While waiting to cross the border from Thailand to Cambodia, Adam and the gang passed the time playing with the border kids. They were cute enough to keep.

[Journal by Colin McAuliffe, photos by Nancy Olson]

Thailand lets you stay in their country for 30 days. No more, no less. After my first 30 days, I took a trip to the local immigration office and got a visa extension. It cost me 50 bucks for ten days, so, when that extension was up, the team and I decided to do what is known as a "visa run.” Now, a visa run is basically a quick trip over the Thai border so that when you reenter the country you get another 30 days to do whatever it is you want to do. We decided on Cambodia for our visa run for many reasons: It's close, it's cheap, and it has Angkor Wat, a huge complex of Khmer ruins.

So, it was with smiles on our faces that we headed towards Cambodia in two Drive Around the World vehicles for one night. Little did we know that we would be dealing with logistical nightmares and worse. Anyway, we got out of Bangkok and to the Cambodian border town of Poi Pet without a hitch; however, when we got to the border, we were disturbed to discover the customs office for our cars was closed, so we were forced to spend the night in the no-man’s-land between Cambodia and Thailand, which consists of only one type of thing, which is a good thing and a bad thing. These things are something that I love and hate. These things can be tons of fun or a pain. These things...are casinos, and tons of them. So the team, plus one, this funny English guy Tom that I met on Ko Samet, and I, all booked ourselves into a casino for the night, with plans to move on in the morning.
So, the next morning, wallets just a little bit thinner, we wake up to discover that Nick and Todd have run into some difficulties taking our cars into the country and have gone off to the next province to talk to some bigwig type guy. The team was told to stay close by, which basically meant stay in the casino, which I took to mean "keep gambling." So I did, and I broke even once again. Eventually, Todd and Nick returned and handed us the shocking news that we would not be able to drive our cars into Cambodia, but, and this is a big but, Cambodians could drive our cars into Cambodia.

So off we went to look for some Cambodian drivers, and actually it wasn't tough. We managed to very quickly find two drivers and a guide who could communicate with them. The guy who drove our car had a name we couldn't pronounce, so we called him Mr. Moon, and the guide's name was Ank.

And so they drove us all over Cambodia in our own cars for a few days, and it was actually pretty cool. Outside of having five people crammed into our vehicle on all types of ridiculously bumpy roads, having a driver was very cool. Anyway, we saw a bunch of the Angkor temples, which were very interesting and photogenic. I'm not the biggest temple fan, so I tend to lose interest after the third or fourth one, but we got some great video footage of the team, and I managed to snap some cool pictures. Neil, Adam, Ank, and I even managed to meet the guy from the cover of the lonely planet. Yes, things were good, but there were problems yet to come.
So we went to the ruins, and they were great big old temply things, just like you'd expect, and it was good. We went out and went to a Cambodian nightclub, and it was good. We ate food, and it was good. We drank milkshakes, and it was good. I slept, and it was good. Then we went to drive back to Thailand, AND IT WAS BAD! Ok, actually it wasn't bad until after we already got through the border, but let me just put it this way, we ended up broken down on the side of a Thai highway in the evening and there were tons of mosquitoes all vying for my attention. Thank God for Gameboy is all I can say. So it was a very long ordeal, and if it wasn't for a friendly local Land Rover enthusiast, I’d have no idea what would have happened. He took us in, made some calls for us, and got us situated in a nice hotel for cheap. I don't remember his name, but three cheers for him (glass raised). Anyway, all in all, Cambodia was an extremely interesting/hectic experience for me.

Help support our cause: The LONGITUDE Expedition is the longest journey ever attempted with a focus on Parkinson's Disease. The Drive Around the World team aims to raise money for Parkinson’s Disease research by driving four Certified, Pre-Owned Land Rover Discoverys around the globe following lines of longitude. Readers are encouraged to pledge small amounts of money per expedition-kilometer via a pledge form that can be found on our Parkinson’s page by clicking HERE. One hundred percent of donations received go directly to Parkinson's research, and all who donate $10 or more will be entered into a raffle to win an expedition-equipped Land Rover Discovery.