soooooo...........

just got into Thailand tonight... man what a bunch of crazy days i've had this week. First off, I left Sihanoukville... quite heartbroken to say the least, and headed off to Kampot which is about 2 hours away. The guesthouse was decently nice.... pretty cheap... stayed there 3 nights and it only cost me $28 for room and food.

However, every night about 5:30 or 6:00, it would start pouring... out of nowhere.... i don't mean raining ... literally it was like a faucet was turned on... plus lightening and thunder to boot. Well one day, figure it would be a good idea to rent motos and drive out to Kep Beach. Usually this takes about 30 mins. On the way there (already a late start), get there in enough time to catch a boat over to Rabbit Island. Not only did i not want to drive my moto in the dark, but with the previous 2 nights down-pouring the way it had... i really didn't want to get stuck in that.

It's about a half hour ferry ride to Rabbit Island, so to make sure to have plenty of time to get back... the boat is to pick us up at 4:30. It gets to be about 5 til, and it finally shows up... already behind schedule. Don't end up leaving Kep until 5:45.... with the sun setting and the massive black clouds rolling in.

It starts raining so hard and so much, you have no choice but to pull over. End up at some family's house (about 20 people of all ages) sitting there staring.... waiting for a show.. or something... probably thinking how dumb it is that there are westerners driving around in the pouring rain. This was only about 10 minutes into the drive. So, we wait til it dies down a bit and continue on the way... only to have to stop again about 10 mins down the road. This time... no family's house for comfort.... only this straw covered shack with the wooden planks, used as floorboards, starting to break through. This by no means is shelter... but its better than being completely poured on.

About 10 mins later... on the way back.... it seems like we just might make it.... literally around the corner... but of course.. it starts back up again.. this time... worse than before.

Absoultely insane!!! I"ve never seen it rain like that before.. let alone get stuck in it or try to drive a moto bike through it. It ended up taking almost 2 hours to get back.

Then, this morning, i get on my mnibus that is going to take me to the Thailand border. When i got on, it was already full... and by full i mean there was only 1 legit seat left... and i took it. However, we stop 4 or 5 more times to pick up more stuff and more people. Not including the driver... there were 14 people inside the van, plus everyones cargo... rice, plastic bins, a basket of dead ducks... yeah ... you read right. Not to mention there were 4 guys sitting on the top of the van because there was no more room inside.

So we drive this way for the next 4 and a half hours..... get to the border... finally a group of us talks this guy into taking us to Trat (which is where most of us need to get to catch a connecting bus to Bangkok). No one wants to take us for anything less than a ridiculous price.... but we finally end up getting 11 people shoved into the back of this truck... 2 of them barely hanging on. We arrive in Trat at 5:47 with the LAST bus leaving at 6:00.

You have no idea how happy i was to be on that bus to Bangkok.

So I'm now going to meet up with some friends who i met in Laos, and head down to Koh Tao for a little while before my flight to Aussie.

I'll write again before i go to the islands and hopefully upload the pictures I have from Phnom Pehn to Kep.

Thank you all for your emails!!!

xoxox