Well here we are in Phnom Penh, staying ant the Sokha Heng guest house, which is very nice.

The trip from Saigon yesterday went pretty smoothly.We walked from our hotel to the bus stop, concerned at the prospect of catching a public bus, having seen (and nearly been run over) by the green rattlers around town. Pleasantly surprised to find a reasonably new coach with toilet and airconditioning.The drive to Cambodian border was about 2 ½ hours, and it took a while to get through, waiting in line to be called up to the counter.Georgie was first, then Janie then me.We had to wait on the other side and it took a while for Cal to get through.It turned out that his Vietnamese visa hadn't been fully stamped when we entered.He had to go back to the other side and get the Visa fixed before they could let him through.Dino the tour guide was with him, but it must have been a bit worrying as neither Mum nor Dad was with him, but he took it all in his stride.We then got back on the bus and drove to a stop for lunch - we didn't eat there on the advice of Dino as people have come down with food poisoning in the past (we bought some rolls etc as we were pre-warned, so no-one went hungry).One interesting observation is the number of casinos crowding the border on the Cambodian side - they aren't allowed in Vietnam.

The first part of the Cambodian leg was through dried paddy fields - it actually looked like much of Queensland, flat and boring.The difference however is that there is water around, and you can tell it would be a very different place in the wet.The fact that most houses are on stilts also attests to the fact it gets pretty wet.

The overall feeling is of crushing poverty, most of the houses are very basic.

We got to the Mekong River crossing and had to wait a while for the barge (there is no bridge).On the other side the conditions seemed even worse - I saw one man with his shirt off who looked like the wind would blow him over.As we got closer to Phnom Penh conditions improved, but the road deteriorated.Many people are actually quite fat; Dino told us that being fat is a status symbol.

Initial perceptions of Phnom Penh are positive.The people are very friendly, and the little kids are gorgeous - cheeky grins and they seem very bright.I do however get an underlying feeling of oppression.This is mainly due to an interaction I saw between a policeman and a cyclo driver in the market.I don't know what happened to make the policeman angry but he was indicating to the driver that he was going to pull his baton out and give him a flogging.He was trying to do that in a covert way, and when he saw me looking he raised his eyebrows at me and gave me a look that was frankly quite chilling.It was clear that using his baton wouldn't be a new activity.

We had tea in a nice local restaurant where we tried the local cuisine - mine was a mild curry called Moka which was very nice.The local beer (Angkor) is also OK.

I went to bed early as I am coming down with a cold, so I will let Janie tell you about what she did.