Saturday 10th January 2009
I decide to travel to Battambang to see what it would be like in a different city of Cambodia other than Siem Reap or Phnom Penh. Someone suggested I take a river boat there, as he put it, it was a great experience. I learned a lot from this...A great experience does not necessarily mean a great trip! When I arrive at the port I see a boat that looks loaded with people, I ask someone which boat is mine and he points to the loaded one! 
The trip is about 9hrs, some nice sights on the way but after an 1hr or 2 you've seen them all a 100 times over. 7 or so hours later its relief to get off the boat. I was lucky enough to get a seat on the bottom level while quite a few people had to sit up on top in the blazing sun...you wouldn't believe some of the red faces, arms & legs at the end of the trip!Pulling up into the city centre of Battambang is some sight...similar to Poi Pet at the border, it has a edge about it. It kind of grows on you on after a while, especially when you see how nice the people are. I had a funny incident on my first night where I left my hotel without any map...in the end I got well lost and after several attempts to find my way back I had to ask for some help. I called in on a few guys playing Chess and asked them to point in the right direction. None of them had much English so one of the guys hops on his mo ped and tells me to jump on...now we all heard plenty of stories of people getting taxi's/tuck-tucks and they taking them to some unknown place and demanding cash from them. Sod it, there isn't much in my wallet so I decide to take my chances. I hop on the back and tell him my hotel name. I've no idea where I am but this guy starts to give me a tour of the town, a few sights like the market & the river front, bars & restaurants. I'm beginning to wonder where this is all going and starting to think...is he going to charge me for this? Sure enough after about 30mins he's dropped me right outside my hotel, I try to give me a couple of dollars but he won't accept a thing and just departs with a smile and a wave good bye...you can't beat that!
In most of these towns/cities everything revolves about the market and this place is no different! It has quite a large market and from 6am to 6pm its all systems go. What ever you want they got it!
The plan in Battambang is to spend two days and then venture on to Phnom Penh. We book up to do a day trip the following day. The trip entails going to the Killing Caves, Pagoda and the Bamboo train but in the end we get to see a little more than we bargained. The trip starts out with a tour around some villages and a trip to a farm to see how they grow and harvest the different types of rice. After that its a trip to another farm to see a range of different vegetables that they grow in the area. The guide we have is second to none, great English, has an answer for everything and really witty! We do the other sights with a couple of stop offs for food and at the end of the day they take us to see some cock fighting. It seems to be a big pastime over here...there seem to be cock fighting rings in most villages. 
At the end of the day we make it to the Bamboo train. This is basically a make-shift carriage (the surface of which is made from Bamboo...hence the name) with a motor attached to it so it can run along a rail track. It is still used by locals today in transferring goods from one village to the next. Anyway we hop on for our trip but we are no more than 5mins into it when something snaps and front two two wheels hop off the track...its a bit of a shock...even to the driver but in a couple he has back on the track and the piece of wood that snapped is now tied up with a piece of string...I'm sure that will keep it together for another couple of trips!!!
I decide to travel to Battambang to see what it would be like in a different city of Cambodia other than Siem Reap or Phnom Penh. Someone suggested I take a river boat there, as he put it, it was a great experience. I learned a lot from this...A great experience does not necessarily mean a great trip! When I arrive at the port I see a boat that looks loaded with people, I ask someone which boat is mine and he points to the loaded one! The trip is about 9hrs, some nice sights on the way but after an 1hr or 2 you've seen them all a 100 times over. 7 or so hours later its relief to get off the boat. I was lucky enough to get a seat on the bottom level while quite a few people had to sit up on top in the blazing sun...you wouldn't believe some of the red faces, arms & legs at the end of the trip!Pulling up into the city centre of Battambang is some sight...similar to Poi Pet at the border, it has a edge about it. It kind of grows on you on after a while, especially when you see how nice the people are. I had a funny incident on my first night where I left my hotel without any map...in the end I got well lost and after several attempts to find my way back I had to ask for some help. I called in on a few guys playing Chess and asked them to point in the right direction. None of them had much English so one of the guys hops on his mo ped and tells me to jump on...now we all heard plenty of stories of people getting taxi's/tuck-tucks and they taking them to some unknown place and demanding cash from them. Sod it, there isn't much in my wallet so I decide to take my chances. I hop on the back and tell him my hotel name. I've no idea where I am but this guy starts to give me a tour of the town, a few sights like the market & the river front, bars & restaurants. I'm beginning to wonder where this is all going and starting to think...is he going to charge me for this? Sure enough after about 30mins he's dropped me right outside my hotel, I try to give me a couple of dollars but he won't accept a thing and just departs with a smile and a wave good bye...you can't beat that!In most of these towns/cities everything revolves about the market and this place is no different! It has quite a large market and from 6am to 6pm its all systems go. What ever you want they got it!
The plan in Battambang is to spend two days and then venture on to Phnom Penh. We book up to do a day trip the following day. The trip entails going to the Killing Caves, Pagoda and the Bamboo train but in the end we get to see a little more than we bargained. The trip starts out with a tour around some villages and a trip to a farm to see how they grow and harvest the different types of rice. After that its a trip to another farm to see a range of different vegetables that they grow in the area. The guide we have is second to none, great English, has an answer for everything and really witty! We do the other sights with a couple of stop offs for food and at the end of the day they take us to see some cock fighting. It seems to be a big pastime over here...there seem to be cock fighting rings in most villages. At the end of the day we make it to the Bamboo train. This is basically a make-shift carriage (the surface of which is made from Bamboo...hence the name) with a motor attached to it so it can run along a rail track. It is still used by locals today in transferring goods from one village to the next. Anyway we hop on for our trip but we are no more than 5mins into it when something snaps and front two two wheels hop off the track...its a bit of a shock...even to the driver but in a couple he has back on the track and the piece of wood that snapped is now tied up with a piece of string...I'm sure that will keep it together for another couple of trips!!!
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