My first night in Cambodia completed and having finished with morning sex with my two overnight girls I dismissed them and sent them back to the brothel. I was hurriedly packing my stuff because I had to catch the speed boat ferry to Sihanoukville. I peeked out of my room and saw the motodop I hired from the day before was indeed dutifully waiting for me in the public sitting area. I finished packing and went down to checkout of the room. They said just a moment for them to check the room and they returned quickly with a battery charger and a few papers I had left behind in my haste to leave. Nothing very valuable but at least they were honest.
BTW after my trip I found the web site for my $3 hotel here http://www.pattayacity.com/kohkong/nokor.html . If you want a $3 hotel I suppose it is pretty damn good for $3 a night but you do get what you pay for. For $3 there is a ceiling fan, in room bathroom with squat toilet and shower. (cold water only) No TV and no AC. My room was exactly like the "Single Room" in the picture on the web site only the floor was not freshly waxed and it is a little more worn than is apparent in the picture. The "sitting area" shown on the web site is where I smoked weed with the motodop driver. Would I recommend it???? Well for $3 I suppose, yes. It's one hell of a good $3 hotel room. LOL Probably more "normal" people (unlike myself) would prefer the still rather basic Koh Pich hotel http://www.pattayacity.com/kohkong/kohpich.html or the Rasmey Makara Hotel http://www.pattayacity.com/kohkong/rasmey.html which is also rather basic but is closest to the brothel district. These are like $15 a night for a passable room with AC, TV and hot water.
I was so stoned the night before I forgot to make sure I got my speedboat ferry ticket which I had already prepaid $15 for. Sloppy on my part to let the motodop get away from me the previous evening without first producing a ticket for me. If he was dishonest he could easily have noshowed that morning and took off with my $15. Fortunately he was honest and arrived on time, ticket in hand.
Tickets were $15 for westerners and $12 for Cambodians. The two tier price gouging was official so even though they were gouging you for being a foreigner, it is "official gouging" not the initiative of the local ticket agent. Make sure your tickets has the price you paid for on it ($15) since you will not get on board with a $12 ticket (unless you can pass as Cambodian).
It was still about 45 minutes before the speed boat ferry left so the driver suggested I have breakfast at Otto's guesthouse while I was waiting. http://www.pattayacity.com/kohkong/ottos.html Otto's is supposed to be the local expat hangout where you can meet westerners and exchange info and such. The food is supposed to be trustworthy and it's alleged to be a all round good place. Me, I didn't much get along with the European backpackers or the expats that were there but they could be a source of useful information. The proprietor, (Otto I supposed) is alleged to be honest and if you need a western friendly haven or retreat Otto's is supposed to be "the" place. No one there seemed to be sex tourists though and I kept that aspect of my trip under wraps since you never know who is going to be some kind of right wing bible thumper or militant left wing social activist. Otto does not pay commission to motodops so some will try to misdirect you and tell you it is closed or no good. I suppose the fact that the motodop I hired recommend a place to me I knew did not pay commissions is yet another sign I hired an honest guy to drive me around. Maybe that's a possible honesty test for motodops.
I had a delightful western breakfast. The baguettes were particularly good. Cambodia has bakeries that learned from the French and there are very good fresh baked goods throughout Cambodia. After breakfast it was still about 15 minutes until the speed boat ferry was scheduled to leave so I walked the remaining 1/4 of a block to the dock. The boat was there and there was a large crowd of Cambodians milling around and loading cargo onto the boat as well as a few of the unlikable European backpackers.
The Speed Boat Ferry At Port In Koh Kong
I waited around until about 5 minutes before departure and then boarded and went to my assigned seat. There is assigned seating but it is almost universally ignored by the Cambodians so here it is more or less sit wherever you want unless someone complains. The boat was pretty good sized, it was air conditioned, the seats were quite comfortable but leg room was inadequate for a 6" American. There was a TV monitor in the front of the cabin playing music videos of blaring Khmer Karaoke music. I happen to more or less like Khmer pop music, it kind of grows on you after a while and the girl singers are cute but if you have an aversion to blaring Khmer pop music you will be quite unhappy inside the cabin and should ride on the roof or front deck. We pulled away from the dock only about 10 minutes late and headed down the river and into the open sea. As much as I was enjoying the blaring Khmer Karokie music I moved out of the inside cabin and took a place outside on the front deck with the cargo so I could enjoy the awesome views.
The sea was very smooth that day. Perfect weather. The boat is quite fast and was perfectly solid cutting through the open sea. I'm sure it may drastically change in bad weather and after all it is a boat designed for river travel used on the open sea but on this day the trip was perfectly smooth and even the most delicate of stomachs would not get seasick. If you did there was an old woman who came around every 2 minutes trying to sell Dramamine. She also had cold beer which I found most delightful.
The boat kind of follows along the coast of Cambodia. From the front deck you could see the Captain was navigating by following a series of two liter Coke bottles and chunks of Styrofoam anchored to the sea floor with fishing line. The coast of Cambodia is absolutely beautiful. Miles and miles of totally uninhabited white sand beaches with crystal clear water. I wonder if those beaches are safe or not. They sure were beautiful. After a couple of hours we came up to a seaside village on an island somewhere off the coast of Cambodia. Mostly elevated bamboo huts and such. I guess we were there only connection to the mainland. I was riding up on the front deck with most of the cargo which consisted mostly of fresh vegetable and other produce. We docked at a rather rudimentary wooden dock and locals came on board and started throwing all off the bundles of produce onto the dock. The town was quite scenic and was just like something out of a movie. I thought it was kind of cool.
From there it was off again for maybe another hour through open sea until we reached the port at Sihanoukville. The whole trip maybe took 3 1/2 hours and was incredibly scenic and comfortable. We docked in Sihanoukville. I walked off the boat and was again set upon by a few touts. I just ignored them and headed down the dock. At the end of the dock there was an office with a uniformed Cambodian Immigration agent. He ask for my passport, checked my visa and recorded my name, nationality and passport number in a notebook. He wasn't the friendliest guy but he didn't hassle me any or demand any money. That whole process was pretty quick. Leaving the office there were still two touts hassling me. I walked off the dock through a gate where I guess the other motodops and taxi drivers had to wait. I randomly chose a motodop who said he spoke English and ask him to take me to Holiday Palace Hotel and Casino which I chose from a guide book based on its location near Victory beach and kind of midway between the port district with the Chicken Village brothel area and downtown with the Blue Mountain brothel area.
Read my report on the hotel here. https://www.clubhombre.com/discus/messages/1365/45905.html?1072924348
The motodop immediately tried to hard sell me on a place on Ochheuteal beach instead and pulled out a guide book saying how cool it was and how Victory beach is near the port and is polluted whereas Ochheuteal beach is far from the port and is pristine with crystal clear water. All true. But.... While the port water may be polluted, the port district is where most of the hookers are. Also Ochheuteal beach hotels are more expensive and pay big commissions to motodops or taxi drivers to bring in customers. And last but not least, Ochheuteal beach is a fair distance from any of the action other than freelancers on the beach. You will need long taxi or motodop rides. And after 10:00PM it is not a safe ride either. Cars and motorcycles have been recently trapped on the bridge late at night and robbed enroute from Ochheuteal beach and down town. My advice is if you want a hotel near the beach chose a Victory beach hotel. When you are ready to go swimming. Take a taxi or motodop down to Ochheuteal beach during daylight. If you could care less about the beach, downtown is a good option too since it is close to the downtown mongering venues. There is no place acceptable to stay real near the port district/chicken village venues so you are just as well off being in Victory beach for those venues. Taxies or motodops are incredibly cheap.
I told the motodop to forget about Ochheuteal beach and directly ordered him to take me to Holiday Palace Hotel and Casino. I found this approach worked well when you were getting the hard sell from a motodop. Just ignore his advice and directly order them to do what you want. The will try to talk you into taking you someplace that pays them a commission but in the end if you directly order them to do something, even the dishonest ones will do it. I think I agreed to 2000 Riel (50 cents) for the ride. 1500 Riel would probably have been the fair price but he out bargained me by 13 cents. He put up a hell of a fight for that extra 13 cents and I gave in to easy. If I did it again, I would have offered him 1500 Riel take it or leave it. It truly is a trivial amount of money either way but it took me three days to get in the right mind set for bargaining with the Cambodians. They will put an incredible amount of effort into overcharging you a very trivial amount of money and the temptation is to just say "fuck it" and pay but at least for me, once I settled on the "take it or leave it" approach to bargaining I generally got more or less he correct prices on everything.
I got to the hotel and went inside. I ask the motodop to wait for me incase I had a problem with the place. I ask the price for a standard room. $15 a night. The lobby was quite impressive and I said sure, I'll take a room based just on the quality of the building and the lobby. I was sure any thing in such a nice building had to at least be worth $15. I checked in and went up to my room. I was very pleased except there were two double beds and I would prefer a king. I almost went back down and ask for a king but then it occurred to me that two doubles pushed together was even better than a king bed so I accepted the room as is. The mini bar was empty except for the free bottled water so I did go down and make sure the front desk was aware of that so I wouldn't be charged when leaving. They said no problem, if I needed anything just call instead. Fine with me since I never use the mini bar stock anyway.
While I was down there I ask the motodop who was still waiting if I could hire him for the day. He ask $10. I said $8 and he agreed. $5 was probably more reasonable but oh well. $8 to have a driver on call the whole day is not bad either. I told him to wait while I showered and settled into my room. A half hour later I came out and ask him to take me on a tour of the town showing me all the various whore mongering venues. He did do a pretty good job of tour guide and also along the way tried to hard sell me on the three main houses on Blue mountain which pretty much told me up front who is paying the best commissions in town to motodops. I passed on Blue Mountain for the time being and saw Chicken Village as well as the local tourist sights and such.
The Main Traffic circle
The Main Buddhist Temple on the hill Above Sihanoukville
Downtown From The hill where the main Temple is.
Port District From The hill where the main Temple is.
I told him to stop at an open air restaurant we passed that looked cheap but nice and had many prominent Angkor beer banners. I needed lunch and to get some beer loaded in my system. He of course started trying to hard sell me some tourist restaurant downtown but I just said here looks fine. I went in, looked at the menu. The place looked OK to me so I went out and ask the motodop if he could get me some weed. He of course said sure. I gave him $2 and said go get me some and bring it back here. He took off and I sat down and ordered some kind of really good fried rice dish and drank about 4 beers before the motodop came back.
He had my weed. Probably a 1/8th of an ounce of nice tight bud wrapped in a piece of newspaper. Not bad for $2 but probably he pocketed my $2 and got the weed for next to nothing. I didn't care though. How could I complain to much over $2 for a nice packet of bud. I didn't feel comfortable smoking it in the restaurant so I had him take me back to my hotel. I couldn't find a pipe or rolling papers so I emptied out a cigarette "Cambodian style" the same as they did in Koh Kong and packed it full of weed. I smoked it about half way and put it out.
Good and buzzed I went back out of my hotel and ask the motodop driver to take me to Chicken Village.
Chicken Village
Boring installment done. All sex in the next one.