Fascinating Cambodia
N 12°33'26.1'' E 105°03'32.0''
Date:
12.06.2017
Day: 713
Country:
Cambodia
Location:
Romdoul Farm Residence
Latitude N:
12°33’26.1”
Longitude E:
105°03’32.0”
Daily kilometers:
78 km
Total kilometers:
24,086 km
As the crow flies:
54 km
Average speed:
23.9 km/h
Maximum speed:
29.0 km/h
Travel time:
3:14 hrs.
Soil condition:
Asphalt
Maximum height:
25 m
Total altitude meters:
71.270 m
Altitude meters for the day:
58 m
Sunrise:
05:33 h
Sunset:
6:25 pm
Temperature day max:
33°C
Departure:
07:00 a.m.
Arrival time:
12:30 p.m.
Total plate tires:
15
Plate front tire:
3
Flat rear tire:
10
Plate trailer tire:
1
(Photos of the diary entry can be found at the end of the text).
Before the sun cooks us, we get on our bikes early in the morning and cycle north. Traffic on this route has been low so far. Without any elevation, it goes along at about 25 km/h. Rice fields stretch out to our left and right. Miserable huts, some of which are on the verge of collapse, huddle in the beautiful green of the fresh rice seedlings. Cargo rickshaws park in front of a bamboo food stall. As we drive past, a delicious aroma wafts into our nostrils. Perhaps the rickshaw drivers are satisfying their hunger with the delicious national dish called amok. This is a curry dish prepared with coconut milk and served with meat, fish or seafood. Or they are eating Lok Lak, a common dish where the locals fry beef in a sauce which is then placed on onions and lettuce leaves. I would love to stop and satisfy my ravenous appetite with the tasty Khmer cuisine, but we still have at least 60 kilometers to go to our destination today, the ancient temple complex of Sambor Prei Kuk. Apart from that, we rarely eat meat, especially not from cookshops, as they usually don’t have a fridge. Meat spoils within a few hours in the monkey heat and the extremely high humidity of over 90 percent. So we cycle on, even though it’s already horribly hot at 9 a.m. and a shady spot would be tempting to rest for a while.
In a small town, there are posters everywhere with the likenesses of various politicians looking down on the inhabitants of the country. Their serious or smiling faces are intended to express seriousness or trust. Given what happened in this country just a few decades ago, these often power-hungry people tend to scare me. In contrast, we are delighted by five novices who are going from house to house to bless their inhabitants. In return for their blessing, they receive a few coins or something to eat. A few hundred meters further on, huge billboards stretch across the main road, warning people not to eat turtles and not to soak snakes in brandy. “Who would have thought that there is a lobby for species conservation in Cambodia,” I say happily.
Tack! Tack! Tack!, the sound of blows echoes across the street. Stonemasons work rough, light-colored stone with hammer and chisel to bring beautiful Buddha statues to life. We stop and take a few pictures. Some of the artists stop their work to ask us where we are coming from with our heavily laden bikes in these temperatures and where we are going. “We’re coming from Germany and in a few months we’ll be taking a longer break in Bangkok,” I say. The men shake their heads, laugh loudly, gesticulate wildly and don’t seem to believe a word we say.
The variety that Cambodia’s street life offers us is extensive. There is always something new to marvel at, admire and contemplate. As if a great power had given free rein to its imagination, it is either particularly loud, hectic, dusty, dirty, chaotic or particularly colorful, pleasantly green, good-smelling and quiet. 10 minutes later, the small town spits us back out into the peaceful countryside. Apart from a few vehicles overtaking us, there is hardly any traffic. A farmer plows through the rice field with his oxen right next to the strip of asphalt boiling in the sun. The hard work and the heat didn’t stop him from raising his hand and shouting a joyful “Chomreabsuor!” (hello) to us. “Hello! Hello!”, we reply. Right next to it, a fisherman throws his net into a pond filled with brown water with a sweeping motion. “Are there still fish in that sad pond?” wonders Tanja. “Well, if they are, they’re certainly not big,” I reply. We stop to watch the equally friendly man at his laborious work for a while. He hurls his net onto the murky water without stopping and it is always empty. “Well, if he feeds on this work, he must be starving today,” says Tanja. “Look at him. He hasn’t got an ounce of fat on his ribs. There are still a lot of people here in Cambodia who live on the absolute breadline,” I reply thoughtfully.
More and more often, the golden roofs of Buddhist temples rise up from the tropical canopy. We feel like we are in a world long gone. A world that takes us back to a time before technology, cars and pollution. We leave many of the deserted temples behind us. We pay a short visit to a particularly beautiful one of the sacred buildings. We put the bikes on the stand, sit down on the yellow-painted steps and take a short breather before continuing on to the little-known and mysterious ancient city of Isanapura, lost in the jungle…
If you would like to find out more about our adventures, you can find our books under this link.
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