After an eventful 12 hour bus journey we arrived in Ban Lung very tired. The buses work a bit differently here, they sell more tickets then they have seats for so people were balancing pieces of wood between two aisle seats to create a seat, and they even squeezed two moto's (scooter to me and you) in the luggage compartment under the bus. This then created a problem as people couldn't get there back packs on, so these went in the aisle also. As you can imagine the bus was pretty cramped. Anyway we found a cheap hotel, grabbed a bite to eat at a restaurant which was run by a Dutch couple and then headed back to bed.

The main reason we had come to Ban Lung was to do some trekking and see some of the beautiful scenery. We organised a two day trek for the following day, so for the rest of the afternoon we decided to head to a volcanic lake on some bicycles we had hired. We weren't expecting the ride to be so steep, at points we had to get off and walk but we made it in the end and it was well worth it. The lake was beautiful, surrounded with forest and decked areas to sit on and relax. We stayed for a couple of hours before we plucked up the courage to cycle back. That evening we found a great little Cambodian restaurant serving very authentic Khmer food, it was cheap too.

The next morning we were collected from the hotel to head off trekking. We joined with another group of people and drove down dusty lanes until we reached the river. The organiser gave us our hammocks and water and we set off in two extremely small boats towards the village. These boats were so narrow that you had to sit in a line facing the front. The boat ride was stunning, the villages around the river are very remote, they don't have electricity and you could see the men fishing in the river. After 40 minutes we arrived, we hopped off the boat and walked up in to the village. The locals had just cooked a pig over a fire, one guy was sitting with his bow and arrow. We continued further in to the village and stopped at one of the houses. The kids all sat and watched us as we waited to leave. There were lots of puppies, chickens, ducks and pigs wandering round and you could really see the basic way of life all these people live. There were huts on stilts scattered around the fields. Every house seems to have a huge chainsaw; one Canadian guy with us said they were over a thousand dollars each so they obviously make a lot of money probably through illegally logging.
We headed out on our trek through the fields and in to the jungle, the scenery was beautiful but there was very little wildlife. Mainly because anything that moves, the villagers kill and eat. We trekked for about 4 hours through the jungle and finally reached our camp. We were amazed by our guides, one of whom was from the village. He carried a huge sack tied to his back with a scarf, it was full of food, all sorts of vegetables and weighed more than both of our big rucksacks that we are travelling with, luckily we weren't carrying these.

Our camp was next to a beautiful waterfall, everyone was rather hot and sweaty after the walk so we jumped in for a swim. The water was freezing but it was so refreshing. After, we soon dried off and started to get ready for diner. Our guides were busy getting everything ready, cutting down bamboo to make cups for all of us and cutting down big pieces of bamboo in which they stuffed with rice, vegetables, pork, chilli and various other seasoning. They then placed the stuffed bamboo over the fire to cook. And wow the food was absolutely amazing, probably the best food we have had in Cambodia. They then brought out the home made rice wine, blimey this was strong!! A bit later although everyone was full our guides were cooking beef and pork over the fire, this has to be the best meat we have ever tasted!!! We are slowly recognising the benefits of seasoning food with MSG. After this we were all tired so we got into our hammocks, it's proved a little challenging for some people. The hammocks weren't normal ones, they had mosquito nets attached to them so you had to climb inside them and zip it up, it was like being in a cocoon. It was lovely being able to sleep under the stars with the sound of the waterfall next to us and the sound of animals in the jungle. It was a pretty cold night, for some they only had a small blanket so didn't manage to get much sleep, unfortunately Pete was one of these.

The next morning we were up early and tucked into some breakfast of noodle's and vegetables, it was yummy! All water used for cooking or drinking was taken from the river, Pete was a bit scared about drinking the coffee and insisted that the water boil for 12 minutes to ensure all germs were killed. We packed up and headed off back to the village, going a different way this time. Our first obstacle was to climb a steep mountain, it went on for ages but we managed. To celebrate we cracked open what was left of the rice wine and finished it off, bare in mind it was only 9.30am at this point. Once we had all recovered we continued on, it was all up and down but good fun. One of our guides stopped at one point and went over to a bush and pulled a leaf out, he folded the leaf in half and started to pat it, we were all a little confused until he opened the leaf up and it was full of big red ants that were now half dead. He then proceeded to pick up a big bunch and put them in his mouth, yuk! But we tried them and they actually tasted quite nice...like a sour sweet. We continued on until we stopped at a river for lunch. After a quick break we carried on going, we finally reached the edge of the jungle and were walking through the fields in the baking sun. It was so hot we were all dripping, we walked for a further hour then reached the village with a big sigh of relief! Before we started the trek we were all given 2 big bottles of water to take with us and when we got to the camp they filled our bottles with tea made from the wood of a certain type of tree, it wasn't the nicest! We were happy to be back at the village but our day was not over yet. Our guide took us on a tour of the village, it really is the simple life! He then took us to the cemetery which was amazing, each grave had a hut over it which was decorated with cloth and handcrafted wooden sculptures. After this it was time to head to the boats. After a 7 hour trek we were exhausted, when our boat arrived back at the drop off point, we were greatest by Mr Smey who we booked the trip with, luckily he had brought cold drinks for all of us.
Unfortunately they only had a pick up truck to take us back into town, and there were 7 of us, some got in the cab of the truck whilst the rest of us jumped in the back. Cambodia is a very dusty country and the earth for some reason is red here. Pete had an unfortunate position on the back of the truck and ended up being covered head to toe in red dust by the time we got back to town. We were pretty tired so we met up with everyone for a meal and headed back to the hotel for an early night as we had to be up at 5.30 the next day to catch our bus.

We would like to say that that was that, however Kate woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of cars beeping their horns, people running about and what sounded like fireworks. A little worried she started to get up, all of a sudden you could see two shadows at our windows and could here them trying to pull down the metal gate, petrified she woke Pete up and went to the door. As she got to the door she could smell smoke, she opened the door and looked down the corridor, it was all lit up with loads of smoke and ash flying down it, there was a fire. Luckily we packed the night before as we had to be up early the next day to catch a bus. In complete panic and not knowing where exactly the fire was we quickly grabbed our stuff. We couldn't get down the stairs of the hotel as this is where the fire was. So we had to go out the back, pull a metal grill back and climb under onto another balcony. Luckily we found another set of stairs we could take in an adjoining building. We finally made it outside and you couldn't breathe because of the smoke. We legged it across the road to get out of the way of the electricity cables and joined the hundreds of people that had already gathered. By this time it was 12am, the fire was in the building next door and had clearly been burning for some time. There were no police or ambulance, and after watching the fire for 20 minutes the first fire truck turned up, it stayed no more than a few minutes until it had run out of water and had to go and refill. Ban Lung is a very small town in a remote location, you can tell they aren't prepared for these kinds of incidents, people were helping the firemen hold the hose. The fire truck was even donated by the People's Republic of China. So after another 10 minutes another fire truck arrived, emptied there water trunk and disappeared. An hour later they finally got the fire under control. We were now homeless with no where to go so we headed up the road to try and find a hotel that we could stay in and have a couple of hours sleep. It was the most scariest night of our lives, we are just glad we got out ok with our belongings.