a look of, "This is what you don't understand, idiot," especially since he probably repeats this scenario every few minutes. Luckily, there's a window behind us for visas on the spot. We have to wait about an hour (because there were probably 30 Czechs applying ahead of us), and then, drenched in sweat, we set off. The customs building had a single fan, but half the Czechs were stationed in front of it. We also enter with a two-fold decrease in the cost of $40, and I have two unused visas in my pocket.
We are entering Cambodia.
Diane, 11:30 AM, November 11th. Entering The Town Cambodia
We're prepared for the worst. For filth, poverty, alcoholism, trucks, marauding militias, expats who come here to work remotely and live with underage women, old British men holding hands with young girls, and above all: drugs. It's probably not hard to guess that we saw virtually none of these things.
My expectations are like the scene where Johnny Bravo is flying in a plane and the narrator says in a low voice:Mr Johnny Bravo is about to travel to a zone, where normal things don't happen very often.” This is obviously not the case – it's another normal country that I simply had a wrong idea about.
The first kilometer is a bit like entering Lesotho, but for beginners. The color scheme changes – it's more red, there's a bit more trash on the roadside, more roadside businesses and food stalls. The buildings also become much more sparse. There's an ATM, which I decide to use just in case. Apparently, you can easily pay in dollars here, but better safe than sorry. I don't feel like checking the exchange rate, so I simply click the second, highest option at the ATM, hoping it's a reasonable amount. I'm in a poor country, after all. I get one million Cambodian riel from the ATM, and my Revolut account receives a notification that about nine hundred złoty has been debited from my account. I'm glad the exchange rate is simple, but I'm a bit disappointed because it's probably more than I planned.
Over time, however, this proves to be a good move, as Cambodia is significantly more expensive than Vietnam—so much so that prices often surprise us, as it feels like home. It's a shame, I thought we'd be kings of life. I wanted to compare Warsaw to Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, in terms of price, but it turned out to be pointless. Especially since the difference between Phnom Penh and the rest of the country is roughly the same as between Warsaw and Gryfów Śląski.
Buying a compact car in Cambodia, for example, is 30% more expensive than here, gasoline is 50% cheaper, milk is 50% more expensive, and water or beer are the same price. As a reminder, average wages in Poland are two to three times higher, and the minimum wage is four times higher. You can actually pay in dollars, provided they're in perfect condition. Crumpled ones with minimal defects won't be accepted – not even at a roadside "bubble tea" stand – arguably the most popular business in the country. At least judging from the perspective of two cyclists on folding bikes.
We quickly realize we're in a wonderful place. Not so wonderful that I'd say, "Let's drop everything and go to Cambodia," but it's very pleasant. And then I don't know it's going to get any better until three days later when I think, "Hey, this place is definitely worth recommending for a bike ride."
The dense development along the canals is being replaced by large stilt houses and villas that even Raszyn would be proud of. I'm thinking mainly of the columns, statues, facades, and other elements that show the neighbors who's boss. There's vast open spaces all around, rice paddies, salt pans, and a few animals. There might be a little more trash, but it's ten times more interesting, and I feel like we're entering a much richer and more impressive country – a welcome change from the endless, straight asphalt roads and endless rows of tin houses. And those stilts under every house, an abstraction – I've never seen anything like it.
Cambodia consists of two places: the capital and the largest temple complex in the world: Angkor Wat. At least that's what my online research suggests. If you dig a little deeper, you might also find Kampot, our destination – a supposedly modern expat city surrounded by mountains and close to the sea. Next to it are the Cardamom Mountains, a few islands that should rival Vietnamese Hawaii, and perhaps the city of Krong Battambang, but perhaps only because it's one of only three cities in the country listed in large font on Google Maps. To give you a sense of scale, it has a population of just 150,000.
We arrive in Kampot in the early afternoon, stopping along the way at one of the most famous beaches in the country. The only thing worth mentioning is the crab statue. The beaches themselves would probably be considered the worst in a Spain like this. Of course, there are no people at all, which still puzzles me. Because if not there and not now, then I don't know when or where they are. Kampot doesn't look like the modern city we expected, more like an overgrown village with a durian statue in the middle. If the main attraction of the city is the durian, you can guess what you think of it. As a reminder, durian tastes like a sponge soaked in gasoline, and smells like it too. So I abandon my plan to end the day early and wander around town. We start looking for a taxi to take us to the Buddha Hill; I have a decent hotel in mind there. I think there are about four cars in the entire town; the rest are tuk-tuks and scooters. Somehow, I can't wrap my head around riding a bike up a kilometer-long mountain with a tuk-tuk. It's only a few kilometers from the start of the climb, but then it's 20 or 30 kilometers uphill, which would take several hours in a Brompton. What a waste of life.
We can't find transportation. Desperate, I go into a hotel that looks expensive and ask about arranging transportation – no problem. A few minutes later, a 19-year-old Toyota Highlander picks us up. The driver says 55. I assume he means thousands of riel, meaning 50 złoty. Unfortunately, no, it's in dollars. It's a ridiculous amount, but we have no choice. After five minutes of haggling, I come up with 50 dollars and a few riel, which probably translates to 56 dollars. It might be more than the starting price, but the important thing is that it's a bargain.
We ascend the mountain like kings. Looking back, I think we could have just as easily stopped at the beginning of the climb and hitched a ride, or even paid for it. by tuk tuk drive in.
Our extremely expensive hotel (250 złoty) doesn't necessarily resemble the one advertised, though it's certainly not to be faulted. I'd estimate there are several hundred rooms in our building, and three more are being built right next door. I'm also almost certain we're the only guests, which surprises me a bit – after all, there's an extremely impressive attraction just a dozen or so kilometers away. What's more, we're surrounded by several temples with stunning views of the ocean and the coast a kilometer below.
In the evening, we explore the area by bike. Allow me to quote Perplexity, which likely cites other sources regarding Mount Bokor:
"Bokor Hill in Preah Monivong National Park near Kampot is one of the most atmospheric places in Cambodia: a combination of a colonial ghost resort, a misty plateau and a jungle with elephants, bears and cats."
This is truly a place for fans urbexUnfinished luxury resorts, forgotten churches, and the Chinese continuing to build wide roads and expensive housing estates there. It looks like a place the Chinese are preparing as a refuge for local elites before the end of the world. We return to the hotel and get excited about another day. The entire lobby is dedicated to the great Buddha, so we can thoroughly prepare for our visit.
Day 4 - gallery
We set off after breakfast, about 16 kilometers from our destination. Along the way, we stop to see the temple again, taking advantage of the relatively good visibility. Fog, to a greater or lesser extent, accompanies us for most of the trip – probably due to the humidity. There were heavy thunderstorms overnight, so it's quite good. We pass a guardhouse with a guard who has probably also spent the last eight days sitting and playing Candy Crush. He tries to explain something to us and turn us around, but ultimately waves us off – strange. I'll understand what he meant a few minutes later. We drive through a quite beautiful landscape, on a road winding over small hills. I don't know how it's possible that we're getting closer and closer, yet there's no sign of anyone, and more importantly, no Buddha. Somewhere on the horizon, a large scaffolding appears – large in size, not height.
Something's starting to come together in my head. I go to Google Maps, click Buddha, expand the comments, and the first one at the top is: "Buddha statue has not been built yet. This is just a construction site." Others say the same thing – it's been a construction site for years, and what's more, some people have even been sold tickets to this place. We're doing "poker face" and we turn back. I would be outraged if it weren't for the fact that we didn't have any better ideas anyway, and the ascent, as an adventure, was quite cool – a good excuse too. Now, to anyone who shares a place near the Buddha, I'll write in the comments:I was there before it was popular"More importantly, we now face an endless descent to Kompot – through jungles infested with monkeys. It was very pleasant; my worries about the brake pads proved completely unfounded. No one turned us back to tell us that bicycles weren't allowed. Somewhere along the way, at a viewpoint, we encountered scooter tourists who informed us in Polish that the road was full of monkeys and that we should be careful.
In Kampot, we catch a bus – no major problem. You can book virtually any connection online, or at any VET Air or Giant Ibis location. Everything seems to be connected, and the wait usually isn't too long. Our bus is a 10/10 on the luxury bus scale. There's a ton of space, a TV for everyone, and the TV has all the torrent content available.
We're about 150 kilometers from the capital, which is... a 4.5-hour drive. Yes, our average speed will be the same as that of an average road cyclist. But that's not because the road is bad—it's quite good, often even two-lane. Although perhaps it would be closer to the truth. one and a half bandsSimply driving through the capital is like driving through Nairobi. Scooters are moving, quad bikes are parked. It would probably be faster to get off the bus at the entrance to the city and walk on foot… if, of course, you could walk on foot around the city, on sidewalks. Outside the city's core, tourist center, this isn't convenient.
Phnom Penh itself is a city like any other in the world. It's just a bit warmer than most cities. And walking is more difficult, even though there are sidewalks. Apart from some markets and a promenade by the river, walking hasn't caught on there either. There are, however, plenty of tourists, even European ones. Besides the usual: Domino's, Starbucks, hotels, pizzerias, markets, and monuments.
The nearest McDonald's, however, is 200km as the crow flies to Saigon, or 500km away in Pattaya, Thailand. As seasoned tourists, we go for an Italian pizza, to an Italian restaurant – a pizza costs about 50 złoty, and a can of Coke costs almost ten złoty. In general, everything is absurdly expensive (compared to our expectations). The walk isn't easy, and we quickly regret it. It's too hot and too stuffy.
Day 5 - gallery
The next two days are perfect. In Phnom Penh, we cross the Mekong River by ferry. It's interesting that the capital doesn't have a bridge over the river. The nearest is about 30 km to the north, and another one about 70 km further on. Of course, we won't miss crossing it. This way, the "Cambodian-Chinese Friendship Bridge" won't stand so lonely and empty. The view of the capital's "little Manhattan" makes us realize we're halfway through the song:
Here, for now, it's just stubble. But there will be San Francisco. And where that molehill is, there will be my bank.
The city looks like my Racuszkowo in one of those city-building games, about two minutes after I enter the code for unlimited money. A few skyscrapers are already up, but dozens more are on the way, and all that's left is to wait. And now Phnom Penh is about half a million people larger than Warsaw and growing 10 times faster.
As for the route itself. It's impossible to describe this perfection with photos or words; you simply have to see it. We pass thousands of houses on stilts, each one a unique attraction in itself. Each one is also completely unique – I doubt we'll pass two identical houses. Then there are hundreds of temples, each with something more surprising… at least for the first hundred kilometers, because after visiting a few dozen, it becomes a bit monotonous. Then there's the occasional bubble tea stand and kids greeting us from every direction. By evening, Sylwia's voice is gone from shouting back, "hello"It's so good that I can honestly recommend the route north from Phnom Penh, along the Mekong River, to people bored with the Dolomites and the Canary Islands. That's if, of course, you enjoy extreme heat and humidity. Cold tea or even iced tea can help you overcome this, though I'm sure far more people will return than have left. Currently, I'm mostly subsisting on tapioca gel balls.
There should be seven paragraphs here about how nice it is, how interesting all the villages are, how impressive and somewhat ridiculous the temples are. It's poor, but you don't feel it. For some unknown reason, poverty always evokes filth and disease. Here, it's poor with dignity, if you can even call it that. Poor, but at first glance, cheerful and positive. From the perspective of a tourist on small wheels, of course, and at a time when there's no major flooding. I can only say that there's much more to it than you might imagine.
I love the sight of a frog in the shitter in the morning
Delighted, we cover 130 kilometers, because in such beautiful surroundings, time somehow flies more pleasantly. We reach Hanchey Bamboo Resort, these are fancy bamboo bungalows for American tourists. We meet a British couple and a French couple with their guide there. The property is located on the only hill in the area, slightly separated from the villages along the road, so it doesn't look so surreal. It's obviously one of those properties founded by a white man and employed people from—as the description says—disadvantaged families, as a way to support the local community. I always have my reservations about such places, but I'll keep them to myself. I'll just point out that I have them, for peace of mind. We pay 90 złoty and probably end up spending twice or a third of that at their restaurant, but the food is absolutely worth the price. From the coconut water drunk straight from the coconut, to the avocado shake, to Lok Lak (traditional fried beef). On the way to the cottage, I accidentally kick a frog because it's dark. So, in retaliation, the frog appears on our toilet seat in the middle of the night and refuses to leave it. I mean, not the seat, but its position. We lose this duel and end up using the shared restroom at the restaurant.
Day 6 - gallery
The next day is another 100km north. The same, though a bit more Muslim and even more rural. To add variety, we sometimes leave the asphalt in favor of red gravel roads – very good, by the way, although if it had been raining, I would definitely say differently. Carried by sugar balls made from tea, we reach Krâchéh. It's no coincidence that I chose this town as my destination. Apparently, it's there, just north of the town, you can find animals called "Irrawaddy dolphins." In our language, they're called the Irrawaddy dolphin, and they look fantastic. Apparently, there are only a few dozen left in the Mekong, so I don't have high expectations. It's enough for me that I learned about their existence and saw them in What do they look like on the Internet?. They look as if I molded my index finger out of modeling clay and then drew eyes, fins, and a smiling face on it.
Travel agency rush.
We arrive in Kratie sometime after 3:00 PM. It gets dark two to three hours later. I have four tasks ahead of me: finding someone to take us dolphin-watching in the morning, arranging a hotel, food, and transportation, including the next day's trip to Siem Reap, 350 km away. All of this happens on its own, because upon entering the city, I stop at a sign for a transportation company. An English-speaking guy approaches me and says he'll arrange everything for me in 10 minutes. Sure enough, moments later we're unpacked at the River Side Hotel and Restaurant, scheduled for a 7:00 AM bus, and we're already sitting in the car. tuk tuk a man with a wooden leg, being taken to Kampi to see dolphins, with a break for food at 7-Eleven. All of this is certainly a bit overpriced, and the room itself is "so-so," but considering the time savings, it's a sufficient option.
There are tourists at the dolphin spot, so the organization is very simple. You buy a ticket for about $10 each and head to the boat. We get a private boat – the two of us plus our "captain." We catch the last rays of the sun, then the sunset – perfect. We're the last to arrive, and I feel like we've been swimming for much longer than the hour we paid for. There are definitely more dolphins than I expected. Or maybe they're the same ones swimming around – it doesn't really matter. They appear for a maximum of a few seconds, exhaling loudly, usually a few to a dozen meters from the boat, but they also happen much closer. I'd go so far as to say that we see or hear them at least once a minute. It's a surprisingly good attraction. I have no idea if it's morally justified or more like watching elephants in Thailand. However, my ignorance doesn't offer me a single reason why it might be bad… although perhaps those small pieces of bread in the water might be a bit concerning. A very successful day, which even the Indians, who organised a long dinner on the balcony, right next to our windows, could not spoil.
Day 7 - gallery
A little after 7 a.m., a 13-seater minibus actually arrives to pick us up. We're traveling in a more traditional style, not the luxurious style of a bus. This means we have about 20 stops along the way to drop off or drop off parcels, and we're also carrying two boxes of roosters crowing regularly. Sylwia starts laughing after each crow, dismaying her fellow travelers. It's not bad, though. We arrive in Siem Reap before 2 p.m., a mere seven-hour drive covering 350 km, with a stop for a light lunch along the way. We spend the rest of the day wandering around the city. There are plenty of white people everywhere, but they're within about 4 km of the main tourist street.
We sleep in "The Community – Siem Reap", which is one of the more expensive accommodations in the area, paying around 150 złoty. This is another establishment that prides itself on supporting local communities – as the name suggests. Some people are so incredibly kind that, like a true Pole, you feel like beating them up. The receptionist who takes care of us goes way beyond that and is even nicer. She starts by saying that this isn't a hotel at all, but that we're just one big family for a day... and then it only gets worse. I don't want to be a big family anymore, I don't want a foot massage, a swimming pool, I don't want to support any community – I dream of a ham and cheese sandwich and then sleep.
We take a tour of the area and arrive at the APOPO Visitor Center – a place whose main theme is rats searching for mines. It's so crowded, however, that the next tour is three hours away. We fight each other, but the crowds win, and we head off aimlessly to explore the city. Here's a hint: you don't have to. Just wait until dusk and head downtown to the river, then to the two main, touristy streets – it's cool, even pretty. Like a classic tourist town. We find a stand selling mango sticky rice, so I consider the day a resounding success. We also find my new favorite ice cream chain: BING CHUN. That means the day couldn't have been better. We discovered it two days earlier, somewhere along the route. A nice lady there made us a matcha frappe I'll remember for the rest of my life. Then she came back to the front of the shop to wash her Crocs in a bowl. I've never seen so many Crocs in my life as here.
Day 8 - gallery
Theoretically, the last day of our trip – the culmination of our vacation. A place that attracts around a million tourists a year – all of them probably spend the night in Siem Reap. Before the pandemic, it was several million a year. A place that's on the Cambodian flag and, for most people in the world, the only association with Cambodia. That is, of course, if anyone knows Cambodia exists. I'm talking about Angkor Wat – the world's largest temple complex. I think the term "largest" might have been used at the time of its construction, but more in the context of the Khmer king Suryavarman II. Back then, Angkor was also called Yasodharapura – the change seems good from the perspective of buying tickets to this place. It's about 4km from the hotel, and we bought tickets online – nearly 40 USD per person, so I have the impression that over the last thousand years, the construction might have paid off. I'm going there skeptical, but I'm trying to appreciate what I see. Of course, I don't succeed. We stand on the famous bridge, look at the building, and all I can think is, "Oh, cool." Maybe if we had a guide, maybe if we could appreciate the small details. But I guess we can't, because what we love most about the entire visit is a teddy bear head drawn by some vandal on one of the historic walls.
Important note: it's RECOMMENDED (though not necessary) to wear knee-length trousers to the temple complex. This is the only time of the trip we wear them, so we're very happy about it, even though our legs get a bit sweaty.
Then we visit a few more temples – they're scattered every few kilometers and connected by a paved road. Each one has a bicycle parking lot and guards, so you can easily leave your gear and go for a walk. None of them really stirred any particular emotions in us. As simple people, fond of color and cheerful sculptures, our more primitive tastes were much more appealing to the random temples we passed by along the Mekong River. Only Ta Prohm saves the day – it's, of course, the one from Tomb Raider. Although probably mainly because it looks like it's in the middle of a jungle and blends perfectly with the impressive trees growing around it. I think its creator might get quite annoyed when someone constantly calls it "famous because Angelina Jolie ran around it." Or maybe it's not the temple that's impressive at all, but the trees. And Neak Pean is also quite nice – but not because of the temple itself, but because of the artificial island and lake with trees and lilies. I find myself enjoying everything around the temples much more than the temples themselves. That's probably why we ride bikes instead of sightseeing. After a few hours, we've already stocked up on spirituality for the next few years.
We wouldn't be ourselves if we didn't find ourselves some absurd shopping activity for the second half of the day. In one of the shops near the main temple, Sylwia finds a small, handmade wooden statuette of a Khmer guardian lion. It's a hybrid of a lion and a naga. A naga is a kind of snake. As these snake-like He accompanies us throughout the trip, almost buying it. Almost, because $150 for a statuette as tall as a long index finger is a bit beyond our sense of decency. At the shop, we get a business card from the studio that made it. It's on the other side of town, of course, so we drive an extra 15 kilometers to visit, hoping it'll be cheaper or have something else to choose from.
If you're looking for a souvenir from Siem Reap, the "Satcha – Cambodian Handicraft Center" is a place worth recommending. It's a small complex where artists, scattered across various sections, actually create art by hand. Someone paints, someone sews, someone carves, and at the end is a gallery that would be a star on Warsaw's main street. There are indeed lions, several to choose from – each slightly different, because they're handmade. However, none of them seems as pretty as the one we saw at Angkor. We return the dozen or so kilometers. It turns out that the other one isn't as pretty as we thought. We head to the hotel, where we check in at 3:58 PM, and we have a taxi arranged for 4:00 PM.
The new Siem Reap airport is 40 km from Siem Reap. It's about an hour's drive, even though there are no traffic jams and the car is new and comfortable. The new road to the new airport is also comfortable, but that doesn't change the fact that our driver doesn't exceed 60 km/h. It's amazing how warped my Polish brain is, not understanding that if the limit is 90 km/h, someone can drive significantly slower, and of their own free will.
The bikes performed exceptionally well on the trip, so they're given extra bubble wrap at the airport. I don't really know why; the two Dimpa bags from IKEA I carry with me the entire trip have always been sufficient. We pay an absurdly high price for bubble wrap, but that's mainly because I haggle. I have a feeling my inner desire to get rid of all my riel subconsciously compelled me to do so. I think I'm paying more than the guy initially wanted.
To top it all off, we learn during check-in that we're not on the passenger list. This doesn't surprise me, really, as I bought my tickets the day before and could have made a stupid mistake. I have visions of an all-night bus trip, as Saigon is almost 500 km away. It's not much, considering we rode our bikes from there and covered 1,000 km, plus another 500 km by bus. Luckily, we find ourselves on the schedule of another airline, which flies to the same destination, but about 15 minutes later.
We land in Saigon after dark and walk the 2km back to the hotel where we left our bike bags. We still have well over a day until our return flight.
Day 9 - gallery
Our plan for the last day is obvious – to buy kittens manekineko – those are the ones with the waving paw. We bring one back from every Asian vacation and slowly run out of space in the house. That is, we did until Sylwia discovered that shelves at home are like a student on a bus. If X can fit, then X+1 can always fit. Every store we visited was carefully hidden. Just like the one on 5th floor of a residential building in Singapore a year earlier. So we barefoot, sweaty, into strangers' houses and look at the kittens, which they probably only sell by mail order.
I'm pretty sure we'll never find a place like the one carefully hidden in a garage and guarded by three teenage girls and a small dog: the Maneki-Neko House. To illustrate, I am attaching a link to Google Street ViewI don't know if we were more shocked to be going in there, or the aforementioned teenagers, that someone had found this place. It's a garage where the statuettes are probably assembled, painted, and everything else necessary to create them. I'm certain in 98% that this garage is where they put amphetamines in kittens and ship them to Europe – everything adds up. There are hundreds of kittens, tables for packing and assembling, and those little girls just to disguise themselves. Especially seeing the panic that set in when Sylwia knocked on the gate. Two frightened little pairs of eyes peeked out, asked what the purpose of the visit was, the gate closed, ran off somewhere, and said they'd open it in five minutes. Luckily, I was watching Johnny Bravo and knew I should answer that I liked pancakes.
We return victorious to the hotel, wash up, and take a taxi to the airport. Three hours after arrival, I'm already on (almost) the top floor, in an office with glass doors. The sun is setting, another day has passed. Or, to be more precise, it hasn't, because I have to endure another six-hour work meeting in the same building. I was brave and didn't let it be known that I was dead inside. But I was still less brave than you, if you're still reading this...
Day 10 - gallery
If you're hoping for a summary here, there won't be one. If you specifically you scrolled I spent the last two minutes scrolling through a single sentence about whether it was worth it – I won't post it. Because, as usual, I don't know. There were no impressive views, no click-worthy photos for social media, and we didn't eat anything worth mentioning. For some reason unknown to me, it was great – like most places that seem unsuitable for cycling and where people don't usually go for that purpose. The route might appeal, especially the Cambodian section of the Mekong. Not everyone, but someone definitely will.
