Mark Green's Blog, page 3

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By now we were adjusting to the ‘anything goes’...

By now we were adjusting to the ‘anything goes’ driving mentality of Cambodia and were getting the hang of South East Asia veteran’s Mel and Matt’s advice to “don’t wait, just walk out” when crossing the road. So now it was time to brave the roads proper by hiring bicycles!

The next morning we set off to explore, in search of a hairdressers - Nicky having taken the...

The next morning we set off to explore, in search of a hairdressers - Nicky having taken the decision to ‘go short’ due to the heat of travelling. That’s not a bad idea… I thought, scrunching my hippy writer hair. Here’s what happened next…

Thanks again to Andy, the cab dropped us to a lovely Guest House...

Thanks again to Andy, the cab dropped us to a lovely Guest House in Battenbang called the Ginesha - at $8 a night and with beer at 46pence a glass, Nicky was very happy!

After quite a long, hot and at times slightly stressful journey, we ordered a jug of beer and relaxed into the wonderful hospitality of the Ginesha Guest House. Their Khmer Curry is still one of the finest we have tasted. As we were thinking back and reflecting on our journey, we realized with heavy hearts that 5:30pm local time, less 7 hours = 10:30am in the UK - the time of the funeral of a work colleagues wife, Karen. The stresses of the day compounded with the sadness of Karen’s passing, cruelly taken by cancer and we sat quietly for half an hour, raising a glass to her, sharing the thoughts of our friends back home. A very sad evening.

Bangkok to Chanthaburi and Across the Border

By the time we left Bangkok we’d got the hang of ‘negotiating’ with the Tuk Tuk drivers and cabbies. For the Tuk Tuk’s. “Two hundred Baht? Too much. How about one hundred? No? Okay we’ll walk, thank you.” This normally prompted one of two reactions, a shrug as we walked off, or a begrudging: “Okay.” For the cabbies, “Meter please, okay.” And if they didn’t press the meter button, start to get out the cab. We soon learned that a good tactic was for me to get in the front and tap the meter whilst smiling at the driver.

We’d had fun in Bangkok, had got over our initial tiredness and jetlag, but we were looking forward to pushing on - next stop Chanthaburi, the stopping off point for a bus to the lesser used border crossing at Pailin (south of the normal traveler route to Cambodia at Poipet)

We grabbed a room at the Riverside Guest House in Chanthaburi and set out into the town for dinner and experienced our first truly authentic street food - without any English spoken, or mostly any idea of what we were eating aside from rice and some sort of minced meat… lamp perhaps. (hopefully!)

Riverside Guest House. Yes, that is a cup of tear I’m drinking.

'Proper' street food…

The next morning saw us traipsing around town trying to find the bus pick up point for a minivan to the border that had been mentioned in the Lonely Planet. Unfortunately we were relying on a local bus that normally did the Thai gentleman’s casino run to the Cambodian border. Despite the best efforts of several Cambodians who were really keen to help us, we eventually followed a sketch map from a coffee house employee teenager who directed us to the bus station, so off we traipsed with full packs in the late morning heat.

Thanks to the help of the information ladies at the bus station, we boarded a bus - not the one they’d recommended as the conductor of a rival company seemed to be heading our way. Oh well, it’s an adventure, lets see where we end up…

Pong Nam Ron is where we got off. Half way to the border town of Pailin, okay, not bad. Time for another bus. We carried our packs over the road and stopped somewhere near where the bus driver had kindly indicated. After a bit of wondering around, I asked a startled passenger in a minivan. It transpired they were going to Bangkok, but during a series of conversations with more and more helpful Thai’s, they established that the bus we wanted was across the street - once we looked carefully at where they were pointing we realized there was a shelter of sorts. Awesome, a bus stop.

The bus turned out to be a pick up truck with bench seats and a roof for it’s passengers. Helped by another passenger waving us aboard: “Kampuchea” (Cambodia)  we paid the driver our fare and climbed aboard - the only westerners to do so, squeezing in with probably double the recommended number of passengers. Border crossing here we come!

Amazingly, despite a slightly tense moment when the remaining passengers had filtered off the bus during the course of the journey and three lads in a small village tried to persuade us to get off to go with them across the border (probably a visa scam) the driver indicated that we should stay aboard and within a mater of minutes he dropped us at the border crossing. Result!

We managed to avoid the visa scammers (only a couple of half hearted efforts - they could see the determined look in Nicky’s eyes…) and scampered across the border to the Cambodian side. I think the LP’s terminology ‘scarcely used by westerners’ would apply to this crossing point - nowhere near the stress of the Poipet stories we’d read about. I should also mention that we were extremely fortunate to meet a Swiss chap called Andy who was also going to Battenbang by taxi  (around a hour’s journey) because he’d done the crossing many times to the house he was having built and knew he could get the fare for $25 not the $30 to $35 mentioned in the LP. Another great result!

First couple of days in Bangkok. Top: Nicky poses by a...

"I'm missing the rain, MG."

First couple of days in Bangkok.

Top: Nicky poses by a ‘houseboat’ - food for thought…

Clockwise from top left:

Some bling-bling anyone?

Celebrating Chinese New Year with a Cheng beer or two…

China Town at night. Busy, busy, busy.

Kao San Road. Anything, everything and then some for sale.

Mark & Nicky arrive in Bangkok...

Apologies for the lack of photos with this post - the internet cafe has no connection available - I’ll hopefully sort this out next time! Please also check out my Facebook page for our backpacking travel updates:

https://www.facebook.com/mark.green.10690203

Wow, what a different place Bangkok is - hot, hectic and relaxed, despite the political unrest. We’re still suffering from jetlag as our bodyclocks struggle to catch up, but we’re almost there. River taxi yesterday to Chinatown for around 80 pence and a crazy Tuk Tuk ride home after Chinease New Year - movie clips to be posted soon on Facebook!

We think we have a rough route forming: heading to Cambodia in the next few days, then up the east coast of Vietnam to Hanoi (on the train) and then south through Laos to hopefully hook up with an old rowing buddy in Thailand near the Cambodia / Laos border before heading home after 8 weeks travelling via Bangkok. So exciting to be planning out our route and thinking about the travel adventures that lie ahead.

We’re getting used to the tourist part of Bangkok and the add-a-few-Baht-on-for-the-tourists ethos, but can’t wait to explore away from the city, especially Laos and Cambodia.

More posts and some photo’s to follow in a week or so…

Mark & Nicky

Latest Sales News for my eBook: The Travel Auction

My eBook ‘The Travel Auction’ is fast approaching 22,000 sales, is still ranked #1 on Amazon’s Top 100 free eBooks and is getting lots of positive feedback. Thanks to everyone who has supported it. :) Here’s the latest review: http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/687511133

This is ‘Iris’ my Honda CG 125. Otherwise know as...

This is ‘Iris’ my Honda CG 125. Otherwise know as The Mistress!

What a Crazy few Days...

This has been the strangest, most exciting, nerve-wracking and surprising two weeks ever. Ten days ago I recognised and embraced my mid life crisis and bought a motorbike. The only slight problem was that I had to collect it from Brentford, west London and ride it home, a journey of 130 miles and 6 hours on A and B roads. Scary and exhilarating!

A few days later I found out how to check the promotional ‘free’ eBook sales of my self-published book: The Travel Auction and was amazed to discover I’d ‘sold’ just under 1,000 copies - result! The day after that I was up in London pitching the romantic comedy film version of the book to a production company. Very nerve-wracking!

I would later find out that although they liked the characters and premise, they couldn’t see where the humour would come from. I was pretty disappointed, but it was still a fantastic experience. The next day I found how to check all other non-Amazon free book sales and was delighted to see I’d sold an additional 1,500 copies through Smashwords and their distributers. So that’s a ‘starting point’ of 2,500. Even better!

Then craziness really started. Over the weekend sales kept rising. But not in dribs and drabs. We’re talking 1,000 copies a day. I couldn’t sleep, I was so excited!

Latest free book sales currently stand at: 10,526 !!! Even better, the book is currently ranked #1 in the humour category and #3 overall in the Amazon.co.uk top 100 free eBook sales. How mad is that?!

Thank you so much to everyone who has helped make this happen - from Goodread readers and friends to reviewers I’ve been pestering, to friends and family for helping to promote my book. Your help has been fantastic!!

I suppose at some point I should put a price on the book (again) and see how it fares against other ‘proper’ authors, but for now I’m enjoying seeing the free book sales figures rise in direct proportion to the size of my stunned smile as it begins to hurt my face from grinning so much. I think I’m finally starting to believe I am a writer… and it feels amazing!