Another weekend, another out-of-town outing for teachers of Krou Yeung School in Phnom Penh. And another long ride in a cramped car — in fact, it was an even longer ride than the last one, clocking in at 5 and a half hours. But there were only 6 of us making the trip, so the compact car was only uncomfortable instead of excruciating; and the destination was well worth it.

First we arrived at a shoreside town on the Gulf Of Thailand, where our boat pilot met us with a cart and hauled our gear, including a jug of drinking water, down to the dock, through narrow passageways between vendors hawking their wares in wooden stalls. We passed a group of monks in their orange robes, whom, it would turn out, we’d encounter the next day when we were snorkeling.

To our surprise, we encountered a hitch at the dock, because there were some government officials there checking passports — which we didn’t bring along. We do have copies of them on our phones. At least ordinarily. But we were suddenly unable to locate them. So that left getting them from an online backup — but we had no Internet service either. Finally, we were able to jump on one of the other teacher’s hot spots and supply a sufficient quantity of red tape to mollify the red tape beast. Phew. We were beginning to think our comrades were going to have to abandon us at the dock and go camping without us.

Then we had about a 40-minute ride to a pit stop at the pilot’s home, an open-air house in an antiquated little fishing village on stilts, where the “sidewalks” are simply boards stretched over the water. We felt that we were getting a good taste of the real Cambodia, the traditional Cambodia — except that for all their isolation, the pilot’s kids still played games on their phones like kids everywhere. And they slept in little tents inside the house.

Here we had lunch; our cohorts dined on fresh seafood caught by the pilot’s wife in their front “yard” and cooked in their kitchen. We, being vegetarians, supplied our own grub, and we all ate on the front porch. At some point we had to use their WC, which simply dumped waste into the water, the same water from which the seafood was caught. But hey, the ocean has the power to purify to make corrections, at least up to a point.

And then it was back into the boat; getting into and out of it required a bit of athletic skill, because there was no ramp, no set of stairs; you just climbed up to get out and hopped down to get back in. Then on for another half hour or so to the island of Koh Kong (“koh” means island) and the beach where we were to camp.

After we’d scouted out our site, the pilot helped us haul our things to shore; we had to wade for about 50 yards, as there was no dock. After that, he settled in to spend the night on his boat, at our beck and call as needed.

Then we set up our rented tents on the beach, and we had the afternoon to relax at our seaside resort. The two of us had the foresight to bring along our hammocks, which we put up and used for a nice long nap.

There were primitive toilets, and even a primitive cold water shower; but we weren’t game to give it a try, as it didn’t seem to be exactly pristine. There was no good garbage disposal system; evidently you were supposed to haul out whatever you hauled in. But many people didn’t, and the refuse lay in piles waiting for someone to set a match to it.

That night we built a fire and cooked some food (again supplying our own instead of the daily special of seafood that everyone else was having), then had a nice peaceful rest, far from the city and many yards away from the only other occupants of the beach. This was definitely turning out to be a weekend getaway worth getting away to.

3/16/2024