You know, I really have to go through this blog sometime and figure out how many times I’ve passed through Bangkok in the course of this journey. If I was to hazard a guess, I’d say ten times. Not bad given I’d not even set foot in Asia before March 14th 2006. Is it really [...]

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No, this isn’t that rude. It just describes my back end after many hours on the back of a motorbike along the rather bumpy local roads. I met up with my driver, who’s name sounds like “Cheers” and I couldn’t write it in Khmer anyway, at the hotel at 8:30. Before I start, I’d recommend [...]

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As promised, here’s the video of my day trip around Battambang as a separate post so that those with RSS feed don’t miss it. You can also view the hi-def version if you prefer.

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Battambang is pronounced Battambong. The way the locals say it, it’s more like “butterball”, in fact. Amazingly, it’s the second-largest city in Cambodia. I say “amazing” as you can walk from end to end in around twenty minutes. The bus trip was fairly uneventful – around five hours with one toilet break in a layby [...]

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This one’s for people visiting Cambodia. ANZ, an Aussie/Kiwi bank, is by far the most pervasive here. There are more ATMs belonging to them, and they’re in more convenient locations, than any other bank. Thing is, of the ones which accept foreign cash cards they’re also the only ones that charge a fee on them. [...]

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No problems with my Myanmar visa at all. I popped over to get it this afternoon and coughed up the very reasonable $20. I believe the government will just try to screw me for cash in other ways when I’m there, but $20 for a visa isn’t bad in Southeast Asia. For my cash, I’ve [...]

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As I suspected, I’m definitely going to be doing nothing until I depart on Saturday. I was hoping that either today or tomorrow I could hire a moto of my own and zip off out of the city for a trip around some temples and a wildlife sanctuary. Unfortunately, this requires leaving your passport as [...]

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Not a real lot to write about today, the first of three days’ forced residence here. Don’t get me wrong – it’s not a bad place. There’s just little for me to see and do having been here twice before. The city is changing, though. At the end of Ph 258, where my guest house [...]

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I did opt for the Pnomh Penh bus, and booked it for 12:30. I had a few things to do around town before I headed off for the capital. First up was to walk to the Rainbow Foundation’s bookshop opposite Monkey Republic. This is one wing of a children’s charity and the small shop sells [...]

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We didn’t get a chance to grab breakfast as Simon was already waiting for us when we rose at 8:00. We hopped onto the awaiting tuk-tuk and sped off towards the dock on the far side of town. Well, when I say “sped” I mean “crawled”. Simon reckoned he’d got the only slow driver in [...]

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