A step back in time through rural Cambodia

Pursat City – Krakor = 32km + 10km to Kampong Luang floating village

Tough day of riding the short distance to Krakor either on the dirt shoulder or on the pot hole rough bumpy highway. They don’t call cycle touring Cambodia the wild west of south east Asia for nothing.

Krakor is a dusty very poor looking town with 3 guesthouses, that I’m sure wouldn’t be often frequented. The first one looked a bit dodge so we settled on the 2nd one with a nice lady running it…..well let’s say a business woman. Andy did the negotiations while I looked after the bikes. After being offered fan room for US8 or aircon for US12 she then said $10. Super excited with the bartering once we were in the room we asked for the aircon remote only to be told ” no $8 room and $2 for bikes”. (So our first fan room this trip) Let’s just say lost in translation as no English around here.

Hey after the past few nights of great digs we knew we were going to have to lower the standards but after seeing some of the rural living standards today we are definitely living it up. Super lucky that for an extra $2 Betty and Nancy can be tucked up in the fan room with us as not hot tonight anyway.

Town of Krakor

Opposite our guesthouse – daily life in Krakor, cow and all

We unloaded the gear and rode the 10km down a bouncy dirt track to Kampong Luong one of the few floating villages remaining in Cambodia, which also has a floating school, church, petrol station, police station, markets, shops. It is set on Tonle Sap Lake which is the largest fresh water Lake in SE Asia and listed as a Unesco site. However there was nothing fresh water looking about it and as its the dry season the village was further away as they move it with the water heights. The road out to the floating village would be one of the poorest stilt house communities we have seen and we actually couldn’t wait to do a U-Turn and get out of there. Looked like something out of “Mad Max”. Hygiene was appalling, so we took a couple of discrete quick snaps and home for a shower! Definitely made our digs seem palacial.

The village on the way to the floating village

In the distance the floating village, rubbish and plastic everywhere

We decided to go for a walk through Krakor and what lovely people, and we changed our initial impression of this dusty town.

We stayed here for about 45mins just chatting or hand charades to this man and his wife and family. He did the best 30c ice creams. Sorting out the finance over the coke purchase

Krakor – Kampong Chnang = 64km

Hit the road early before the sun and wind picked up we decided to get down the road a bit before finding brekkie. Starting to get a little jaded it took us 30km to find something edible in Ponley which was a town full of activity

Deep fried banana stall

So much to look at along the way

We reached Kampong Chnang at midday and found a guesthouse where we stayed last night and today we are having a rest day. We have just under 600km on the clock and have ridden 11/13 days so legs and bum need a rest.

We have 4 solid days of riding ahead where we will be roughing it on and off the bike through rural Cambodia before we will reach the more touristy area of Kampot and Kep in the South where we will hang out for a while. Having a ball and loving Cambodia.