Here I didn’t really do much, other than change modes of transport.

I got up early to get a 07:00 bus to Stung Treng from Ban Lung. The bus stop was actually a picnic table sat in front of a food stall, where the bus drivers congregated. There was no written indication that this was a bus stop, but the people there looked like they were waiting for something, so I had decided to stop here and ask a day earlier about buses to Stung Treng. The bus was late, so I sat there and ate a fairly enormous baguette until it turned up. A man who had helped me with the bus times disappeared with his son and returned in a minibus a few minutes later.

I got in the bus ad sat there for the obligatory drive-arouund of the local area, fishing for extra passengers. Eventually we set off for Stung Treng and got there a few hours later. In Stung Treng I went and had coffee as soon as I got off the bus and was joined by an Australian man who had spotted me in Ban Lung the day before. We talked and a German and an Italian the Australian had bumped in to came over and joined us. The conversation started getting a bit deep, so I left and went and found a hotel. After finding one, the woman on reception had wanted all of the money up front. I had spoken to a Thai and a Cambodian woman whilst having coffee and they had said that it was dangerous staying in guesthouses, as you never knew if your stuff was safe. With this in mind, I decided that I needed to give the guest house staff some incentive to look after my stuff, so I refused to pay and then left, as they refused to give me the room key. I walked around the corner and checked-in to somewhere else.

After findind somewhere to stay, I went to the nearest place that looked like it had tourist information and asked them about getting to Kompong Thom. They said that I could get a motorbike to Tbeng Meanchey and then a shred taxi to Kompong Thom. This was going to cost $60, but they could give me a discount of $5, to make it $55. I walked outside and talked to the motorbike drivers and they said they could do it for $35. The next morning I got up to meet my allocated moto-dup driver and got to Tbeng Meanchey, paying $5 for a shared taxi to Kompong Thom.