Goodbye Thailand, hello Cambodia

The first part of my overland trip to Siem Reap – the Thailand bit – was not too bad, taking only 4 hours to get to the boarder from Pattaya. The Cambodia immigration process was as tedious as everyone had warned, but eventually we were in. I had decided to upgrade from minibus to taxi for the Cambodia part of the journey on the basis that this would be quicker and perhaps more comfortable. The first hour or so of the drive was reasonably OK and I was starting to wonder what all the fuss had been about. Then we hit the dirt track that passed for a road for the remaining 3 hours of the journey to Siem Reap, and I was wishing that I had been able to fly in as originally planned. At one point we hit a bump so violently that my head hit the roof of the car quite hard.
The hotel I had booked at the last minute was, as I had feared, some way out of town so I had to get a taxi in to the main eating and drinking places. Had a great Khmer meal and a few beers, then walked around a bit before heading back to the hotel for an early night, ready for a 5:00 am start the next day.