After checking out of our hotel in Sihanoukville, we caught a minibus to Kampot. We went there as it is meant to be less touristy and more like the 'real' Cambodia, but there were loads of tourists and expats so I'm not sure that's true anymore! Anyhow, Kampot is quite a small, dusty, cute riverside town. At night all the dogs in the neighbourhood howl like crazy, like something out of 101 dalmations. The electricity cuts out at least once a day. The roundabouts ...

It took almost six hours for our bus to reach Sihanoukville from Phnom Penh. We'd booked a hotel in advance and felt a bit out of place when we turned up, with our sweaty faces and our backpacks, as it looks like a 4 star kind of place even though it wasn't expensive. Felt a bit better when we realised that there is a building site next door, no plugs in the bathtub and that the drawerhandles fall off when you open them too energetically - perhaps we are the usua...

According to our lonely planet, a 2008 TI corruption perceptions index ranked Cambodia as 166th out of 180 countries, i.e. very corrupt. We experienced our first taste of this before we even made it across the border when, despite the tourist visa being just $20, we were made to pay $25 to the official. Since then we have spoken to locals who have told us that Cambodians have to bribe staff at the supposedly 'free' hospitals to treat them or they won't be seen to...