One of the most bombed countries in the world, one of the highest amounts of landmines per head of population, mass genocide within living history, Brad Pitt’s adoptions and the world’s largest religious monuments – welcome to Cambodia! 
One of the easiest borders so far saw us into the country where we met the truck after our solo jaunt through Nam, good roads to the river, a quick ferry crossing and back to dirt roads. First impressions were much the same as Laos; however Cambodia is much poorer and lacks the confidence and optimism of Laos.
It took us the best part of the day to reach the capital Pnomh Penh where, unsurprisingly, it was full of Gary Glitters, just like Saigon. Lots of mopeds, lots of prostitutes and lots of pollution, we didn’t stay for long; three days was enough to visit S21, the temples and a few bars and street food markets where we found such delicacies as deep fried tarantula or locusts.
If we thought the war museum in Saigon was heart-wrenching, it was nothing compared to S21 where thousands of Cambodians were tortured to death simply for disagreeing with the Khmer Rouge, being “intellectuals” or even just for wearing glasses. Being shown round by an ex-inmate really brought it home and nobody left without a heavy heart that day. The following day we went to visit some temples and the royal palace before settling down with some apple crumble at the Foreign Correspondent’s Club to watch the sun set over the river.
The next day saw a return to dirt roads with the odd stretch of random tarmac, eventually though we reached Siem Reap, home of Angkor Wat.
The first night was spent trying to find a decent bar to watch the football before heading out to the Wat the next morning – some 
brave/sober souls even got up at 5am to watch the sunrise; the rest of us left it until a more sensible hour. 
Angkor Wat is something we believe everyone should see in their lifetime, the largest religious complex in the world; it took some 500 or so years to build. It is spread over an area the size of Chester le Street at the smallest and takes days to visit all the sites/sights. Have a look at the photos, although as usual, they don’t get close to doing it justice. One of the problems we faced when visiting is that it is extremely hot around midday and never fails to pour at teatime so you have to
plan where you’ll be at those times.After seeing the state of the roads so far, a handful of us decided to break from the truck and
travel into Thailand ourselves so we booked taxi’s to the border and then a train from the border to Bangkok. Although the taxi driver thought he was the late, great Colin McRae, we had a better journey than those on the truck as they suffered their first breakdown since Bulgaria. 
Fortunately it didn’t take Steve long to sort the problem and they were on their way again. By this point, however, we were on the Thai border eager for our first green curries......
One of the easiest borders so far saw us into the country where we met the truck after our solo jaunt through Nam, good roads to the river, a quick ferry crossing and back to dirt roads. First impressions were much the same as Laos; however Cambodia is much poorer and lacks the confidence and optimism of Laos.
It took us the best part of the day to reach the capital Pnomh Penh where, unsurprisingly, it was full of Gary Glitters, just like Saigon. Lots of mopeds, lots of prostitutes and lots of pollution, we didn’t stay for long; three days was enough to visit S21, the temples and a few bars and street food markets where we found such delicacies as deep fried tarantula or locusts.If we thought the war museum in Saigon was heart-wrenching, it was nothing compared to S21 where thousands of Cambodians were tortured to death simply for disagreeing with the Khmer Rouge, being “intellectuals” or even just for wearing glasses. Being shown round by an ex-inmate really brought it home and nobody left without a heavy heart that day. The following day we went to visit some temples and the royal palace before settling down with some apple crumble at the Foreign Correspondent’s Club to watch the sun set over the river.
The next day saw a return to dirt roads with the odd stretch of random tarmac, eventually though we reached Siem Reap, home of Angkor Wat.
The first night was spent trying to find a decent bar to watch the football before heading out to the Wat the next morning – some 
brave/sober souls even got up at 5am to watch the sunrise; the rest of us left it until a more sensible hour. 
Angkor Wat is something we believe everyone should see in their lifetime, the largest religious complex in the world; it took some 500 or so years to build. It is spread over an area the size of Chester le Street at the smallest and takes days to visit all the sites/sights. Have a look at the photos, although as usual, they don’t get close to doing it justice. One of the problems we faced when visiting is that it is extremely hot around midday and never fails to pour at teatime so you have to
plan where you’ll be at those times.After seeing the state of the roads so far, a handful of us decided to break from the truck and
travel into Thailand ourselves so we booked taxi’s to the border and then a train from the border to Bangkok. Although the taxi driver thought he was the late, great Colin McRae, we had a better journey than those on the truck as they suffered their first breakdown since Bulgaria. 
Fortunately it didn’t take Steve long to sort the problem and they were on their way again. By this point, however, we were on the Thai border eager for our first green curries......
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