DSCN0414My first experience of cycling in southern Cambodia really set the tone for the rest of my trip through this amazing country.  I had arranged to meet a guy that I had never met at random a crossroads at 5pm.  He would then take me to the village where I would join his family to spend the night.  Thankfully this meeting went as planned and was the start of some amazing adventures in Campuchia.

A few weeks earlier I had posted my route on various blogs and facebook pages asking for people to get in touch if they wished to literally open their homes to me and let me experience their lives.  The response was amazing and the person that I had arranged to meet at the cross roads was one of those who responded and was called Connor.  Without people like this opening their lives to me then I never would have had the experience that I did during my short time in Cambodia and the memories will live me forever.

Connor escorted me through padi fields to the village which lay about 3 km away and lies just outside Kampong Chrey.  The village really is like stepping back to a different way of life – many of the houses are the traditional Khmer wooden stilted houses where the villagers still sleep outside and work the fields.  I think that the village only got mains electricity last year which kind of shows how the way of life has remained largely unchanged.

The house that I stayed at is owned by Connor’s wifes family and generations of the family have lived in the house for over 300 years.  Recently, Connor has helped the family to ‘upgrade’ the house by putting in concrete walls downstairs and bedrooms, a kitchen and new bathroom.  The parents however have never used any of this and still live in the traditional way by sleeping outside and cooking on wood that they burn behind the house.

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Mok’s mum cooking dinner

The dining room is still the front yard:

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Dinner time with Mok (Left), Connor (Right) and Father (Centre)

Mok is the daughter of the family and about 6 weeks previous she gave birth to baby Richard.  In the picture she is wearing a hat, this is not because it is cold but because she is simply following an ancestral tradition linked to the birth of her son. After the delivery, new mums wear ‘hot clothes’ from head to toe and stay warm at home for at least one month – more if they can. They protect their bodies against the cold and the wind otherwise tradition states that they will suffer from headaches and health problems in the future.

Such beliefs and practices are apparently widespread among Cambodian mothers, regardless of their economic or social status. Rooted in Chinese medicine, the Cambodian vision of maternal health is based on the necessity of restoring the ‘hot’ state of the mother, who is believed to have lost her heat during the delivery, suddenly left in a weak state after the birth. Any failure to immediately regenerate the mother’s heat in the following weeks will expose her to direct or future health problems known in Cambodia as toa.

Young mothers are considered as being sick, and they endure dozens of traditional ‘heating’ practices which generally do not have any actual medical significance. For instance, while I was there Mok was taking part in a ritual where she essentially sat covered in a blanket over a bowl of water on a fire and was ‘steamed’.

I had a fantastic experience in the village and here is a video that I made during my amazing time here with the family (13 minutes)

Thank you Connor, Mok and the family for opening your home to me and letting me experience a little bit of your lives:

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Connor, Mok, baby Richard, granny and friends

Just before we bid farewell to the village I would like to share one more experience with you and if you have always bought your chicken from a supermarket then this is how to pluck a chicken Cambodia styly. (3 minutes)

After saying farewells it was time to hit the road and try to catch up with Fraser and Trinh who were about 100km ahead of me and waiting in a town called Kampot.  Yet again though the day would have a series of unknown adventures waiting for me which meant that I nearly never made it to Kampot by nightfall.

The first adventure happened literally within 20 minutes of finally leaving the village.  I had heard music for about 3km’s whilst cycling down the road which would take me towards Kampot and so decided to go and investigate.

No sooner had I left the funeral and gotten back on the road when I met a monk who was outside a typical Cambodian stilted house where what seemed like a family gathering was being held. The monk asked if I would like some food and never one to pass up an experience, or free food, I parked my bike and joined the party. (6 minutes)

After having a very enjoyable lunch with the community I once again set off to head towards my rendavue s normally happens during my cycles I get bored of the main road and so decided to take a track that I came across which looked a bit more interesting.  After checking the map the track wasn’t really going in the direction that I wanted and would add at least 20km to my journey that day but hey what is an extra couple of hours on the bike; I would rather spend the extra time to have an adventure rather than just cycle down a main road and so off road I headed.

The landscape in this part of the world was ever changing now that we were starting to come into the Cardamon mountains but the one constant along the way were the padi fields that I seemed to encounter around every corner.

All along the roads of Cambodia you encounter people walking their cattle either to or from the fields.  The cattle really are the backbone of the agricultural process here.  Every village house will have at least one cow which acts as the ‘tractor’ which does the hard labour – everything from pulling the plough, carrying the equipment and bringing in the crops.

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On this same road I came across my first Cambodian peloton.  I am not sure what these guys were doing but I think that they were rustling coconuts.  If anybody knows can they let me know.

Eventually just as it was going dark I finally arrived at Kampot.  Once again people had responded to my facebook posts and had gotten in touch to offer me a place to stay.  This time it was the owners of the beautiful Bokor Mountain Lodge riverfront hotel – Andrew and Scott.

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From left to right – a member of staff, Andrew and Scott

It really was in a great setting and I had a great night’s sleep.  Perhaps the amount of alcohol that I had consumed had something to do with this as I had met up with Fraser and Trinh and gone out for beers. Or I should say I had gone out for beers as both Fraser and Trinh are not drinking at the moment.

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Fraser and I ‘giving it large’

The next morning, or afternoon as it was by the time we eventually left, it was bucketing down as we set off and continued raining for most of the day.  It didn’t matter though as it was a great to share the day with the guys.

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Fraser and Trinh – my friends from Ho Chi Minh

It was great to spend the day cycling with these guys and here is a video that I shot during the day:

That evening we arrived at Prey Nob, a great name for a place, and found somewhere to sleep.  To describe it a s a town was an exaggeration.  It really was a T junction where two major roads met.  Still it made a convenient place to stop for the night and all you need is somewhere with a fan and fresh water to wash which is what we had.

We had met up with two other cyclists from Finland along the way and so we all went out for dinner together.  It was very late by the time we were ready to go out and so options were limited.  We eventually found one place that would cook us some food and it turned out that like F&T they were also vegetarians and they all ordered vegetarian fried rice whilst I had the chicken.  As is pretty standard in Asia they do not really understand the concept of vegetarian food and I swear that the guys got more meat in their food than I did having ordered the chicken fried rice.

DSCN0579From left to right – Emilia. Mikko, myself, Fraser and Trinh

Emilia and Mikko were heading to Sihanoukville the following morning which was the opposite direction to where we were heading which was into the Cardamom Mountians and towards the border with Thailand.  We had arranged to meet at 8am for breakfast but as usual I was running late.  By the time Fraser and Trinh had finished breakfast I was just up.  I said that if they started on the road then I would catch them up and so after I had packed and had breakfast the guys had about an hour head start on me.  I stuck my head down and within 40 km I had caught up with them while they were stopped at a coconut stall.

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Fraser and I cycling towards the mountains

You really never know what is around the next bend or in this case over the next bridge – my ‘mini’ adventure that day was finding a load of oyster shuckers working by the side of the river.

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How to shuck an oyster with an axe

Here is the video I made and make sure you watch the grilled baby chicks at the end – a delicacy in SE Asia. (6 minutes)

As nightfall approached it was time to say goodbye to Fraser and Trinh as they were going to stop at a town called Sre Amble whilst I would push on for another 30km where I new that there was a river crossing and I hoped a bed for the night (which there was)

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There are times when cycling that you know that you will be able to find a place to sleep e.g. when there is a town on the map.  There are other times when this is not the case and as it gets dark around you there is nothing on the map for miles.  In cases like this the easiest thing to do is to pull into a restaurant or shop and use sign language – put your hands together on your head to make it look like you are sleeping on a pillow.  So far on this trip I have not pre-booked any accommodation and literally where I am when it goes dark is where I sleep for the night.  The video below shows what generally happens (6 minutes)

Now that I was on my own again all that stood between myself and Thailand were the Cardamom Mountains. Luckily though the roads were not busy, and about the only ‘traffic’ that I had that day was the odd cow crossing the road.

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A friend had recently cycled the same way and so I new what I was in for – 50 km of hell.  The mountains were not the steepest of the longest but cycling +100kg of bike, kit and fat westerner up a mountain this early into the trip definitely tested my resolve. (8 minutes)

After a long day in the saddle the mountains were now behind me and it was time to head for the border and to cross into Thailand.  There was a town about 5 km before the border, Koh Kong, but I still had about an hours daylight left so decided to head for the border.

DSCN0708The visa into Cambodia had cost me $30 USD and two passport photos.  At the Thai border it had cost me nothing and with just a smile and a stamp I was given 30 days in which to cover the 1800 km that would take me across the border into Malaysia.  This would be a tough ride given that I wanted to spend a week on the beach.  However, if the adventures in Thailand are anywhere near as fantastic as I have experienced in Cambodia and Vietnam I will be in for one hell of a good time.

I hope that you have enjoyed reading and watching my travels through Cambodia, and if so then drop me a line to say hi every now and again.

Cheers

Stewart

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Cycling through southern Cambodia
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