So we are finally safely into Cambodia after definitely the worst journey ever!
After a lot of deliberating and Lonely Planet checking we decided to book onto the tourist bus from Bangkok to Siem Reap, also known as the Scam Bus. We were told that hundreds of people will try to demand double the price to 'help'with your visa or changing money and that they try to take you to an affiliated guesthoiuse when you arrive which will be expensive and a bit scummy but as long as you politely say no to everything you'll be fine - not true!
The four of us set off bright and early from our hostel and everything was going fabuklously until about 20 mins before the border. We stopped at a restaurant to fill in our visa applications where, surprise surprise, the guy offered to help us get through quickly for only 1300 baht (about double the price of the visa if you just pay on the border) We did as we'd been told and said no thanks, we would just go through ourselves only to be told that the bus on the Cambodian side to Siem Reap wouldn't wait for us and we would have to hang around the border town of Poipet for about 5 hours waiting for the next bus.
Unsurprisingly we didn't fancy that much, expecting that the mystery new bus either wouldn't come at all or would charge us double since the guy refused to give us back our tickets so we could prove we had paid for the full journey. So, more than slightly annoyed, when we got to the border town on the Thai side we just took ourselves off to the visa desk and left the rest of the bus (who had all paid extra) behind. Strangely enough, as we were walking off our guide had a change of heart and offered to take us along with him to negotiate our visa ourselves but in a completely different direction to the customs office where another one of his friends was no doubt waiting to try and fleece more money out of us for something else...
By this point we were on our own in the middle of one of the worst border crossings\ in the world and so it came as very little surprise that the customs official for Cambodian visas was asking us for $20 plus 1000 baht for ''express service.'' When I said, very politely as instructed, that the normal service was fine thank you very muich and we would just be paying $20 they slammed the window shut and told us we would be waiting all day. Some other people were offered 100baht bribe which they paid and got their passports back straight away but we were stuck waiting in no-man's land, without our passports for the longest 15 minutes of my life! I think they realised that there were enough of us not to be intimidated into paying so just got on with processing our visas to get rid of us and try to overcharge the next people who came through.
After all that you would have thought that everything might get easier once we got through the border into Cambodia. No such luck! We gave up on the bus we'd paid for and decided to make our own way. First plan was to get the free tourist link to the bus station and then a bus or taxi on from there... easier said than done! Poipet has hundreds of buses standing around with no signs and hundreds of touts trying to get you on their bus. Understandably by this point we were pretty wary of believing what anyone said, especially when the tourist police were backing up all the touts in return for very obvious bribes, regardless of where their bus really went. So after running away from the group of about 5 touts following us around we agreed to pay $40 for a taxi all the way to Siem Reap.
It's the most beautiful journey through the rice fields and past some great local scenes - men riding along with 3 live pigs strapped to the back of their motorbikes, thousands of children in school uniform all cycling home at the end of the day and the most beautiful bright red sunset I've ever seen. Unfortunately it's also one of the worst roads i've ever travelled! There's a rumour that the airlines have bribed the government not to repair any of the roads so they're full of dust and potholes, although apparently miles better than they were a few years ago. So after 3 and a half hours of being bumped up and down we were more than ready to jump on a tuk tuk to our guesthouse and collapse! All in all the worst 12 hours travelling I've ever had to do...
But thankfully Siem Reap is completely different. Although it's hugely touristy everyone is incredibly friendly and we've organised our trip around Angkor Wat for tomorrow with a fab tuk tuk driver so things are definitely looking up for Cambodia!

PS I haven't forgotten to add all the rest of Thailand but have been promised a speical guest entry by Mr Jamie Davies which I'm sure will be well worth waiting for!