23rd to 26th day Monday, January 19, 2015 Phnom Penh

Hello everyone,

I greet everyone in cold Germany.

Very early in the morning, I started off in Siem Reap, exactly at 6 o'clock. When I arrived at the reception, it was dark and there was no one to be seen. Well, I checked out and left the room key at the reception, as usual. And I just waited outside the hotel for my taxi...

But alas, there was a huge locked iron gate, seemingly for the security of the hotel guests at night, which prevented me from leaving the hotel premises. So, I had to go back to the reception and behold, there was some movement behind a table, under a mosquito net. They were the two nice gentlemen who were on the night shift. After calling them 3 or 4 times, they finally woke up, and with a laugh, they took care of me.

They organized a taxi for me over the phone and brought me a coffee immediately, so the day could start well. The destination was Phom Penh, the capital of Cambodia. And this time, not by bus, no, but by boat, to be precise, by speedboat across the Tonle Sap Lake directly from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh.

So, we went straight towards the destination at a speed of 40-50 knots (80-100 km/h). And let me tell you, it was fun to speed across the lake. What was not funny was the price of 35 dollars, but this time they tried to rip me off again and asked for 40 dollars at the hotel (I'll get it back somewhere else). Arriving in Phnom Penh, the first thing, as always, was to go to the hotel and then to a less funny, rather tragic, place, namely the 'Toul Sleng Museum'. The former prison and torture center of the Khmer Rouge from April 17, 1975 - January 7, 1979. What happened there is simply horrifying!

The next day, there were also the 'Killing Fields'. Those who went there had no idea what was going on there. One thing is certain, they never came back. Pol Pot's (Brother Number One) people were on the verge of exterminating their own people (3 million dead out of 8 million inhabitants) during that time, 'Unimaginable'.

Well, after that, there was the typical sightseeing, and then it was unfortunately time to say goodbye to Cambodia.

The next morning, I took a tuk-tuk to the bus station, then a bus (6 hours), changed to a tuk-tuk (12 km) to the Cambodia/Thailand border, crossed the border on foot (this time everything went smoothly and without extra fees), squeezed into a minibus with 2 people per seat (no problem at all, as it was only 80 km), switched to a shared taxi (this time I chose to stand at the back), walked to the ferry, and finally took another shared taxi to the hotel (of course, I had to stand again due to space constraints).

So, let's count, shall we? Right, 6 transfers! Everything was quite simple, and now I have earned my next 12 days of vacation.

You probably won't hear much from me here until then, but I will continue my journey and I promise to update you here again.