We had heard a lot of stories about travelling from Thailand to Cambodia overland, mainly about all the scams when crossing via the busiest border of Aranyaprapet/Poipet: cheap buses from Khao San Road arriving very late in Siem Reap to make sure the tourists will stay in a specific guesthouse, custom officers asking for extra money to process visas or touts offering very expensive taxi rides to Siem Reap. This is why we had decided to enter Cambodia from Surin via the less travelled border crossing of Chong Jom/O'Smach. Information and travellers experiences can be found on the very useful website www.talesofasia.com. Most of the information are about the crossing at Poipet but there are still a few postings about O'Smach. We knew that after negotiation people had paid around Bh2000/2400 for a taxi to Siem Reap and all advised to catch the first bus in Surin to arrive early at the border.We caught the first bus for Chong Jom at 6.10am which is in fact a mini-van that costs Bh60 per person. 1h30 later we arrived at the border. There is not much around, just the buildings for the custom officers. We had already purchased our visas in Bangkok but 2 French girls travelling with us obtained easily their visas at the border. The visa is $20 or Bh1000, with $1=Bh30 it is better to pay for the visa in dollars, Bh400 cheaper! Only one photo is needed for the visa application. So the first part of the crossing was easy however the other part which was to get a taxi to Siem Reap was a bit more tricky but turned out quite well.
First of all it did not look the best as there were only two taxis waiting for tourists on the other side of the border. One taxi was quickly taken by a Cambodian guy travelling with his Thai wife and his daughter so we had only one taxi left for us. The Cambodian guy who spoke very good English was nice as when we asked him he told us that the taxi ride to Siem Reap will cost him Bh500 per person. We wanted to share a taxi with the two French girls so we asked for a price for 4 people. The first offer we got was for Bh5000 as we were being told that it was the Cambodian New Year and there was no other taxi. We found out that the guy was right and that the 13th, 14th and 15th of April was a holiday time for the Cambodians so maybe not the best time to cross the border, but we knew the price was not Bh5000 for a taxi (Bh1250 per person!). As he did not want to put his price down and as we told him we did not want to pay more than Bh500 per person, he just drove away... but was back less than 10min later offering a ride for Bh2800 (Bh700 per person). We kept discussing the price and he finally accepted to take us for Bh2200 (Bh550 per person) but said we will have to share the taxi with others. After driving around the villages and coming back to the border 2 times he finally got 2 other passengers, so we could start our journey towards Siem Reap... 1h30 after arriving at the border!
Straight away we felt the huge gap between Thailand and Cambodia, the nice sealed road on the Thai side became a dusty and bumpy unsealed road on the Cambodian side, the landscapes were similar but the houses poorer. We were a bit squeezed in the car being 4 at the back and 3 at the front but the trip went quite well. The quality of the roads varied a lot, some were very bumpy narrow unsealed roads allowing a speed of only 20km/h, some other unsealed roads were in very good conditions and 80km/h was a very comfortable speed. Reaching Siem Reap we finally drove on sealed roads. This trip was our first contact with Cambodia, we were impressed by the trucks packed with people that kept passing us, we noticed all those little kids riding old bicycles 2 times bigger than them and we also found out that in Cambodia the average number of people on a motorbike was higher than in Thailand with most of the time 3-4 people squeezed together on old motorbikes. The dust was ever-present on those unsealed roads, making us realise how unpleasant it was for Cambodians to travel with motorbikes, bicycles or at the back of a truck. We were not surprised to see that a lot of people were wearing dust masks.
In Siem Reap our taxi dropped us, the tourists (not the two other Cambodians), at a petrol station at the entrance of the town where two tuk-tuks were waiting for us (it had been all arranged by our driver). If we did not have to stay with the French girls for them to draw dollars and give us back the $20 we lend them to buy their visas, we would have argued with the driver to drop us in town so we could have walked to our guesthouse. Anyway we got off the taxi, got our dollars back as there was an ATM at the petrol station and then got a tuk-tuk for $1 to take us to our Guesthouse. We did not go with the tuk-tuk that had been arranged for us as he wanted to take us to other guesthouses than the one we wanted to go to. He was trying to say that our guesthouse was not nice anymore and we should trust him to let him take us to better ones. Talking to other travellers in town we found out that all taxis coming from the borders do the same, they drop tourists outside of town where tuk-tuks are waiting to take them to the guesthouses they receive commissions from.
Well we finally arrived at our guesthouse at 2pm and after taking some time to rest after this long trip we decided to go and explore Siem Reap. In Siem Reap there is no boards with street names so it is not that easy to find out where you are. However the town is small so it does not take long to get to know the main streets...well for our first hour in town we appreciated the help of a very nice Cambodian guy who gave us a free lift on his motorbike to the tourist area. Around Bar Lane and Bar street are all the restaurants and bars for tourists. Just nearby is the old market and a very busy area where are lots of food stalls. We were amazed by the traffic which was very dense with motorbikes everywhere carrying up to 5 people, we also saw a guy carrying easily more than 50 chickens all tied up on his motorbike! For our first day in Cambodia we really felt the difference with Thailand, the stage of the roads, lots of people riding old bicycles (not many people cycle in Thailand), the messy streets, the way of driving (at the beginning of our journey it was not that obvious that people should drive on the right hand side!) and also the fact that in Cambodia nobody wears helmet (at least in Thailand some people do!). We got offered by a lot of tuk-tuk drivers to be taken to Angkor for the sunset but we rather stayed in town after a long day of travel.
