Howie-n-Karen: Asia

Cardamom Walkabout/Moto

Our gracious friends at Conservation International (CI) provided all logistical support, however we lacked the Thai cooking tins that are required camping gear, so we stopped at the Thai military market on the outskirts of Phnom Penh for our compact and versatile green metal boxes. Apparently the market is also a source of old contraband that still floats around this country. Ak 47 or grenade launcher. This is the spot. The government is cracking down on this stuff now, as it doesn’t promote a tourist-friendly atmosphere.

We stopped for lunch in a small village and ate at a restaurant new to Wayne, where our ‘table’ was set up under a nipa roofed platform where we sat, barefoot, looking at a little river. Lunch was rice, a soup and a meat and vegetable dish, delicately seasoned and ready in less than 5 minutes. It was a wonderful surprise to be in such a dusty little town and get treated to a tasty meal. Especially when the first place we tried to get lunch just closed its kitchen.

The remainder of the ride was on a road that became progressively decrepit until we came to the end of the road for our little vehilcle. This took us to Monkol’s house. He was our main guide and his wife cooked us a simple but delicious dinner, and prepared breakfast and a ‘boxed’ lunch for the next day consisting of rice and a piece of dry, salted fish jerky. We ‘bathed’ at the local well, which was a pump courtesy of an NGO. (The road was provided by the Lutherans.)

Beyond the village, Howie spent the waning hours of the day enjoying the birds of the deciduous gallery forest that runs up to the escarpment that climbs into the mountains. This is an area where numerous birds are easily spotted, including four species of woodpecker: black-headed and fulvous-breasted wp, hoopoes, rollers and dollarbird; Numerous raptors including black baza, shikra.

Anthony and Wayne felt the need for appropriate guides and security, so Anthony contracted with Monkol and he sought out Tet. We were hiking areas, although protected, illegal poaching and timber extraction was still occurring. (We ran into some young men dragging logs down the trail. When we appeared, they dropped what they were doing and disappeared into the forest, not knowing who we were. Perhaps we were lucky they had no weapons or it might have been a more dangerous situation than it turned out to be. Names were taken as well as photographs. Apparently the blackwood tree that they were hauling out was worth in excess of 10 K US.)

The first day’s hike had to go down as one of the toughest we’ve ever done. Besides having to climb about 2200 feet in elevation, we had to do it carrying over a half gallon of water apiece, 5 days food (which included rice, onions, carrots and potatoes and a pound of sugar). This was essentially a trail that was used by the Khmer Rouge to move supplies. As a result of its limited use these days, areas were severely overgrown, with low arching bamboo, fallen trees and clusters of vines.

Both Karen and I became dehydrated and exhausted, seemingly tripping every third step as fatigues was overwhelming us. Other than a few sightings of great hornbill, I had not the energy to lift my bins. Our destination that night was a grassy pine savannah, where we set up our hammocks and made camp near a small stream, which was the source of our drinking water. I was designated waterboy by Wayne and made use of our new water purifier pump, which came in very handy indeed.

The dry season had come and the creek was barely a trickle but there were little pools where we could squat and bathe. It was surprisingly deliciously cooling to be able to freshen up at the end of our day’s trek. Understand that the mud adjacent to these pools was totally churned up by wild pig, so who knows what we were actually bathing (and doing our dishes) in.

We stayed two days at this camp. Karen and the boys took a hike on day 2 and I stayed back to find little openings down into the forest and spent the day looking for birds.

K’s hike (first burnt then tractless jungle)

The following day we had a blistering 25 k hike out, most of it a gentle descent and with having eaten away at some of our load, it made the day’s travels easier. Most of the trip was through good evergreen forest, “tropical evergreen forest” is what you might think of as jungle. We were treated to a spectacular show of upwards of 75 wreathed hornbills. Early on we came across a tree that had signs that a bear had recently climbed it. The claw marks went up and out of sight, so that bear could have been 75 feet up there looking down at us as we trudged by.

Bigger than my hand, elephant spider.

About an hour before dark we reached our campground by a bigger stream. Once again the day was consumed with travel and little time was available to explore the bird life.

Day four: I got out of camp before anyone else but in about 10 minutes, the other folks appeared and off we went. But to my surprise we stopped in about 1 k, tore off our backpacks and were directed up another path where there were reports of black-necked storks. We did a 7 k detour looking for a grassy wet area supposed to be 3 k away. We never found it. Got to a nice river and saw a white-throated kingfisher and a green bee-eater. But no stork.

Luckily, our hike to the next stop, a tiny small settlement, was only about 5 k away and by then, it was in full sun. Despite its size, the town held a small monastery and remnants of an old wat destroyed during the rampages of the Khmer Rouge. A wooden structure had been built to replace it. From here, after about an hour and a half of negotiations with the locals, the guys were able to come up with 5 motorcycles for the 6 of us (the guides doubled up) and they took us on a 2-hour joy ride over footpaths, water buffalo tracks, jungle trails and over 3-log bridges in various stages of disrepair.

I had to pay particular attention to overhanging branches because I was a head higher than my driver. It was an impressive display of driving skill, albeit at times too speedy for my tastes, as the drivers negotiated sand, mud, deeply eroded ruts and all those bloody stream crossings. I must say, when I could suspend my paranoia, it was really fun!

The night was spent at the home of the commune leader of a larger village. Our presence was cause for the generator to be turned on and karaoke shown on a large flat screened TV (!), for which CI was billed 25 cents for the diesel. The TV ran past our bedtimes and we employed our trusty earplugs once again. Most of us strung our hammocks in the yard, only to be awakened at midnight be rain. The scramble was on to find spots on the porch in the dark. No big deal, you just do it.

The reach of technology is amazing, as this was a completely raw village. We pumped our drinking water from a hand-dug well and 15 feet up on the trail from the well there appeared a large human fecal deposit. If ever there was a test for our water purifier, this was it. This is also where people bathed.

We all sat on the floor of the porch of the head man’s house for dinner. There was chicken, a delicious peanut sauce, soup and rice. The first two pieces of chicken had no discernable meat on them.. I tried gnawing what I could off them, gave up and reached for a third piece. I realized I was chewing on the beak and the head of the poor chicken. Slim pickins. I tossed the bone, like everyone else, into a gap in between the porch and the house, where the pigs, chickens and dogs cleaned up. When we finished dining w/ the men, the women and children took the food back to the kitchen and feasted on the remains.

CI is going to build a school in this community later this year, which is a part of their long-term strategy to garner trust in hopes that the villagers cooperate in conserving the surrounding forest and the animals living there. I was impressed by the commitment involved in the work being done to create a conservation ethic in a setting that is one of the poorest you’d find anywhere. This is a huge and complex task and time is running out for the forests.

Final day and more ‘motos’ – no more hiking at all. We drove about 25 k to the ranger station again on tracks and jungle trails. We did stop for a dip in the river, which was right in the heart of Siamese crocodile habitat, not a man-eater but critically endangered in the wild. This was also elephant habitat, although none were seen.

We were given simple accommodations and a bed, tasty Khmer food, fresh fruits, showers and toilets (more exciting for Karen). I was asked to give a speech to the ranger crew after dinner explaining who I was and why I had come so far to be in their presence. I hope they got some sense of my love of tropical forests and some encouragement to help them do their work.

Cleaned up after playing v-ball.

As we were leaving, the next morning for our trip back to Phom Penh (which included 3 ferry rides), Anthony was getting ready to go on another trip. He went with Jake, the regional head of CI, and biked trails even worse than we hiked. Intrepid fellows. If I am going to keep up with the folks doing work in the field here, I’m going to have to get tougher.

What follows are a few photos taken on some of our more touristy jaunts through PP

Royal Palace

Wat Lanka

February 17, 2006

A few photos taken on our outing this morning: Bassac and birding around the water’s edge 15 km outside Phnom Penh. Later we’ll go to the famous Elephant Bar for their heralded happy hour to celebrate my 53rd with our PP friends.

pied kingfisher

purple swamphen

plain prinia

rounding up the fish

blossom (last photo for now)

Tags: Adventure in Asia, Asia, hiking, Travel

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