The last of my major activities in Phnom Penh was a 4 hour quad bike tour of the Cambodian countryside. It was by and large a brilliant time, but the day I chose to do it was blisteringly hot and unpleasantly dusty. I later realised that every day was probably this dusty and polluted but I hadn’t noticed because any significant distances I’d previously travelled had been in a car, rather than on a tuk-tuk or quad bike. (The starting point of the tour was an hour from my hostel but the quad bike people sent a tuk-tuk to pick me up. An hour in a tuk-tuk wouldn’t have been so bad but the dusty, ridiculously pot holed road did not make for a pleasant journey).

There was one other guy in the tuk-tuk with me, Anton from Germany. He was only doing a one hour tour though (whereas I went for the half day option) so after we got started on the quad bikes, we only travelled together for about 20 minutes before our paths diverged. The Cambodian countryside was, as I had already found it to be in other places, absolutely beautiful. As the day wore on it became clear that the heat was a mixed blessing. I’ve told you before that I don’t deal with the heat well so I wasn’t loving it at first but the weather conditions that resulted from that heat made the visibility excellent. You could see out over the unspoilt Cambodian landscapes for as far as your eyes would let you. It was important for several reasons to take care when navigating the dirt roads we were on though. I had a guide leading the way on a motorbike so the paths he took around the sometimes massive holes and fractures were not necessarily the best ones for me to take, being on a four wheeled vehicle instead of a two wheeled one. There were also very sudden drop offs by the sides of a lot of these routes, sometimes leading into river, sometimes leading into a field or rice paddy. And also, just like with the horse riding I’d done in Siem Reap, our path took us past a number of long ‘residential roads’ (I’m not sure if I can actually call them that given that they look like they’re in the wilderness but they did have lots of houses on them and people living there). The people living in these houses often had young (and unspeakably cute) kids with them. When they heard the quad bike coming they’d run outside and start waving and saying hello, it was absolutely adorable and one of the cutest things I’ve ever seen. After seeing this and the dance I saw a few days earlier in that Siem Reap orphanage, I can see why Angelina Jolie felt so compelled to start her adoption spree here. Some of the slightly older kids that were already outside would stick their arms out as I went past so I could high-five them, it was really fun.

The heat wasn’t as bad as it could have been because on the clearer, child and pot hole free roads, I could cut lose a little and build up some real speed on the quad bike. As I was so close to the ground, the sense of speed was fantastic as the air rushed past me and the Cambodian scenery blurred by. It was nice that, unlike the horse I was riding a week earlier, the quad bike did not get tired or suffer from heat exhaustion.

About 2 hours after we started, my guide gestured that we stop for a light lunch. It was only a pack of crisps but the drinks he got us were very refreshing. He got us sugar cane juice mixed with mandarin orange juice and ice cold water. I was expecting not to like it because I don’t like things that are overly sweet but it was pretty good. After being in the Cambodian heat for so long it was just what I needed.

All the dust I’d surely eaten on the way there (and I’m guessing an element of heat exhaustion too) caused me to have brief spells of dizziness on the ride back. It wasn’t anything I couldn’t handle but it probably wasn’t the safest thing to be riding like that. I was fine, though I didn’t feel so good on the tuk-tuk ride back to the hostel. It was even dustier than the first time and the only way I could make it through was to pull my shirt up and cover my nose and mouth.

A while after being back at the hostel I perked back up and felt completely normal. Things perked up even more when I finally had a chance to speak to the people from my room. The first night I was in this hostel I had my 6 bed dorm completely to myself. This room was unusually big for a hostel dorm too (and the beds were huge) so it was a nice little treat having it to myself. After my first night, I headed out to do some stuff the next day (the Killing Fields etc.) and when I got back saw that all the remaining beds had now been taken. I also saw that they were probably all girls (my first and only required hint was all the bras laying around). The six of us and an American guy we’d met (Gordon, cool dude) ended up going out for a big night that evening. It was pretty epic but I’ve run out of space to tell you about it :)

Cambodia was brilliant, in the end Siem Reap ended up going exactly how I wanted it to and I ended up getting a nice little bonus in Phnom Penh meeting all those great people. Vietnam is going to be fantastic! Since it’s the only country on my journey where I’ll be with a tour group for the whole thing, I’m expecting to meet loads more great people over there :)