Jenna spoke to one of the drivers who had a sign that said Apollo Hotel. He'd obviously been sent down there by the hotel to round up some customers. Jenna said 'no thanks' and explained that we wanted to go somewhere called Asia Hotel. He flipped his sign over and displayed a list of about 20 other hotels, including Asia Hotel, 'I go there too!'.
So we jumped on his tuk tuk and checked ourselves into the hotel. The driver was called Ching Ching and was a really nice bloke and offered to be our driver the next day. We agreed and arranged for him to pick us up at 2pm and to take us to the two places we wanted to visit; the Killing Caves and the Bamboo Railway.
We spent the rest of the day having a look around Battembung. It was quite a large town and had a big market in the centre. There was also a large river passing through and it seemed quite an industrial town. Siem Reap had felt quite touristy, but this place didn't. But when you think about, tourists have only been visiting Cambodia for the past 15 years due to various wars. We figured we were fortunate to be visiting now, rather than in ten years time when it will probably have been developed beyond recognition.
Unlike Siem Reap, poverty seemed a little more evident in Battembung. The sad truth is that it's no longer a shock for us to see bare foot kids walking the streets, or an old woman looking for food in a bin, which is an unfortunate reality of travelling in Asia. I think any tourists jetting in on a fortnight holiday might have found Battembung a little bit over-whelming. We saw one boy carrying a cardboard box which looked as though it doubled up as his shelter for the night. If tourism brings extra revenue to Cambodia and can reduce the level of poverty, then I guess it can only be a good thing.
The following day we killed a bit of time before meeting our driver by taking a walk down the river. It was baking! Jenna looked like she'd just run a half marathon (which incidentally she has signed herself up for the Great South run!). We checked online and the temperature was 39 degrees! It seems crazy that we've become accustomed to that heat and are able to go for walks along the river in it!
Our driver picked us up at 2pm and we drove about 10 miles out of town to the Bamboo Railway. The stretch of unused railway line is maybe 5 miles long and the locals have built very basic bamboo platforms which sit on wheels and are powered by a go-kart engine! You zoom along the track at maybe 30 mph. It's difficult to explain, so hopefully the photo will explain it better. If a 'train' is coming in the other direction then the driver comes to a stop and physically lifts his 'train' off the track and allows the concoming train to pass! It was very bumpy but a funny experience!
The tuk tuk then drove us another 10 miles or so to the Killing Caves. The caves were located up in the mountains and Jenna and I jumped onto the back of a moped to drive up the steeper section which the tuk tuk couldn't make. It was very cosey with the two of us plus the driver! The caves were our first introduction to the violent history that Cambodia has suffered since the 1970's. The Khmer Rouge were a political party who came to power once the French had removed themselves from Cambodia. They were a communist group who had a very clear vision of how Cambodia should be governed and anyone who thought otherwise, or who were even vaguely suspected of being 'trouble' were killed. The exact number of people killed during this period is not known, but it is estimated that 2 million of the 8 million population were murdered. There are dozens of killing fields dotted all over the country, with some inaccessible due to unexploded land mines. The cave which we visited didn't leave much to the imagination. Prisoners were marched up there and brutally pushed into a cave. The majority of victims would die on impact, the remainder would eventually die with no means of escape. It was made to feel very real by the number of actual bones and skulls on display. It was a difficult place to visit, especially as the crimes were committed so recently.
The tuk tuk then took us back to town, stopping off on the way to show us appoximately 2 million bats which leave one of the caves at a certain time each evening. I've never seen anything on that scale before and it was quite an amazing sight. I'll have a look when I get back home because I'm sure Planet Earth will have filmed it! Despite Ching Ching only being our tuk tuk driver, he doubled up as a really informative guide, even if we didn't always understand what he was on about! Like many Cambodians, he couldn't do enough for us.
We went for dinner at a food market by the river and got speaking to a couple from Denmark who were doing a smilar trip to us. We left the market at about 9pm and walked back to the hotel. It was very strange as everything winds down very early in Cambodia and by 9pm it was practically deserted and most of the street lights had been switched off!
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