Touring Cambodia

Poipet, Cambodia by Motorcycle

     by Glenn Black

On to Poipet, Cambodia

The next day I made the run into Poipet and exited Thailand without incident (of course, full registration and a book is required). I stopped at the customs office in Poipet to ask about a temporary import document. The Khmer I spoke to at the customs office spoke English and was nice and told me not even to worry about it. He said, "customs in Phnom Penh are supposed to issue the documents but for the present this isn't being bothered with. Just don't worry about it".

I asked if I could exit through another border crossing; for example, Koh Kong? He said "sure". I took him at his word and this turned out to be the case.

Map of Thailand
Map of Cambodia

The road through Poipet and out of town to Sisophon was hard surfaced and bore very little resemblance to the WWI battlefield character of the road I had struggled through on my return to Cambodia in late Oct of 2000. There is a nice sealed 2-lane all the way to Sisophon and it took me only about 45 minutes to get there.

Sisophon, Cambodia

Sisophon nowadays looks much better than in past times. Nine years previously, this was a dangerous, military town with a lot of violence and while it looks nicer today, I didn't stick around too long to look under the surface. With the war finally ended since early 1999, even Sisophon must be tamer. There appeared to be many new hotels in town. I headed down Hwy 5 to Battambang.

Battambang, Cambodia

In Battambang I was unprepared for the explosion of development that confronted me. There were new hotels everywhere and I eventually settled for one on Hwy 5 called the Rattanak. The rooms were $12 a day with air-con and satellite television. It was quite nice. There are several touristy bars and restaurants off streets on the river-side of town.

In the evening I rode for a little out of town on Hwy 10 to Pailin, just to see how that road was doing. From 1998 to the end of 2000 I drove down this road at least three times a week to the Samlaut turn-off. During most of those trips the road was awful and my thoughts of comparing a road to a WWI battlefield first occurred to me during those long, churning car trips down to Samlaut. At it's worst, 2.5 to 3 hours down to Ta Sanh and the same time to return to Battambang that evening. Sometimes the provincial public works department would grade the road, reducing this time to 1.5 hours.

Turning onto Hwy 10, I thought I would at least visit Phnom Sampov, the dramatic, limestone karsts that serves as a picnic area for Khmer about 10 km west of Battambang. Hwy 10 is being rebuilt and every half-kilometer are detours where bridges are being built. The reconstruction appears to be a serious effort and the new road will be better than anything that existed previously. Regrettably, it will probably be used to exploit what remains of the forests around Pailin and the top half of the Cardamom Mountains, accessible via the Samlaut road south of Treng.

... next Phnom Penh, Cambodia