A Treatise on Cambodian Roads

The Vehicle

The Driver

The Road.  A really, really good section of the road.

Kampot afternoons are hot. A Cave Temple sounded like a great plan. not that I haven't seen cave temples but, well, caves are nice and cool. And around here they have bats. Bats are cool as well. So, two cool things, no?

Its off to Phnom Chhnork (yuppers, that's how its spelled) in a new variation of a Tuk-Tuk. The Kampot version are an independent scooter with a little two-wheeled trailer mounted on a smaller version of the remork gimble hinge. Its pretty crazy.

Once you learn about Tuk-Tuks in Cambodia, the next thing you need to know is that Cambodian roads, well, they suck. No, really, I am a connoisseur of shitty roads. I have wasted precious hunks of my childhood running the old Al-Can highway, cut my moto teeth on the backroads of the Western United States and bounced across Northern Laos in a packed bus. I have some range of experience with fucked up roads. And Brothers and Sisters, if I can get a witness, I am here to tell you that Cambodian roads come in three types. You got your speedway of death type, which are "paved" and incite all sorts of deadly shenanigans from the locals, you got your under-construction-forever roads which are chip-seal in a perpetual state of incompletion, travel over which will fill your lungs with fine white dust and a groovy case of "ghost boogers" and, finally, you got your Cambodian Rural Road. The latter is red-orange silt clay, baked hard as Fiesta Ware, until a DROP of water hits it. Then, well, then you got gumbo. The problem is that the gumbo gets squished into all sorts of fantastical shapes that in no way resemble a road and then *Bang* the rainy season ends, the tropical sun hits that gumbo and in the course of 24 hours bakes it back to fiesta ware hardness, fantastical shapes and all.

So, you take Tuk-Tuk, a determined driver, and a Cambodian Rural Road and what you have is one ass-kicker of a ride the likes or which will reduce you to tears or cause gales of laughter. Take you pick, but its gonna cause a reaction. Or a medical condition.....