Had a nice rest day in Kampot. Woke up early even though we were supposed to have a sleep in.  Hung around in hammocks and swam in the natural pool.

Had a jenga challenge and fuzball championship. 

Climbed a mountain and went caving.

Made new friends. 

And again, marveled at Cambodian roads.

Brilliant. 

Well, I was expecting bad roads but it is hard to imagine how bad they can be until you are riding them. 

Gravel as far as the eye can see, which isn’t very far because the dust is awful.  The dust gets in your eyes and in your mouth. It coats your lips, tongue and teeth. Your eyes are gritty and you start to blink frantically because there is a truck honking it’s horn behind you to warn you to get out of its way. The only problem is you have cows crossing the road in front of you and they are not in a hurry.  You have motos (motor bikes) every where.  They only seem to take the road rules as a suggestion not a rule. There are tractors pulling carts full of wood. Some of the motos also have cargo. One yesterday had at least 10 live ducks hanging from the bike. Adding to it all, people on the side of the road are calling out to you to wave to their children. It is crazy. I love it. 

Cambodia is extraordinary.

We stayed a night at a small town just over the border and the next morning we jumped on a bus for a 300 km drive through a national park and remote country. We decided to not cycle this stretch of road after speaking to a german cyclist who had just travelled through this area. She said there were a few guest houses but they were 100km apart and there are no food stops in between.  The bus trip was fine except for a british tourist sitting behind me who talked none stop to the poor girl sitting next to her. I swear she hardly drew breath.

We arrived in Sihanoukville and cycled to our accommodation. I have decided to go for budget accommodation. It was a mistake. The room was fine but the smell in the bathroom was just awful. I wont describe it because I am sure you can all imagine what the stink was.

We headed off as quickly as we could the next morning but did not get far before the boys saw something that they could not go past.

After a 2 hour stop off at the beach we headed off. We only had a 39km day planned but the state of the roads was worse than we expected. That combined with head winds meant we did not arrive at our next stop until after 4pm.

We had heard of a waterfall in the Ream national park so we stopped at a hotel near where we thought the waterfall was. The hotel was amazing. Eco bungalows built along the cliff overlooking the beach. The price broke our budget but it was beautiful and our only option. It turns out the the waterfall was not accessible due to the local Khmer villagers being really scared of ghosts  that they believe live at the waterfall. The manager of the hotel said he wants to find the waterfall but does not want to go trekking through the bush because there are unexploded bombs from the Vietnam war in the forest. Fair enough.

We left Mairood this morning. Some of the other guests at the resort got up early to see us off. It was really nice.  Such a lovely place. 

We cycled south east along the narrowest section of Thailand.  There were a few spots where we could get off the main road but not many. There were road works along the main road and it was undulating hills most of the way. 

We reached the Cambodia border around 11.30. It took a while for lunch and getting through immigation. When we reached immigation it was difficult to know who was an official staff member and who was just a adventitious rip off artist.  We were approach by two men who asked us for our passports. They took our passports and did our paper work for us.  They asked for our fee money. So we gave it too them. They showed us our passports with visas in them but kept our passports. They then asked us for a tip of 1000 baht for doing it all for us. I proceeded to reach across the table and take our passports back. There were not happy with this and tried to take them back. In the end we gave them 700 baht. Dodgy buggers. 

We crossed the border and discovered that Cambodia drive on the right side of the road. It really spun the boys out being on the other side of the road. 

This photo is us leaving Thailand. Check out the flat bitumen road.

This is us entering Cambodia.  Check out the rough concrete road. 

The boys are going to enjoy their suspension.  

I was sad to leave Trat this morning but it felt good to be on the bike again.

We cycled south east along the coast towards the Cambodia border.  We met some other cyclists.  Two Germans on their way to Bangkok. They gave us some great tips about Cambodia.

We cycled on and after about 30 km saw a sign for a waterfall.  The boys were keen, so we stopped.  I am so glad we did.  It was the best waterfall so far.  Allister is going to upload some of the videos of the boys jumping into the water onto YouTube.  So check out his post too. I jumped in as well. It was really deep and it took longer to reach the surface than I expected.

We reluctantly left the waterfall and within 3km we bumped into another cyclist.  This guy was a hard core touring cyclists. By himself with no technology, just paper maps and a good sense of direction.

We headed off again and before we new it we had reached our 50km threshold to start looking for accommodation.  There was nothing. We starting to think we would have to cycle on to the next town, 26km further on but eventually we saw a sign for Mairood. Mairood is a small fishing village in the middle of nowhere.  Perfect. We discovered that there was one ‘Resort’ in Mairood. The word resort is used loosely in Thailand.  I imagine lush gardens, swimming pools and lovely rooms when I think resort.  That is usually not the case in Thailand.  Small room with a fan in a rundown building has been our experience. So when we saw there was a resort in Mairood we were expecting a bed with a bathroom.  Hot water if we were lucky.  Well, Mairood resort is paradise.  If you ever find yourself near the Cambodian coastal border you have to stay in Mairood.

Just bikes and boats. As I said, paradise.

We have just had the most amazing time walking around the night markets in Trat. Once a year they have a celebration on the weekend of the 3rd to the 5th of March. It involves the most enormous night markets I have ever seen. Imagine markets running the entire length of Strickland street, to the old hospital, plus all of the side streets filled with food and toys and clothes.  Awesome. 

Patrick, Robert and I braved the insect food stall.  The beetle Robert chose tasted like fish. The grasshopper tasted a bit like KFC but you really had to use your imagination.  

Patrick was very brave but throw up about 20 seconds after this photo. 

The next thing that happened was just incredible.  We bumped into our first Australian, Vanessa.  We asked the usual question “where in Australia do you live?”. When we answered Denmark, she said “you don’t know Pete and Belinda Ross do you?”. 

What a spin out. Turns out Vanessa is the sister of Pete’s sister, Megan’s husband. 

It is such a small world. 

Beautiful days. Perfect weather. Wonderful rest days. The photos explain it all.  

We hired a car again for our rest day and I am so glad we did.  The island of Chang is so mountainous.  The boys had a great time riding is the back getting a blow wave.