Our first land border crossing since Africa! We've not exactly been frugal with the cash and have flown our way around Asia!

This border crossing isn't even in Lonely Planet, we only know about it from someone else who did it and she told us she had a nice van with a lovely driver who dropped them at their chosen hotel. It didn't quite work out like that for us.

We caught a mini van from Kanchanaburi to Phunamron at the border. Us two, seventeen locals and all our luggage squeezed into this small van. Once through Thai immigration we paid £16 each, which is the most we've paid for land transportation yet, for onward transport to Dawei; a little town in Southern Myanmar. We got a pick up truck through no mans land and was then told to wait-that was the extent of the English spoken. Just over an hour later our transport arrived. It was a car and there was already one person in it. After we'd put our luggage in the boot another person turned up. Poor Tony had to sit in the middle seat all the way.

It was a hot, very dusty and very bumpy four hour journey. The road was gravel and as the driver didn't like slowing down for the very frequent bends, twists and turns, the car did a lot of sliding about. He was also fond of closely following in the wake of other vehicles and so you couldn't see a thing for the dust. Thankfully he knew the road well but there was some aggressive braking when he finally could see something in front.

This part of Myanmar looks even less developed than Laos although I imagine that will change as they are building a Special Enterprise Zone and creating a four lane highway that will link to Bangkok and a train line that will link to China.

The very lush hills were dotted with frequent gold pagodas.

We got dropped off several kilometres out of town. The driver refused to go in town and told us to catch a motorbike taxi which was 5000kyat (£3). We had no local currency yet I told him, and then told a little lie and said the company we'd booked the transport through, said we would be dropped at our hotel-which we hadn't yet actually booked.

After ten minutes of him saying he wouldn't get back in the car and me saying this was already agreed, we didn't have money and it was too hot to walk, he finally very begrudgingly got back in and took us to our chosen hotel which a friend had told us about.

Unfortunately they had no rooms in our price bracket available. They were very friendly and sent us around the corner saying there was another guesthouse there. Dawei has six hotels in total, all built in the last two years since the area opened to tourists.

After being shown to a room with single beds next to reception and us declining it, she showed us another room upstairs with a double bed and an extra single bed but the bathroom was downstairs. This was also $20 rather than the downstairs $15 room.

Putting my boots back on ( one always has to take them off in hotels in Asia), I said we'd think about it and may come back. She dropped the price to $16 but we said we would prefer an ensuite. Amazingly she said she had one -with double bed, away from reception, air con and TV and we could have it for $20. Feeling slightly bewildered as to why we hadn't been shown this already and why it was the same price as the other room, we took it. It even has somewhere to hang clothes-not often we get that!

When we came to pay the fun really started. We'd heard that dollars need to be pristine. Ours unfortunately had some minuscule creases in, which we hadn't even noticed, and the currency exchange counter in Bangkok had stamped them all when handing them over. Our lady didn't want to accept these and after scrutinising every note and asking me to swap the ones she didn't like the look of, we handed over the $20 in various denominations.

Thinking all was ok but slightly worried we had $250 no one would touch, she returned with a $1 note and asked us to exchange it. We couldn't. We had no other perfect notes. We set off to find a cash machine for local currency, these were only introduced in Myanmar in 2012 and are prone to not working or being out of cash. We found three in town.... None would let us take out cash. We were feeling desperate.

Spotting a gold jewellers I asked if he would change money; he would. We held our breath while he scrutinised the two $50 notes I handed over and then he gave us a rate which wasn't bad at all. Phew, we could eat and at least pay for a room here for another night.

Our dollars, if we can change them all with the jeweller, should last us until Yangon in a week or so, where we hope, given the influx of tourists into this area, accessing cash may be easier. If it's not.....well, it will be a very short trip to Myanmar.

After the money fiasco we were in need of a beer, our first in a week due to feeling unwell. Despite the adverts we'd seen, not many places sell it! We finally found a restaurant that did. A draught beer for 40p! Bargain.

The locals here are super friendly. As the area only opened up to foreign visitors in 2013, I don't think they've seen many westerners and so we are still intriguing to them. They stop and shout hello and then wave. The shyer women smile at us. Some drive past on their bikes and stare, mouths open.

The men all wear longyi's ( sarongs) and the women and children wear thanaka, a face paint of sorts that acts as both a suncream and serves a cosmetic function.

There is very limited infrastructure for travellers so it may prove a challenge arranging an onward bus further north. There are few restaurants and no bars. We went to a local tea house for dinner at 5pm having not eaten since 8am. It was full of men drinking tea and reading the papers. I was unsure whether I'd be allowed in but the owner came out, told us what he was cooking, and invited us in, pulling out a chair amongst every one else. We had delicious noodles with chicken and a side dish of pickles and onions for 60p. A pot of tea was given for free. Tomorrow he told us, was Sunday, which meant they make biriyani. I think we will be going back for that.