Cambodia
Cambodia
Click on the map link to the left of the country name to see our route
Currency - Riel, Exchange rate as of
January 2006 £1stg=7080 Riel Day 96 - Friday 13th January 2006 - Colin's Account Well finally after over two months in Thailand we are off again. Deyna flew home yesterday and having bought a couple of one way bus tickets from a travel agent near the KhoaSan Road in Bangkok for only 200Baht each we set off at 7.30am. Those of you in the know might be about to groan at this point, but I am fully aware of the bus scams that exist, especially on the Cambodian route. In short these bus tickets are impossibly cheap for such a long journey (only 300Baht), but what happens is that they will offer to get your visa for you at the border for an inflated price and once in Cambodia they will take 7-10 hours to cover the distance to Siem Reap and Angkor Wat (more of these places in a few days). The journey should only take 4 hours, but they want to ensure that you arrive so late that you have no choice but to stay at one of their guest houses for which they get commission. It can even get a bit ugly if you refuse. The way to do it is just to buy a ticket for the 4 hour journey to the border from Bangkok and when the coach stops for 'lunch' 5km from the border, partly as a delaying tactic and partly to pass round the visa application forms, you say thanks very much hop in a Tuc Tuc for the last couple of miles, refusing all visa help etc. On arrival at the border you go through Thai immigration and then straight to the official Cambodian Visa section where you get your visa in about 2 minutes flat at the normal government rate. Once in to Cambodia there are various options for getting where you want to go without the strings attached. Anyway back to our day, the journey to the border was pretty uneventful, although there was unfortunately a rather smelly girl in the seat in front of us (she was German in case you wanted to know) and worse she kept stretching her arms out over her head and making it worse! As mentioned on arrival at the 'lunch' stop we hopped in a Tuc Tuc and headed for the border for 70Baht. Both of us had overstayed our visa by 3 days and so expected to pay the 200Baht a day fine. Indeed I did have to pay, but the immigration bloke let Sam off, so we are 600Baht up on the day. Once the formalities of my overstay were dealt with i.e handing over cash, we walked over to the Cambodian side at Poipet and were immediately confronted by 2 huge Casino's before we were even legally in Cambodia. I bought my visa for $20 which is cheaper than the alternative 1000Baht, although Sam paid in Baht for her one plus a 100Baht fine for not having a photo (Hmmm down to 400Baht up on the day now!). Poipet is not the most enticing place in the world, it's noisy, dusty, full of bad Karaoke singing and has little to do except if you like gambling, but it's friendly, lively and the beginning of new adventures, so of course we loved it. We had planned to go as far as Sisophon today which is about an hour from Poipet and then complete the journey to Siem Reap tomorrow, but the buses only run in the morning and having met a new pal called Top we decided to stay the night and get an early bus (6.15am) to Battambang which is further than Sisophon, but supposed to be nice. From there we will get a boat up to Siem Reap in a few days. Top has been a great find and after a few beers together he taught us a dozen or so Khmer words, helped us get our bus tickets at the station and introduced us to some Cambodian food. Dinner was in a roadside restaurant just down from a local wedding and both had some sort of Karaoke going on which, apart from our new pal who sang a song for us, was mostly pretty awful. The food was excellent and consisted of Saito la pnum (phonetic spelling!) literally translated as the cow on the mountain, together with fresh prawns, a sour beef and vine leaf soup and a whole fish of some description. I wouldn't be doing my job properly if I didn't give you a report on the local beer, in this case Ankor beer which is not bad at all, but so far I have only seen it in cans. Day 97 - Saturday 14th January 2006 - Sam's Account Well talk about an early start! We had bought our tickets for the 6.15am bus from Poi Pet to Battambang. Having dazily wandered through the wide mud roads, we found Top at the train station who invited us for a "shot" of Cambodian coffee . Khmer coffee is virtually as good as a French expresso except for a thick layer of condensed milk laying at the bottom of the shot glass. Thankfully this can be avoided by drinking your shot very carefully. Then, before we knew it we were clambering aboard the local public bus and settling into our seats for a very bumpy ride. I was rather worried when the conductor handed out plastic sick bags to everyone and I glanced over to Colin gloomily thinking oh no not again! I ought to say, that when you've travelled on the Catamaran from Chumphon to Koh Tao in windy weather and seriously choppy seas, nothing, absolutely nothing, can come close to the sheer hellish experience of everyone projectile vomiting around you. Moving on...! Yes the road was bumpy, but nothing we couldn't handle and we were soon rocked into a doze as the bus tyres bumped along the compacted mud and dusty roads. There are not many tarmacadam roads in Cambodia as yet. The trip took 3 hours having stopped for an interesting pee break where men and women alike hopped of the bus and peed on the grass verge just next to the bus. Luckily I didn't need to go! On arrival at Battambang we hauled on our ruck sacks and were instantly assaulted by some motorbike taxi drivers. After some negotiation, and ensuring they would take us where we wanted to go instead of where they thought we ought to stay, we hopped onto our taxi motorbikes with our back packs and rucksacks. The elderly Khmer chap who was driving me spoke French, in fact most of the older generation in Cambodia do. So, we struck up conversation in French and luckily I found I hadn't lost it yet. Phew! Bouliy (my motorbike taxi driver) found the Monorom Guesthouse we had chosen from our Lonely Planet guide and we checked into a very simple yet clean room. After having some well deserved lunch (even though it was still only 10.30am) at the nearby market we set off to discover the town which is apparently Cambodia's second largest town. Hmmm, well there honestly wasn't much to see. After a very hot and tiring walk we went back to the hotel to crash out and emerged for our dinner at around 6pm. Guess who was waiting for us? Yup, you got it, Bouliy. He started to make us feel guilty that we hadn't actually done anything all afternoon, he said he's been waiting for us for hours! Anyway, the long and the short of it was he managed to sell us a day trip to see the local sights outside of Battambang for the next day for 10 U.S.$ per person. Dinner was a cheap and fairly uneventful affair other than the waiter driving two motorbikes through the restaurant as we were eating and parked one of them in the middle of the seating area! My first impressions of Cambodia are excellent, the people are so friendly. The children stop and shout "haaloo" in the streets whilst energetically waiving their hands. It is amazing to be here at all after their terrible history. Half of the Khmer population is under 15 years old, simply because the Khmer Rouge killed so many people. If I had to sum up my first impressions of Cambodia in three words I would say. Karaoke, Karaoke & Karaoke!!! It's everywhere, at the restaurants, on the bus, on the television - they are Karaoke mad! It's so funny as they have no shame whatsoever, even the worst singer will get up and give his best rendition of the latest Khmer pop song over a light bite for dinner. Thankfully we have not yet been asked to participate! Day 98 - Sunday 15th January 2006 - Colin's Account Another early start, we met our two guides outside the Monoron Guest house which is
where we are staying in Battambang. It's clean and tidy if rather tired around the edges.
For example the sink seems to have disappeared and the fan creaks quite a bit, but it's a
good size and is only $5 per night. Just before the summit is a huge new statue of the Buddha and near by some workmen were preparing a smooth plastered wall ready for inscribing the names of those who had donated at least $10 to it's construction. It looked like hot work and they only earn about 8000 Riels per day, which is US$2. Close by are various caves one of which by a curious geological feature has a constant cool breeze blowing through it, wonderful! Monkeys scamper around the trees and some sit on the pathways eating bits of banana while several children follow us around. We returned via steps cut into the mountainside and stopped for lunch, our best Cambodian meal so far. On the way to our next stop my guide explained that many farmers had been killed on the fields and forests either side of us due to landmines. Fortunately they have now been cleared and the farmers have cut back the forests several hundred metres to increase their agricultural land. He also pointed to a forest partially hidden behind a mountain some miles away and told me there are Lions, Tigers and Elephants in there. I'm not sure this is true though, at least for the big cats. The next Wat was a ruin from the 11th Century with a total of 358 steps to reach the summit our guides/drivers didn't feel up to the climb, but a tiny 7 year old boy scampered up the stairs with us, all the time chatting in good English whilst wearing Sam's sunglasses. Unfortunately he tried to lead us and a Cambodian tourist down the other side of the mountain to see some caves, but we discovered he actually wanted to steal us from the other guides and go off on yet another motorbike to get to them, so we all declined. On the way to our final visit of the day we stopped at a tree covered in fruit bats hanging upside down. If you clap your hands together a dozen or so take flight before coming back to the tree. They are pretty big and don't seem at all concerned about the daylight, quite a sight. The last visit was really a bit of fun, there is a bamboo train that whizzes along a rickety old train line and is the only one of it's kind in the world. They plonk a couple of steel wheels on the track at the station and then lay a bamboo board on top together with an engine (see photo's). The four of us climbed on plus the motorbikes and rode the 7km to the next station where they lifted it off again. Of course if anything's coming the other way you have to stop and one of you has to take your 'train' off the track to allow the other one to pass, but we were lucky and only met a manually powered one going the same way, so we gave them a free push. Day over, we arrived back covered in dust and although we only have cold water, a shower never felt so good. Tomorrow we are off to Siem Reap by boat along the rivers and lakes so it will be another early start. Day 99 - Monday 16th January 2006 - Sam's Account Yet ANOTHER early start. We really ought to take things more slowly! Our alarm went off at 5.45am to ensure we were packed, washed, dressed and at the pier to catch our "speed boat" to Siam Reap at 7am. We had managed to obtain some cheap tickets (8US$ each instead of 15$) and were both reassured when the ticket master accepted our tickets and we were safely on the boat. We had been told that the trip would take 3.5 hours so having quickly bought some bottled drinking water we settled into our seats thinking that we could indulge in a tasty brunch on our arrival in Siam Reap around 10.30am. Oh, how wrong we were. Firstly the boat was stock piled with fruit, veg, rice, bread and other staple foods. Then a motorbike was loaded into the downstairs seating area. On our departure we stopped 5 times. Yes, 5 times to pick up locals en route. Most of the "freeboarders"hopped aboard from the muddy river banks in two's and three's with a modest amount of luggage. However, a large family of 6 with babies and children also boarded with (get this!) a huge wardrobe for Christ's sake! So there we are, a minority of westerners having paid top whack for our tickets (well perhaps not us!) totally squished in our seats, our luggage being used as furniture for the locals to sit on and being tortured by the infernal noise of babies crying, children arguing and army men snotting. Wonderful. NOT! We drudged very slowly indeed through the meandering river, regularly hitting sand banks and smashing into the river banks, because the driver (I refuse to call him Captain or skipper due to his incompetence) couldn't drive. We realised that our brunch was a total dream and kept asking ourselves how stupid could be have been to believe it could all go so smoothly. Eventually, after 4 hours, the boatmen (as I cannot bring myself to call them stewards) put away the wooden sticks they had been using to bounce us off of the river banks and we emerged into deeper water and a wider, straighter river. Were we nearly there yet? Don't be silly. We had to drop all the "free boarders" and their luggage, furniture, motorbikes etc... off first. Then just as we thought we may be getting to the first drop off point the boat sank down half a metre closer to the water and a flood of water rushed through the bottom of the boat soaking our feet and bags and anything else that was strewn on the floor. I hastily shoved our precious belongings (passports, wallets, computer, guide books etc...) into our waterproof bag. Everyone was looking at each other very worried and even the boatmen were perturbed by this. The bilge pump had given up and the water could not be pumped back out. We were sinking. Fast. The driver brought the boat to a standstill and one of the boatmen dug out a screwdriver and hammer and went to attack the pump engine. Groan. As luck would have it I had evidently underestimated this crew's professional ability, as before we knew it the pump was soon working again and along with the engine, started up it's almighty racket. I should point out that the motors for the engine and pump made so much noise throughout the whole trip the Canadian couple in front of us donned ear plugs and no-one had a hope in hell of holding any sort of conversation however brief. Anyway, as the water emptied out, the boat rose back out of the water and we all heaved a huge sigh of relief. To cut a much longer story short; we dropped tom, dick and harry and all their families off with all their belongings to their floating water houses and once we had cleared the decks we realised there were only 8 of us left who needed dropping in Siem Reap. Then the boat broke down. The driver got it started again and evidently low on fuel lurched across the lake to the port. Eight and a half hours after having set off from Battambang we arrived, starving hungry and very cranky, at the stinky port in Siem Reap. We were immediately accosted by taxi & Tuk Tuk drivers and we hopped into the first Tuk Tuk we could get our hands on to get to the centre of town. Having tried a few guesthouses (either full or too expensive) we settled on Angkor Village Guesthouse which at 12$ / night was not bad as the whole place had recently been renovated; we even had hot water and a fridge in our room - pure luxury! First things first; a local beer; and then off to the curry house for a good Indian curry - civilisation is a wonderful thing and Siem Reap is civilised - it has restaurants, lots of them, all different - HOORAY! Then we crashed, hardly surprising really. Day 100 - Tuesday 17th January 2006 - Colin's Account After the last few early starts, we refused to get going before 9.30am and Ree, our Tuk Tuk driver was waiting outside our hotel, as agreed, when we came downstairs. The journey from Siem Reap to Angkor is about 8km and once out of town the forests press in on either side of the road giving a welcome bit of shade from the seriously heavy duty sunshine. It is the cool season at the moment, but that doesn't stop it hitting at least 35°C every day. On the way there is a type of checkpoint where you have to buy a pass which is good for practically all the temples and ruins. The cost is huge at $US40 per person for a three day pass. It doesn't sound much in western terms, but is getting on for 3 weeks wages for a Cambodian and the money hasn't been spent on facilities at the site (You don't even get a map!). The town of Siem Reap is doing very nicely from it though with parks, lawns and a sewage system that most Thai cities would die for. Having said all that it is very impressive and well worth doing. We bypassed the first and most famous temple, Angkor Wat as it was very busy and so we decided to visit it later. Without going into all the details of each temple which are much of a muchness, we saw a great deal of quite spectacular ruins and temples with 45° stairs to their summits, wonderful engravings, carvings and occasionally great views. Our Tuk Tuk driver was just that and didn't act as guide at all apart from telling us the name of each temple. He would often wait in one of the countless restaurants outside each temple and give us the number of the one he would be in. Restaurant number 21 on one occasion and number 8 on another. We didn't mind at all as we enjoy exploring on our own anyway. The Tuk Tuk"s themselves are attached to the back of a Honda dream and are not only comfortable, providing shelter from the sun, but are nice and cosy just for two. Hot and tired and 'templed' out, we decided to call it a day just before 4pm and as we had agreed to pay him $10 for the day, we asked him to take us to a bank and then a supermarket on the way back to our hotel. There are no ATM's in Cambodia, although I read that they opened the first one in Siem Reap last month, but they do have decent wine in the shops unlike Thailand and it's good value. Hurrah, we're both sick of beer! There is a huge choice of restaurants for all tastes in Siem Reap and tonight we plumped for some traditional Khmer food. Similar to Thai cuisine I had a Curry with coconut and Sam a spicy shrimp soup, very good. Day 101 - Wednesday 18th January 2006 - Sam's Account Today is the second day of our 3 day pass to the Angkor Temples. We have decided to dump the Tuk Tuk driver and hire a couple of bicycles to do our own thing now that we know the lay of the land. Our guesthouse organised the bikes for us and at 2.50$ a day (instead of 10$ for the Tuk Tuk) this is a much better option. The circuit to the temples and back is a cool 25 Kilometres so we just took our time, especially in the blistering heat of the sun. Our first stop once we arrived at the site, was to drink the couple of cans of beer we had brought with us whilst overlooking the lake and Angkor Wat. We then went to see THE BIG ONE, Angkor Wat. It was in fact a good idea not to see this temple first because otherwise the other temples would have all be a disappointment. Of course it was impressive, and like all of the temples we have seen, it has a mysteriously eerie yet overpowering feel to it. A little like visiting the crypt of a church or the dungeons of a castle. You can feel yourself being transported back in time and can visualise the temple as it was in all its grandeur in the mid 12th Century. Amazing. After spending a good couple of hours at Angkor (we hit it just right when all the big groups of tourists were having some lunch), we left as it started to become busy again and cycled on to find a little restaurant for some lunch. We settled on restaurant n° 12 and I had a Khmer chicken and vegetable soup which is very similar to it's Thai counterpart "Tom Yam Gai" and Colin had fried beef with noodles. We took our time and having stoked the boilers and injected more fluids we cycled off to the final temple we wanted to see that day; Ta Phrom. Ta Prom was constructed slightly after Angkor Wat in the early 13th century by King Jayavarman VII who was responsible for the construction of a massive total of 17 temples around the Angkor archaeological site. Ta prom is definitely my favourite temple by far. It has been intentionally left partially unrestored (however to look at it you'd think they haven't touched it since it was built!). There are enormous trees growing from the towers and corridors which have wound their roots around the site and in turn literally up-rooted the temple. It is even more mysteriously eerie than the other temples and looks as though it fell straight out of the film set from Indiana Jones. This said, it has in fact been used for the shooting of Tomb Raider! You must have a look at the photo's in the Cambodian gallery to see what I mean; although like anything photo's never really do a place justice. After Ta Prom we cycled back home at high speed to get back before sunset. On arrival in Siam Reap we stopped for a cold beer before going back to the guest house for a very welcome clean up. We were filthy - very dusty and not only our clothes were caked in dirt but my feet were virtually unrecognisable! After cycling 25 clicks I wasn't moving an inch from the room, so dinner for me was a take away ham and coleslaw sandwich from Molly Malone's (an Irish pub just down the street from us) whilst sat in front of some mind numbing television. Colin decided to go out and devoured a home made chicken Kiev at Molly's as well as a couple of beers! Day 102 - Thursday 19th January 2006 - Colin's Account The final day of our 3 day pass and we have decided to keep the bikes and take a picnic with us. Having had breakfast at the Red Piano (no red piano or any other colour anywhere to be seen) and our first cup of tea for 8 days, we didn't get going until about 10am. Following the same route as yesterday for the first 10km we then turned off for pastures new, snapping pictures of a family of Waterbuffaloes as we passed. Almost immediately we came across a bunch of Cambodians scratching their heads, gathered around a friends car which had missed the ramp over a small drainage ditch and was well an truly stuck. I pulled over and offered to help which was well received as they were not getting anywhere. The reason soon became clear and so my first job was to put the car in neutral as opposed to park mode. We then gathered round the front of the car and with a heave pushed it back on to the road. They were delighted and at the very least I hope I have repaired a tiny bit of the reputation the Brits have so far earnt themselves abroad! We had planned to stop by a river for our picnic, but found that it was brown from the mud and not flowing, so we carried on to a small temple that few tourists visit called Krol Ko. A perfect site for a picnic of red wine, fresh baguette, pate, corned beef, sweetcorn & tomato's, very civilised don't you know, it even came complete with ants. On the way I had been trying to dry out Sam's Sarong by wearing it as a cape as our water had leaked on to it. I had some funny looks along the road at my unintended batman impression. The children trying to sell flutes, bracelets, postcards etc etc are becoming a real pain, something needs to be done as they are everywhere and don't take no for an answer. Cries of 'Hey mister, you buy, only one dollar' have been burned into my brain. To counteract their rudeness of ignoring our polite no thankyou's, we have decided to ignore them when they come up to us. It works very well, but when that gets boring, I pretend to be Russian (yes, using real Russian words, well mostly anyway) which completely flummoxes them as they haven't got a clue what I'm saying and they soon run off to pester someone else A final temple beckoned after lunch and having avoided hoards of Japanese tourists complete with yellow caps we headed the 12 km back home. As we passed by Angkor Wat we could see crowds of people waiting to witness the sunset over the ancient ruins, but we have no desire to be caught in the middle of nowhere on bicycles in the dark so we peddled furiously on, overtaking Tuk Tuk's and the odd overladen motorbike as we flew along the road to Siem Reap. One local man pedalled furiously after us on a tiny, small wheeled bike to try and sell us something, but he got no further than 'hello mister' before our headlong pace caused him to give up, puffing madly. An 'A' for effort at least. I think after all this exercise I'm going to treat myself to a steak tonight, my first since we left Europe back in early October. Day 103 - Friday 20th January 2006 - Sam's Account It's a 'jobs' day today. Having got up rather late (9.30am), we planned all our jobs for the day. Updating this web-site, sorting through and up-loading the photo's, post office visit to send a few faxes, e-mails, laundry etc... Back home we would be starting the 3 day London Olympia French Property Exhibition and we both agreed our jobs for the day weren't' too onerous after all! Hope the show goes well for all involved. We are thinking of you! Having spent the morning on the computer we headed off to Molly's for a spot of lunch as it has a free WI-FI connection. Having successfully uploaded the site and downloaded a couple of e-mails we congratulated ourselves with a bottle of Australian Chardonnay. It went down extremely well and we then swayed off to book our bus tickets to Phnom Penh. Only 4$ each for the 5-6 hours bus journey to Cambodia's capital, the excellent value for money made us feel a lot less guilty about the bottle of wine! We then trudged in the heat of the day to the post office to send a fax. Dripping in perspiration we made a few "shopping" stops to cool down in the air conditioned shops and in one place we did actually buy something! As we were walking along the last long boulevard before our destination, a Khmer woman came crashing off of her Honda dream and was laying in the road with the bike having fallen on her legs. Unable to move, Colin rushed out to help her and move the bike. Amazingly the locals did not come to her aid at all; they simply beeped their horns and swerved around her in the chaotic traffic as though she was just an inconvenience. Only one other woman came to oversee the situation. Having got her onto her feet she was clearly shaken but insisted on taking the bike to drive off straight away and as soon as Colin released his grip on her bike she couldn't support the weight and went toppling over into all the fruit stands at the side of the road! Banana's, pineapple, sour mango and guava's all went flying and a few were well and truly squished. Both Colin and myself picked her up yet again and tried to tell her to wait and relax before she drove off. However, the women who owned the fruit stalls were yelling and screaming at her and she managed to pull herself together quickly and drove off into the dust and manic chaos of the traffic. She was definitely not insured and unlikely to be able to afford any medical assistance. We eventually found the post office and with beaming faces announced to the cashier we wanted to send a fax. "$5 for 1 minute" she snapped "How much?" we gasped in disbelief. A meal in the market costs 2000 riel (0.50$) Well that was the end of that. We trudged back to the centre of town and ended up in a roof top bar which played, jazz and rhythm & blues. Two cocktails for the price of one was very good value and we watched the sun set over Siem Reap with our gin slings. Tomorrow we are off to Cambodia's capital, Phnom Penh. I have really enjoyed Siem Reap. The French influence here and in Cambodia in general is really quite marked :- The food is not spicy, most of the Khmer speak some French. All road signs, public building plaques and menu's are written in Khmer, English and French. The post office has the same yellow mail boxes as in France and the food and restaurants are excellent and generally run by French expats. Plus you can buy wine for a reasonable price in Cambodia, anywhere else in Asia, wine is either disgusting or astronomically expensive. I'm starting to feel at home! Day 104 - Saturday 21st January 2006 - Colin's Account So another early start and another long journey to make. Having arrived at the travel agents for 7.30 sharp we were driven to the bus station some 6km away where we transferred to a larger bus with air-con and TV. TV is normally a good thing on the bus as you often have a film or two to while away the long hours till you reach your destination. However this is Cambodia, which means loud and awful Karaoke on the TV, help! In fact the 5 hour journey was not too bad. The road was smooth and we listened to some learn Spanish Cd's on the headphones. The only complaint was the people in the seats behind us who had not only a rooster with them the whole way (haven't they heard of bird flu?), but also unwrapped the most stinky bundle of food for their lunch I have ever smelt, god knows what it was. On arrival in Phnom Penh beside the Tonle Sap river we were immediately accosted by touts, taxi drivers, moto drivers, tuk tuk drivers & beggars all wanting our business and trying to pick up our bags for us. Annoyed with the overkill after a long journey we walked away and sat down in a nearby bar to make a decision on the hotel. There are literally hundreds of guesthouses, hotels, restaurants and bars everywhere and it's quite a daunting task choosing. I popped off to look at a few, but found none that I liked in our price bracket partly as we were on the river and partly we didn't fancy the cheapest of the cheap backpacker guesthouses this time. Splashing out $35 at the Tonle hotel, we chose a beautiful, large room on the top floor filled with lovely furniture and with our own private roof terrace. The bathroom was outside the room, but was at least private and just for us. The views were wonderful over the river and lake and we watched the sun go down with a glass of chilled white wine. Sam found a French delicatessen called Comme a la Maison who have a web site and will deliver. So we decided to stay in, enjoy our roof top terrace and have a take away delivered. Some takeaway I must say. I had a Greek salad and then filet steak with pepper sauce cooked blue (it was as well). Sam went for a salad chevre chaud and then steamed salmon with mousseline of courgette. The food arrived on time, was still hot and came with bread, Dijon mustard and vinaigrette. I heartily recommend them if you're ever in Phnom Penh and fancy a home delivery. Day 105 - Sunday 22nd January 2006 - Sam's Account Miraculously, I woke up feeling rather well; especially after spying the empty bottles of wine we'd consumed the night before lying in the bin ! Our breakfast was included in the room rate and we were looking forward to our last luxury as we were seated in the restaurant before checking out to find cheaper accommodation. The breakfast was revolting. We were served an extremely greasy fried egg with warm processed white bread (which was supposed to be toasted) and a pot of luke warm water which was supposed to be tea with smelly UHT milk. To add insult to injury the waitress gawked at us with her filthy sticking out front teeth (Janet street porter eat your heart out!) as she enquired "what you eat?". "Could we have a menu?" I enquired politely "No menu. Middle bwekfst or Amewican bwekfast" she stated unappologetically Having questioned her at some length about the contents of the two proposed breakfasts and the possibility of having some fruit we realised that it was a "fruitless" task even trying to communicate as she understood nothing. Strictly nothing. In the end we had no choice and ended up with the "Amewican bwekfst"; so we sat their dutifully trying to make the best of things, scraping the shimmering fat off of our food as best we could. Then we were off. Looking for a cheaper room. After at least an hour walking in the sun to no avail we happened upon a tuk tuk driver called Sony who offered to take us to a few places for a couple of dollars. We eventually agreed having established the precise detail of the trip and hopped aboard. We settled on the third hotel the "Royal Hiness" - yes it is written like that! and Sony took us back to our hotel to, pack our rucksacks, check out and move into the RH. Safely in our new room having negotiated hard, we dumped the bags and shot off to the central market for some lunch. We have never seen any foreigners eat at the markets and this was much the same. Plastic chairs, surrounded by the hustle & bustle of the locals, eating soup made from whatever ingredients we could see to point at. It wasn't bad but not NEARLY as good as the market food I'd had in Battambang and Siem Reap. Then it hit me. The hangover. I trudged back to the hotel and stayed there all afternoon in our room feeling sorry for myself! Dinner was fajitas at the Alley Cat Inn. Day 106 - Monday 23rd January 2006 Sam's Account Today has been a very gruelling day. We met Sony the tuk tuk driver on our way to breakfast and he agreed to take us to the killing fields and the genocide museum. Two "must sees" whilst here in Phnom Penh. I shed a fair few tears today I must say. The harsh reality of the Khmer Rouge regime hit me hard and as I sit here writing I must admit I am still feeling shocked, numbed and heartily saddened by the days experiences. I'll let Colin explain... Colin's Account We'd planned to visit the Royal Palace and National museum today, but decided on something that proved rather more grisly after chatting to a Tuk Tuk driver. We agreed a price of $10 to visit the Tuol Sleng genocide museum, the Russian market and the killing fields of Choeung Ek. The killing fields, or one of them, are situated 15km south west of Phnom Penh and the road most of the way was tarmac, with many traditional Khmer houses lining the streets. Once off the paved road we were back on the packed earth roads with the clouds of red dust that we experienced in Battambang. Our driver pulled over and bought us a couple of face masks which were especially useful on a short stretch plied by lorries going to and from a land excavation site. The killing fields themselves don't feel particularly haunted or eerie, perhaps because of the bright sunshine, but it certainly hit home about the brutality of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge regime. In the centre is a tall memorial with thousands of skulls displayed behind plate glass windows. Beneath are piles of clothing once worn by the victims executed there. Everywhere you look there are deep indentations in the ground, testament to the exhumed graves. There are some areas that have yet to be excavated and on the pathways between them you can still see bits of bone and cloth sticking up from the ground. A nearby tree has a sign beside it stating that here children were beaten and worse. This brings me on to a somewhat annoying part of Cambodia. Local children lean against the tree in full knowledge of the sign and ask you to pay to take a picture of them there. Evidently they have no concept of what happened here. Unfortunately this 'give me some money' approach is rife all over Cambodia. Some of them are quite entrepreneurial and good luck to them, but the pricing has no reason and tourists are paying far far too much. Departure tax from the airport is already one of the highest in the world and a single beer is three quarters of a days wage for a Cambodian. Shoe shine boys demand from tourists the same as a waitress earns in a day just to clean one pair of shoes (a two minute job) and the tourists just pay up without question. Obviously they need money to help the country, but 'killing the goose that lays the golden egg' is short sighted. Anyway, after the killing fields our driver wanted to take us to a shooting range to try out some AK-47's and M16's, both heavy duty guns, we declined. The Russian market was a maze of alleyways selling everything from clothes to fruit and vegetables. In the motorcycle section there was the distinct possibility of building your own bike from scratch as there were racks of frames, engines and every conceivable part you would ever need. Our final stop, back in Phnom Penh, was at the harrowing Genocide museum or S21 as it was known. S21 stands for security office 21, I can't remember what the 2 stands for, but the 1 refers to 'brother number 1', i.e Pol Pot. Once a children's school, it was turned into a place of torture and death by the Khmer rouge. Individual cells, complete with manacles and other torture devices abound and in other rooms there are row upon row of black & white photos showing hundreds of people all with numbered tags around their necks, they were all killed. The tour finishes with an hour long film documentary told mainly through the eyes of a mother whose family disappeared into S21 never to be heard of again. Day 107 - Tuesday 24th January 2006 - Sam's Account Today we set our alarms and grudgingly pulled ourselves out of bed to visit the National Museum and the Kings Palace. Starting to get tourist fever. Anyway, the National Museum was um, er, how shall I say this? Rubbish! The artefacts were all objects that had been taken from Angkor and just transferred to the museum. They would have been much better left at Angkor. The objects that did not come from Angkor were not dated nor did they have a description for their usage or where they came from; We looked at rows of objects with their labels reading :- Object : Piece of wood Fantastic. Not! My hopes were raised as we went into the pottery section. For some reason, which I really cannot explain for the life of me, I love pottery. Maybe it has something to do with the cuddly old pottery expert on the antiques road show I used to watch every Sunday night with my family...? I don't know. Anyway, I have to say there were some lovely pieces but again no dating nor origin. Such a shame. The best National Museum we have been to so far has got to be the Mongolian one. It was excellent taking you through the history & politics of the country as well as the cultural artefacts of each time. The Cambodian museum really needs someone to go in there and re-hash the whole thing. This all said, I would definitely encourage people to pay the 2$ entrance ticket just to see the actual museum building itself. It is a gorgeous piece of architecture. It encompasses the Khmer / Thai style architecture, with elaborate pointing roofs, and ancient roman architecture including a central courtyard. Khmer students renovated the building in 1979 - 1980 after the Khmer rouge had done it's worst and they have really done an exceptional job of restoration. After the museum we poddled off for some lunch and then ... in fact whilst I think of it I'd like to explain something. Having re-read our accounts we are conscious of the fact that we are regularly referring to eating & food. This is for two reasons. The first is that tasting different foods of the world is all part and parcel of the travelling experience and is something that we both love. And secondly, if you're not on a bus, a plane, a boat or visiting something there isn't much else to do when your not at home and travelling. We have found it quite difficult adapting to not having a structured day and I guess our meal times is the only thing we can actually relate to as a familiar part of our life back home. Moving on. ... we visited the Kings Palace which I must say was stunning. We were not allowed to take any photo's but we managed to discreetly snap a few anyway so check them out! Much of the palace was closed to the public and many women visitors were turned away as they were not sufficiently dressed. Arms, legs and shoulders especially should be covered. The silver Pagoda was to be the highlight of the visit as the floor is entirely made from silver. The majority of the floor is covered in carpet to protect the surface, however one area is open for viewing and although the silver has lost it's colour and the engraved decoration is worn away it was possible to imagine how breathtaking the room was in it's hay day. After a long day walking around Phnom Penh we organised our flight tickets to Banlung which is the main town of North Eastern Cambodia, a region called Ratanakiri. We have decided to go by plane to avoid the 20 hour journey by bus and boat. A luxury when you are on a budget I know but there are limits! We decided to visit this region, instead of travelling South to Sihanoukville, because the description of the south coast of Cambodia in our Lonely Planet Guide is a follows :- "Sun, sea and sand". Now usually this description would have us there in a flash, however, we came to the opinion that beaches in South East Asia are much of a muchness and we had already spent a long time in Koh Tao. So we are culture cravers and proud of it! Ratanakiri was going to bring, trekking, elephant rides, beautiful waterfalls, lakes to swim in, gem mines and much more. We couldn't wait. 2am - Can't sleep. So I have just cut my hair. Oh dear. Hope Colin doesn't laugh too much! Day 108 - Wednesday 25th January 2006 - Colin's Account I had prearranged a Tuk Tuk to take us to the airport for $4 for the 30 minute ride. Phnom Penh International is a small compact modern airport which is bliss after having to navigate places like Heathrow and Zavantem (Brussels). There is a $6 departure tax for domestic flights and very comfortable armchairs in the waiting area. Our plane to Ban Lung in the Ratanakiri province in the North East of Cambodia was a Russian made Anatov 24, twin prop 50 seater plane. Having checked the safety record on the internet, I was concerned that a flight had crash landed in Banlung last November, but it was the only such accident and no one was killed. The alternative was a gruelling 20 hour bus-boat-bus journey. In the event our 50 minute flight was very smooth and we landed at our first ever non-tarmac airstrip. The red dust is everywhere here and everyone is perpetually coated in the stuff. The airport is two wooden shacks with our bags arriving by pick up truck and the 'town' looks like something out of the wild west. We found a nice guesthouse at $9 per night and leaving Sam to sleep as she was feeling under the weather, I went off to explore. There is a large market with fruit, veg, food stalls, clothes & jewellery. Another section of the market is where many of the ethnic minorities come in from the surrounding countryside to sell their wares. We really are in the middle of nowhere here, but following a chat with some tour guides we know that there are some amazing things to visit. Day 109 - Thursday 26th January 2006 - Colin's Account Sam wasn't well today so I went for another walk around town. I eventually found the 'bank' after directions from a local, just as well as I would never have found it otherwise. It looked like a small apartment block that had been marked for demolition, the paint wasn't just peeling off, it was completely gone and the windows were either broken or non existent. Worse was they didn't have any money or visa facilities and nor has anywhere else in this town. The bottom line is that we can't get any money out and so we will have to use our remaining funds to book a flight out again. I am really gutted, because there are some wonderful things to see here, but the tour guides even though they live in a total backwater have managed to import their daily rates from the capital city and without a bank we can't afford it. We weren't the only one's either, I overheard another couple in a restaurant with the same problem and one of the tour guides we chatted to had had a cancellation for the same reason. Oh well, for your info some of the things to see include a volcanic lake, 7 step waterfalls, waterfalls you can walk behind, gem mines, elephant rides through the jungle, ethnic villages and cemeteries with carved wooden totems, trekking in a huge national park with tigers and leopards, etc etc... I managed to cash two travellers cheques at an exorbitant 10% commission, but there was no choice as only one person does it and it's take it or leave it. This done I managed to book 2 flights back to Phnom Penh tomorrow morning. Day 110 - Friday 27th January 2006 - Colin's Account Not much to report, the flight back was quick and easy. The pilot rode off with one of the stewardesses on his motorbike for half an hour while we were waiting for our flight, returning just before we took off, no idea why. Sam's still not 100%. At Phnom Penh we could have flown on 3 hours later to Bangkok with Bangkok airways, but the cost was $127 each. We opted for booking a flight the next morning with Air Asia at only $80 per person. On top of that we have to pay the international departure tax, a staggering $25 each which is one of, if not the highest in the world! That organised we checked in to a guesthouse very near the airport as neither of us particularly wanted to go back in to the city. The first one we looked at was awful with unmade beds, no windows and filthy. Luckily the second one we found was brand new, spacious and the same price. To cap it all, unusually I started feeling quite ill. Day 111 - Saturday 28th January 2006 - Sam's Account Today Colin is not well. For those of you who know him you'll be thinking "no way, he's never ill!". But he's is. We'd both slept badly and when the alarm went off at 6.30am we had no problem getting up as neither of us were very asleep. We walked over to the airport which was only a stone's throw from the guest house we managed to find, and went through the all too familiar process of checking in etc... We used up the last of our riel by buying a cup of tea each (which was an astronomical 4.5$!) and we were soon on our low cost Air Asia flight back to Bangkok. The flight was only a short hop and before we knew it we had arrived, hopped on the airport bus to Khoa San road and checked into the D&D Inn, a hotel we now usually use as it is not bad value for money. It has good internet facilities, a pool, a pool bar and a restaurant. Also, it is slap bang in the middle of Khao San road. Perfect. Colin had a snooze and I bummed around watching TV and reading. I was feeling rough but couldn't sleep. "Boots" is just over the road. What a god send! So I nipped over the road to pick up some sleeping tablets for the night. Having been told they couldn't give me valium (which I hadn't asked for) I was given antihistamine and told to take two before going to sleep. It worked like a dream, if you'll excuse the pun. Plus of course it cleared up my sneezing and sniffles. As you can probably tell things are not marvellous for us at the moment. Both of us are feeling poorly and we are now getting the backpackers blues. We are both missing our home comforts now and we also have many ideas in the pipeline for preserving our hard earned cash whilst we are away. This why we are heading back to Bangkok for a while. We were bound to have a few lows with the highs - I guess this is just the first one, which isn't bad going considering we are now day 111. "So", I hear you ask "What did you actually think of Cambodia and the Khmer people?" Well, a very mixed opinion because our opinions changed every time we arrived at a new destination. As a whole, I loved it. The people are amazingly friendly, welcoming and warm. The country itself is fascinating, not only because of it's history but because we are here whilst it is trying to build it's future. Siem Reap is a definite MUST for everyone and anyone. The town, thanks to it's extensive choice of accommodation and restaurants can cater for all budgets; from the hard-up traveller to the comfortably wealthy. The town is expanding fast, the people are really lovely and I think if you enjoy travelling / archaeology / architecture then Angkor is a "must see", like the Pyramids of Egypt. Battambang is a great place to get a feel for typical Cambodia as you must bear in mind Siem Reap is very much a tourist town. Phnom Penh is simply not worth the travelling expense to get there. It is a small dusty city with a vast amount of beggars and touts who annoy you and there is very little to do. Unless you really want to be reminded of the horrors of the Khmer Rouge don't bother going there. From what we saw and know you can see, Ratanakiri is definitely worth the visit as well. It is more difficult to find upper-end accommodation here but it is arriving fast. The Khmer are evidently trying to forget the horrors of the past and re-build their lives. No one talks about the past, not even our guides alluded to it whilst we were there. This said, as with any country Cambodia has its' positive points and negative points. The down side of Cambodia are the children in the streets who beg aggressively (I have been grabbed a couple of times) or who are persistently trying to sell rubbish to you. They will even come into restaurants and try and sell you something. If you go to Cambodia, don't buy from the children or give them any money. Although it is sorely tempting it is only encouraging them to stay on the streets. Their parents send them out to do this because they are hoping that the tourists will take pity of them and give them money. Many do, but this reinforces their parents decision to keep them on the streets instead of ensuring they go to school to be educated. The only other negative issue would be that although Cambodia is still developing, it is just as expensive for travellers as Thailand if not more, which is not logical in view of the lack of infrastructure and cost of living for the local Khmer. However, if you visit Cambodia on holiday this will of course not be an issue, it is only really felt by the travelling community as in many towns the Khmer are not geared up to cater for all budgets yet. This Journal now moves back to the Thailand Link
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