A very big part of the World Race is the experience of different cultures. In order to experience that, it requires traveling. Travel days are some of the longest and most fun days to be had. I figured I would tell the tale of L squads last travel day in order to give you a better understanding of what theses days look like.
This particular travel day, we were in Thailand and headed to Vietnam. If you google maps it, it should only take 20 hours (in worldrace time that’s nothing) and we have to drive through Cambodia. We leave our ministry host in Thailand at 7:00 pm and begin our journey. Each time we have traveled in Asia we have taken double decker buses and it is glorious. There is air condition and you can read or sleep or catch up with squad mates, it’s a grand time. Last time we only made stops for gas and around food times (breakfast and lunch). So we are now on our bus thinking it is going to be like last time. I have no learned to never think that, ever. Everything is always different and there are always new adventures to be had. As the bus pulls out, our driver is hauling. Like passing every thing in the road hauling. I’m not sure if it was his driving or the wind but by the first stop 2 hours in, most everyone was wishing they had taken Dramamine. I never get car sick and was feeling it. But back on the bus we go and stopped again and again and again. We stopped every 2 hours for at least 30 minutes. We start to realize that at this rate, we are never going to get to the border. Even as it got later into the night when everyone was passed out, our driver still stopped. I’m not really sure why he did, but he did and what was supposed to take 11 hours took 15 but we were at the Thailand Cambodia border.
This is our second time crossing this border so we came prepared this time. At this particular border, you can’t use the same vehicle you drove in on and you have to walk like a mile in between the exit stamp and the entrance stamp which can make you quite sweaty with a 50 pound pack on. So we are now off the bus and are in line to exit the country and when the first person gets to the front, we realized we have out stayed our visa by one day. So now we get ushered into a different line and there is a fee that we have to pay. Our lovely logistic leaders head for the ATM to withdraw money as the rest of use what money they did have on them. About 2 hours we were all through the line.
At this time we have all exited Thailand and are on the black outline on the map between Thailand and Cambodia, no man’s land. Luckily this time the new bus we were taking was just outside the exit and we could drop our packs off before we stood in line to get the new visa’s for Cambodia and officially enter Cambodia. We head to the building that gives us our Visa’s and fill out our paper work. We’re all a little sleep and food deprived and trying to make light of the situation. One of my squad mates looks at me and says “hey it could be worse. At least its not raining”. I love L squad and our positivity. I run to the bathroom, come out and that same squad mate looks at me with a face that says I spoke too soon. It is torrentially down pouring, like flash flood kind of rain. I burst out in laughter and we make a run to the next building to get our entrance stamps. Once that is done, we can officially enter Cambodia. The squad during this time is pretty split up. There are little groups at every station hitting all the check points so that we can get through as fast as possible. We find a Casino along no man’s land that has a covering that we unofficially made our meeting spot. (I can now say I’ve been in a casino, so that’s kinda cool) Once were there we head to the bus stop.
A guy that has been helping us get through this crazy border then tells us to get on a bus, which is not the bus we put all our stuff on, so of course we agree with no questions. It wasn’t until about 5 minutes into the ride that we realize there is only have of our squad, we have no money, no phone, all we have is our passports and were driving in what seems like the middle of no where Cambodia. Pretty Typical I’d say. The bus ended up dropping us off at the bus station where we were told the rest of our squad would meet us. I realized I’m very trusting of foreigners and basically do anything they tell me. Not really sure if that’s a good thing. But the rest of the squad does come and so does the bus with all of our stuff! This bus wasn’t the double decker kind that had room for all our packs and us. It was just a normal bus, which means that some of our packs didn’t fit down below and had to stay up with us. After jamming them in the back, we were only 2 seats short so some peeps found their seat on the floor. (which actually was probably more comfortable than the seats) We finally head off after a 4 hour border crossing. We made a few stops along the way at restaurants with typical Cambodian food (most of which I have no idea what it is) we eat and continue on our way.
At some point throughout this journey it is realized that we will not make it to the Cambodia Vietnam border before is closes so we will have to stay the night in Phnom Penh. After a long 29 hours of travel we arrive at our hotel and get to shower and sleep in beds. Pure luxury.
Fast forward to the next day. Still raining, we load the bus and head out around 9:00 Am. We still don’t have enough seats but that’s no biggie for us. We roll with the punches. As we’re driving along we stop in front of a river and I realize that the bus is about to load onto a ferry. We ride the ferry across the river and with a stop for lunch in between, we arrive at the Vietnam border!
This crossing was much smoother than the last. We all get out to get our passports stamped. Then get back on the bus to drive like 10 feet, get our packs, send them through the x-ray scanner, put everything back on the bus and head to our hostel for the night. Simple and easy. We got to our hostel around 5:30 that night.
On the worldrace you learn to have joy in all situations and make fun out of what you are given. You can look at situations with a bad attitude and have it affect you, or you can look at it as an adventure you get to have with people who are quickly becoming your family. Our squad has done the latter and I am so thankful to be surrounded by people who seek joy and fun.
