How to Visit Pre Veng

I've not really been anywhere in Cambodia yet-aside from the overnight whirlwind trip down to the beach back in December. This was partially intentional. You only have to get over your gut-twisting terror of new places first before your linguistic skills are good enough and your mastery of foreign currencies and foreign food takes over and you're outrageously outgoing.

This post-fear stage ended last weekend when I went two hours southeast of Phnom Penh to Pre Veng Province to stay with friends in Pre Veng town. I needed to leave the thriving metropolis of Phnom Penh in all it's traffic and insanity (actually, I adore Phnom Penh but I had the travel itch). I thought I was going to the sticks--one coworker describes it it as living at the last stop on the Pony Express--but I was pretty sure my friends had a hot shower so I figured it couldn't be that bad. This is why I only went for three days.

Pre Veng town is a actual town. In some ways, it reminded me visiting a close friend in Filer Idaho; smallish houses, wide roads, not a lot of traffic, few trees and a lot of agriculture. Probably half the populous travels by bike, the other half by moto. There were significantly fewer Lexus to prick my indignation. There's one market, many colorful traditional wooden houses each on an actual piece of property, and way more plastic bags on the ground because in Phnom Penh they try and keep it clean for us "brongs." There's a "waterfront/lake" which is currently receding as we're entering the dry season yet will fill back up beginning the end of May with the rains.

The real reason for going was that my entire being craves riding a bike. I got to ride a bike in Pre Veng. It was hardly my specialty 24.5 lb road bike. It was an orange Chinese cruiser...and yes...there was a basket. But that's what everyone else rides in Pre Veng and given that Pre Veng is as a flat as Holland, gears aren't necessary. I went out with my coworkers on the dusty dirt roads of rural Cambodia, through the lotus and rice fields, adjacent to a Mekong River tributary, crossing the river on hand-crafted ferry, through rural villages where small children practice their English vocab ("hello!"), and drinking iced sugar cane juice out of a plastic bag. It was even further then the last stop on the Pony Express....and possibly the most epic Cambodian experience thus far.

This makes for a good weekend. We all need weekends away. And we always love when we feel comfortable enough in new places to begin venturing out.