After our last week in Thailand we were really looking forward to Cambodia and the new adventures on offer there. The border crossing was our first obstacle, and it from our reading it looked like it might be a pretty big one, with corrupt officials, long waits and expensive taxis on the other side. On this trip, we seem to find that when preparing for the worst, we have a really good experience and this was the case here too! We weren't hassled too much and the ...

We had intended our stop-off in Surin to be a nice end to the NE of Thailand, we had hoped to include a visit to the "local" historical park for a warm-up to the Temples of Angkor in Cambodia. We took the train for a change, which turned out to be an excellent decision as we really enjoyed the journey through the rice paddies. The town wasn't very easy on the eye and there was a very poor choice of hotels and no guesthouses. We ended up staying in the...

Khorat, Thailand's second largest city, was just a quick stop-off to break up the journey between the North and South of the North East of Thailand. It took about 9 hours to get there, we were, of course, told about 5 hours would be enough. I wonder why its only been Thailand, apparently the easiest country to travel in the region, that we've had such troubles with transport? Anyways, thanks to some pretty laid-back driving and a full-to-the-rafters bus, we mad...

From Vientienne we took a bus across the border into North Eastern Thailand, staying for two nights in the border town of Nong Khai. We didn't really do much while we were there, just appreciated having somewhere nice to stay again and at a more reasonable price for our budget. The town itself was quite nice, with a modern promenade running alongside the Mekong and a few colourful temples. During our stay I decided to take the plunge and have my hair cut. ...

As Vang Vieng wasn't quite what we'd hoped for, we left a day early. It was a bit of a spur of the moment decision so we arrived at the bus terminal just after one bus had left, with the other leaving 3 hours later. There were sawngthaews (converted pick-up trucks with wooden benches in the back for seats) leaving every half an hour which apparently took the same time to get there so we made possibly one of our most rash decisions to date and caught one of them. ...