A night with the hill tribes

Our 2-day trek up into the northern Laos hills, to visit the Hmong and Khmu tribes will, I’m sure, remain a highlight of our trip.

Our 2 day trek began with a 2 hour journey in the back of a truck, which took us out of the town, away from the tourists and deep into the Laos countryside. We had booked the trek through an independent company who assured us that they were the only ones doing this new route, meaning that the villages we planned to visit would have only recently started seeing small groups of tourists once every couple of weeks and would thankfully not be suffering from ‘tourist fatigue’. We met our 3 fellow trekkers and 2 guides who would be leading us for the next two days and decided that it would be a fun couple of days.

 We arrived at a small village, covered in orange dust which had covered every surface as we bounced along the dirt tracks. We loaded up our backpacks with water and provisions before setting off. We were rowed across a small, but fast flowing river to take us into the jungle and then began the 5 hour trek. It had been raining a fair bit, so it was quite muddy underfoot and we squelched around quite a lot along the narrow tracks and scrambled up through the rocks and over tree roots. The scenery was unbelievable, when we either stopped for a quick break or remembered to actually look up as we navigated the paths, we were met with the most incredible views of lush green hills, streams running below and trees and flowers in all directions. There was the occasional cow or pig wandering along the paths, which sauntered off when we approached them. I even managed to pass the huge spiders webs without too much freaking out (when in the jungle...) We stopped for lunch in a clearing and the guides whipped out a selection of chicken curry, veg stir fry and rice which was amazingly still warm.

At around 4.30, after the threat of rain and some hastily put together makeshift bridges over the swollen streams, we arrived, muddy and heavy-limbed, at the village which would be our home for the night. I don’t think I’ll ever forget our arrival, we heard the children playing before we could see them. As we got to the top of the hill we had a view down into the village and could see a group of children playing football outside the bamboo hut which served as the school. The football was flat, most of the kids didn’t have shoes – a couple were playing in gum boots – but they seemed to be having a great time! We walked into the village, which housed 47 families of the Khmu tribe, past the wooden huts on stilts with dogs and pigs running around underneath, past the communal water tap which served as the shower, laundry and cooking water, past the cows and buffalo which roamed around and up towards the chief’s house where we would be sleeping. We heard some barely stifled whispers and giggles behind us and turned around to see a group of children following us with fascination! We felt a little like the pied piper with the procession growing as we passed by other houses and more children joined in. We had the wonderful opportunity to spend the evening wandering round the village and getting to know the locals. The children loved having their photos taken and shrieked with delight when they saw themselves on the screens. Even their parents found it hilarious to see the photos and couldn’t help themselves joining in with the children’s posing. Some of the children showed George and I a game with sticks and stones (similar to jacks) we tried our hand at it and they were all highly amused when we failed miserably!

Once back in the chief’s hut, we were served up an absolute feast which had been prepared for us. We ate it by candle light (only one hut had electricity – a recent development which was still the height of excitement), watched over by the core group of children who had been following us the whole time.  After dinner, we decided to crack out the playing cards – a very popular decision! After the children had gathered up all the cards we discarded, studied them closely and then tried out their own games, I decided to show them how to make a house of cards. What then followed was an hour of intense concentration from the kids as they tried to construct card houses – it was amazing to watch their faces light up with delight as they completed a house or screw up in despair when the cards fell down. At one point the chief’s wife joined in with the efforts! I think the kids would have stayed all night if they could, but eventually they were ushered out so that we could sleep.

After a very cold night sleeping on the floor, we were woken by the cockerels  at dawn to begin our second day of trekking. We bid a fond farewell to the chief and the rest of the villagers and were followed down to the bridge by the children who stood and waved until we were out of sight. I was so sad to leave and wanted to scoop them all up and take them back with me! We hiked to another couple of villages, where we were welcomed with the same interest and excitement by children and adults alike. We were able to visit a local village school, housed in a large bamboo hut on the outskirts of one of the Hmong tribe villages. It was wonderful to see the classes in progress, although I’m sure we disrupted the calm slightly as the children were keen to see the visitors. George and I were able to hand out the exercise books and crayons which we had brought along and hope they will find good homes.

Our walk back was very different in terrain to the previous day, but no less stunning, with beautiful green hills rising up either side of the undulating track we followed. After 5 hours of trekking, we made it back to the truck, tired, dirty, desperate for a hot shower, but with some memories which will stay with us forever.

A few of the many people we met

About to set off - note the small backpack!



Our village home for the night



Just one of the amazing views

Encountering some of the locals

Relaxing Luang Prabang

Our ‘VIP minibus’ from Vang Vieng was once again, unsurprisingly, an old Toyota which was so small that George didn’t actually fit in the seats! We shared the bus with a group of Korean tourists, who were less than half the size of George and so he was resigned to sitting on a fold out seat for the 6 hour bumpy journey up through the hills (we had been warned to take motion sickness precautions for good reason!) It was an unforgettable journey though as the road wound up through some of the most stunning scenery we had experienced. We had thought that the previous journey up to Vang Vieng had been picturesque, but this eclipsed even that. Limestone hills rose up through the mist in every direction, with views of the beautiful valleys from the peaks, which rose out of the clouds. We travelled through small hill-tribe villages where local village life was in full swing; kids in full tribal colours playing ball whilst their parents were weaving and cooking outside their wooden huts and animals playing at the side of the road.

We arrived in the beautiful UNESCO world heritage town of Luang Prabang and instantly knew that we would like it. The town had a real French feel with old colonial style wooden villas, with coloured shutters overlooking the 2 rivers which ran alongside the town. There are rumoured to be around 80 Wats in the area, so consequently monks in vivid orange robes could be seen in almost every direction. The old town was full of lovely little cafes and restaurants which we became well accustomed with over the few days we stayed. Relaxing seemed to be the main pastime and it was the perfect place to stop and catch our breath for a few days.  We booked a 2 day trek up into the hill tribes (which deserves a blog entry of its own, so more about that later) and then spent the majority of our time wandering round the peaceful town, enjoying the scenery and browsing the very tempting nightly markets.

We found a lovely little independent second hand bookshop, L’Etranger, housed in a traditional wooden villa. In the evening, they turned the upstairs into a little cinema and George and I enjoyed sipping ginger tea whilst we relaxed back on cushions and watched the DVD in the corner of the room! The walls were covered in bookshelves full of old issues of National Geographic dating back to the 1960’s, so we ended up spending quite a lot of time relaxing there (and enjoying the homemade peanut butter on toast).

For a contrast to wandering round the old town and photographing the many ornate and beautiful Wats, we decided to take a cooking course to learn how to make some of the traditional Laos meals we had been enjoying. The course began with a trip to the local market, where our teacher showed us the staple ingredients. It was slightly alarming to learn that the washing up bowl full of pungent brownish fermenting liquid with fish heads sticking contained the fish sauce which is used in pretty much every dish in Laos! I tried to remove the mental picture from my mind and concentrated on the various rice and fruit on display. Once back in town, our teachers demonstrated a number of dishes and George and I tried our hand at 5 of them. It was really fun and I’m sure we’ll be trying out the chicken laap, Luang Prabang salad and pork with eggplant when we get back – be warned!

On our last day in Luang Prabang after the trek, I unfortunately suffered from heatstroke and was quite unwell. We had to check out of our hotel and thought we could probably kill time at the nearby Arthouse cafe which we had been going to for breakfast. I was really struggling and thought I might keel over so George went to ask if there was anywhere I could lie down. The owner, a lovely American woman, didn’t just help, she immediately showed me upstairs to her own bedroom where she made up the bed with blankets and let me sleep there all afternoon even bringing me lemon and water to rehydrate! I wanted to hug her! I don’t know what I would have done without her kindness – needless to say, we tipped her generously and she agreed to treat herself to dinner on us.

One of the many beautiful wats

Young monks hitting the town

George catching up on some National Geographic articles

Me looking ridiculous in some tribal head wear 

Some Laos specialities we rustled up

Kids playing on the river

Up cliffs and down river in Vang Vieng

After 2 days in Vientiane Jill and I went north to the small town of Vang Vieng. Our bus wound its way up into the hills that jutted up from the flat plains around Vientiane. It was a bright, hazy morning and the layers of hills, one rising up behind the other, each one higher and more spectacular than the last, faded away into the pale blue sky. We weaved through villages where children in their full tribal dress played in the streets and puppies harassed unimpressed pigs with playful leaps and yaps.

We had heard many stories about Vang Vieng from friends and fellow travellers in the past few months, but all of the tales ended with “You have to go just to experience it”. We were both a little unsure what we would make of it and the thought of a town full of gap year backpackers drinking their body weight in Beerlao before jumping head first into the river didn’t sound that appealing.

What we found when we pulled into the bus station was a town spanning the Nam Som river surrounded by an unbelievably beautiful landscape with giant limestone karsts to the west, and as we watched the sun set upon them with a cold beer in a relaxed riverside bar we realised that it would be a town of huge contrasts. For all the people who went there to get drunk, pull a random stranger and be sick on themselves, (all while wearing a hat, vest and shorts with ‘In the Tubeing Vang Vieng’) there were people who wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to go kayaking, caving, climbing, trekking, cycling and of course tubeing, that was on offer. We fell into the latter group.

After an early morning breakfast overlooking the river we grabbed a ‘tube’ (tractor tyre innertube), each and jumped in a tuk tuk which took us 4km north of town to the start of the tubeing section of the river. We arrived at 11:30am and were handed a shot of Lao Lao, Jill managed to avoid this but I knocked it back.

For those of you who don’t know, tubeing began life as a relaxing and fun way of drifting down the river surrounded by nature, taking in the the quiet calm of the Laos countryside, then someone thought that they would put a bar at the start. What evolved was a pub crawl on water.You have a drink at one bar, swinging into the river from rope swings or using the waterslides, and then when you are bored of that bar you simple grab your tube and float on down to the next one, they throw out a rope and you pull yourself in. The bars take up about half a kilometre before you can calmly drift the remaining 3.5km to the town.

We made the most of the first few bars, swinging into the river and choosing to watch the unfolding chaos as  the group that we had met along the way get increasingly drunker rather than be directly involved in it. Not put off by the Halong Bay Back-flop I was keen to be flung into the water from various heights. I really enjoyed the experience and to end it with a relaxed float to the finish was an incredible way to see the area.

The following day we thought we would try our hand at a bit of rock climbing. We took a Sawngthaew out of town to a narrow bamboo bridge that crossed the river. We then trekked through an orchard with piglets charging about, a small village with people busy harvesting the fields, and then out onto a jungle path with huge spiders webs on either side. We emerged at a clearing where two limestone karsts sat alongside each other with a 3 metre gap down the middle and vertical faces rising 35 metres above either side. This would be our home for the day.

Our instructor, Li, told us about the various holds and grips, and the basics to climbing before we set off on the first of 6 climbs which got progressively more difficult as the day went on. It was a great day that pushed our muscles in ways we hadn’t before and tested the nerve at the top of the 25 metre climbs. By the 6^th climb, the most difficult, our arms and fingers had nothing more to give and we left feeling spent. That evening we tucked into a well earned plate of Laap and reflected on a fun couple of days in Vang Vieng. The following day we would be off, north again, to Luang Prabang...

Lesson not learnt from the Halong Bay back-flop!

Jill enjoying the crisp clear water...

You can just spot Jill reaching the summit

Sun setting over the Nam Som after our day climbing

The beautiful scenery surrounding Vang Vieng

Vientiane, the most laid back capital city on earth!

Having managed to pull ourselves away from Don Det, a place where you might intend to stay a few days but could easily end up there for weeks, we were back on the VIP bus the relatively short journey north to Pakse. Our intention was to spend some time here getting to know the area, sorting out a few things, do a trip out to the plateau, take advantage of hot showers again and catch up on some sleep away from the cockerels and pigs before the next action. Our plans quickly changed. As soon as we arrived in the town we realised that we would want to be leaving pretty shortly, and with no working ATM’s and only just enough money to cover accomodation and the sleeper bus on to Vientiane our hand was forced and so after only 24 hours we were on the move again.

The sleeper bus was amazing. It was lit up like Regent Street at Christmas with flashing red lights declaring it to be ‘KING OF BUS.’ Because we got the back row of beds I was able to hang my legs in the aisle without disturbance while Jill fit snugly into the the rest of the space. Even the Korean man that spooned me for most of the journey couldn’t put a dampener on things. We got into Vientiane in the early morning light and got a Sawngthaew, (a motorbike with a decorated trailer on the back which has two rows of seats down either side which face inwards, and is the Loas version of a bus), into the centre and grabbed some breakfast. The first thing that hit us was that it was very relaxed and not a great deal seemed to be going on, for a capital city it seemed quite subdued. But this was what we quickly realised we liked about the place. It did have things to see and places to go to, great places to eat and drink but it wasn’t about to hijack a bus full of fresh faced tourists to tell them.

We spent our 2 days in Vientiane walking and cycling around trying to unearth some of it’s hidden treats. It is a city that seems to have a Wat on every block all with orange clad monks milling about in and around them. We visited the symbol of Laos, Pha That Luang and the huge market which sells anything and everything including a rather cheap looking PC which had been decorated with various apple logos, “You want cheap Mac?” I think I’ll pass thanks all the same.

So far the Laos people like the Cambodians are a nation that make me smile, and I look forward to meeting more on our journey further north.

All aboard the KING OF BUS!

Pha That Luang

Food stalls along the river

Jill enjoying the street food

Lanterns at the night market

Sabaidee from 4000 islands

After enjoying a delicious early morning breakfast overlooking the lush green ravine from the treetop restaurant, we were looking forward to our VIP bus which would take us into Laos. A rather small minibus turned up and we were told to pile in – 4 of us to 3 seats in the back row along with most of the luggage. We estimated a maximum capacity of 16 people, so were amazed when the 22^nd person squeezed in! Our seats turned out to be some of the best with 3 people sharing the front passenger seat and one poor lad having to stand for the duration of the bumpy ride!

We arrived at the Cambodia/Laos border where our bus driver assured us that another bus would pick us up from the Laos side and then promptly drove off. We sat patiently watching the border police hard at work at their game of petanque until another, even smaller and airless bus arrived to take us to the nearby 4,000 Islands and the start of our Laos leg of the journey.

We transferred to a small wooden boat for the small Mekong Island of Don Det before  setting off along Sunrise Boulevard (the only other road was, in a stroke of genius, called Sunset Strip) to find a place to stay. We ended up at a place called King Kong, which was owned by a wonderfully eccentric Scouser named Mini. He was a very accomplished chef and we spent our evenings enjoying cold beer lao and laap (a tasty Laos speciality) in the restaurant overlooking the Mekong whilst Mini would have a smoke and entertain us with fantastic stories of island life. Our bungalow was pretty rustic with a small doorless concrete bathroom attached, with just a cold water hose for a shower and a very large resident frog! When we first arrived I wondered how the hell I would be able to sleep there, but in no time I was happily swinging in the hammock enjoying the sunset over the inland paddy fields and buffalo.

Island life was very laid back and slow-paced, although for us started at 5am each morning when the cockerels would start their crowing. This always woke up the pig next door, who would start squealing along with them – not the nicest alarm clock! George and I do need to learn the art of slowing down though, on one of the most relaxed places on earth, rather than kicking back and relaxing in our hammock all day, we decided to cycle round a couple of the islands one day and then go on a full-day kayaking trip the next!

We had a great time kayaking along the Mekong, in between many of the islands all the way down to Cambodia. The currents were surprisingly strong and we were enjoying the rapids which helped us along the way. We got caught in one particularly powerful current which swept us straight towards a tree sticking out on the river. We paddled as hard as we could, but we were no match for the current and crashed straight into it! Our kayak flipped over and we had to hang on to it as we were swept further down the river before crashing into a second tree! We were both bruised and battered and very wet, but after checking that all of our possessions, which we had luckily attached to the boat in a dry bag, were all still there, we climbed back into the kayak and thought that at least it would make a funny story! The rest of the day was much calmer and we had the privilege of kayaking alongside the very rare Irrawaddy dolphins and through beautiful peaceful channels, flanked by the lush green mountainous islands. We paddled back to King Kong’s at sunset where Mini welcomed us home – it would have been very easy to stay for a long time!

 

Our VIP bus across the border

Don Det - the sprawling metropolis

After surviving the crash!

Me, 2 Germans, an English man and 4 kayaks in the back of the Laos-style bus

Kratie kids & red Ratanakiri

After a day in Phnom Penh arranging our Laos VISA and having one final walk around this great city, a place still very much in mourning, we were off again, this time heading northeast for Kratie a chunk of the way towards the Laos border.
Kratie is a small town which sits tight to the Mekong with rice fields and small villages in every other direction. It is also a great spot to see the very rare Irrawaddy dolphins. We spent our first afternoon wandering the streets and meeting the locals, to say they were welcoming is an understatement, as we walked the backroads that are on the edge of town, where the dirt tracks and fields begin, we were invited, by a group of 4 friends, to join them for some rice wine in their front garden. It was a really fun experience, and for $1 for a bottle of home brew, it would be a very cheap way to get smashed!
The following day we took a tuk tuk to Kampi to get a boat out to see the dolphins and were lucky enough to watch them swim around us for a hour. They are very rare in Cambodia with an estimated population of only 70. In the afternoon we hired bikes and jumped on a ferry over to Koh Trong an island in the Mekong with a small population who live there. The locals found us very funny as we grappled with our bikes to get them onto the boat which was a long, narrow, wooden thing that sat low in the water. We spent a few hours cycling around the island, waving to those we passed and smiling to the cries of "hello" that seemed to come from all directions. Word must have got around that we were about because as we approached a group of children they had set up a road block to halt us. Our only way past was to give high 5's and tell them our names and where we were from, it was very funny and they loved seeing themselves on a video Jill took.
After a good couple of days in Kratie we got a bus onwards for Ban Lung, a small town in Ratanakiri Province, the wild east! It was a nerve shredding and bumpy journey as far as Stung Treng, and then we turned off the main road onto the red dirt track that took us the final 3 hours into the heart of the province. We got off the bus well after the sun had vanished and made our way to the Tree Top Ecolodge where we were booked in for a couple of nights. It took us a while to find the deserted unlit road that would be our neighbourhood for the next few nights but it was well worth the trouble. Set in and around a tree covered ridge that overlooks a valley are about 10 wooden huts, all with amazing sunset views and hammocks. There was a relaxed and friendly communal area and great food, it was perfect (apart from the huge spider we shared the bathroom with on the first night).
We woke when the sun came up and hired bikes once more and ventured out into the Cambodian countryside, this time to the crater lake; a near perfectly circular lake surrounded by trees. After cycling for 30 minutes in 30+ temperature it was great to leap into the cold, clear water and cool off. And there was not a tourist in sight!
The following day was another chance to see more of the surrounding countryside, this time on the back of a couple of motos. The area is famous for it's red earth and after our 20 minute journey on the back of the bikes we looked like we had been on the fake tan! We went by elephant out into the forest and up to a waterfall, it was again a very hot day and the opportunity to cool off in it's pool proved to be too tempting. It had a rock shelf which meant I could swim in behind it which was pretty amazing. As we set off for the second waterfall of the day the motorbike Jill was on the back of got a flat, in the middle of nowhere and with little option she sandwiched herself in between me and my driver, the man with the worst bike and the loudest shirt, and we rode as a trio to the nearest repair shop with the other bike limping in behind us.
After our brief stop we were off again to see the final two waterfalls, one in a beautiful, secluded area with a rope bridge and another pool to swim in, the other a high, powerful waterfall that you could walk underneath for an eye watering power shower. That evening we watched the sun set with the locals overlooking the lake north of Ban Lung with a cold Angkor beer, and with that our Cambodia adventure came to an end.
The following day we headed for the border and Laos...

Me getting the ferry to Koh Trong

Relaxing on our veranda

No one else around at the crater lake

Pit stop - note the police helmet!

Jill's fake skiers tan!

Power shower

The magnificent temples of Angkor

We travelled from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap, which would be our base to explore the many temples around Angkor. We settled into to our lovely guest house, arranged a driver and set our alarm for the very unsociable hour of 4.30am. We were collected by our tuk tuk driver at what felt like the middle of the night and headed out to Angkor Wat. We stumbled around in the darkness to find a good spot and then waited for the sun to rise up over the magnificent temple. It was breathtaking to see more and more of this incredibly beautiful temple reveal itself as the sun came up. The scale of the place was so impressive and it was easy to see why it is the national treasure of Cambodia. We wandered around the huge building, marvelling at the intricate carvings which seemed to change as the light fell on them. I think that Angkor Wat is probably the most impressive place I have ever been to.
We spent a long time wandering round the various temples of Angkor Thom; Bayon, another big-hitter, was largely made up of carvings of faces looking in all directions. As we climbed up into the building, more and more faces were revealed to us. We also marvelled at Phimeanakas, a huge temple which was being restored back in the 1970s and had been taken  apart brick by brick. The Khmer Rouge came in, removed most of the heads from the Buddhas and destroyed all of the records which were held on the restoration. They are now facing the enormous challenge of putting it back together with nothing to work from!
Two of the temples, Ta Prohm and Preah Khan had been pretty much left how they were found, with the jungle taking over. It was amazing to see these huge buildings crumbling where trees have grown out of them, with roots intertwined with stones. We could almost imagine what it would have been like to have discovered these incredible temples in the jungle. It would take far too long to describe all of the temples we visited over the two days, and we would probably lose all blog-followers, but each had it's own unique beauty and in any other place, would have been a major tourist draw alone.
We ended our very long first day watching the sunset from Pre Rup (albeit it, along with a couple of hundred other people) before waking our sleeping tuk tuk driver from his hammock (in which he had spent most of the day - I think he may have suffered from narcolepsy) to take us back to Siem Reap for a welcome cold Angkor beer.

Angkor Wat at sunrise

One of the many faces of Bayon

It was peaceful if I didn't look behind me!

The water festival

Writing this after the event, we now know how tragically the festival ended. It's so incredibly sad, especially as our experience of the water festival was of a very fun and friendly event.
George and I arrived from Kampot on Friday evening. Our bus could only take us to the outskirts of the Phnom Penh as all vehicles had been banned from the city centre (motorbikes and tuk tuks evidently aren't considered vehicles). We piled into a tuk tuk to head to the centre, along with approx 4 million other people! We weren't sure exactly what the water festival would entail - the only information we could find was that it had something to do with the change of tides? We thought the river front would be the best place to aim for, so headed down. The streets were full of people celebrating and an impressive firework display was underway. Stages were set up outside the Pagodas with various musical performances taking place to an audience of very excited Cambodians. There was also a series of floats parading up and down the river with incredible light displays on them. We decided to head to the FCC to enjoy an arial view of the activity from the balcony along with a cold drink.
The following day we experienced the boat racing element of the festival - teams of 40 or so rowers, all dressed in team colours would race down the Tonle Sap, whilst everyone cheered on from the waters edge. It was kind of like Henley Regatta without the hats and copious alcohol! Stalls lined the streets, selling anything from clothes to souvenirs to cleaning goods (we guessed all at discount prices). There was also an impressive array of food stalls. The deep fried spiders, snakes and beetles looked particularly appealing. We decided to try out some of the street food, which was delicious. One lady, who we bought spring rolls from, insisted that we squat down next to her to eat them. She found this hilarious and we drew a few amused looks from locals as we tried not to fall over!
We left the following morning after thoroughly enjoying the festival. We heard the terrible news once we were in Siem Reap, a few hundred kms away. The whole country was in mourning and it was incredibly sad to see all the Cambodian flags which people had put up at half mast outside their houses. The prime minister announced a national day of mourning and said that this was the worst tragedy which had occurred since the Pol Pot regime. It was really hard to take in what had happened after such a celebratory event.

Sihanoukville & Kampot

We left Phnom Penh bound for Sihanoukville, a small town on the southwestern coast of Cambodia which sits between Vietnam and Thailand. After a 4 hour bus ride to the soundtrack of a number of random Cambodian songs played at distortingly high volume we were in a tuk tuk taking the short but bumpy trip to Serendipity beach.

We checked into a small guesthouse at the very end of the beach with bungalows sitting in the trees and with a bar that sat about 3 feet from the waters edge. After dumping our bags we took a wander to get ourselves acquainted with the area. This involved finding a sun lounger and relaxing for an hour or so before grabbing a spot further along the beach with an Angkor draught and watching the sun set over the ocean. It was tough!

The following day consisted of more of the same, walking along the beach, swimming when it got a little too hot and eating fresh fish with the waves lapping at our feet. The only thing we had to worry about was how to tell the various sellers who roamed the beach that we were not interested in threading, massages, deep fried fish, fruit, jewellery or the many other items on sale, (although Jill did end up having a massage, like I said, it was tough).

One service that many of the women provided, and that they were insistent I had, was toe nail clipping! They would walk past and then scream in exaggerated shock "Oh my no, so long, so long! I cut for you! Oh, so long!" followed by a near by allie echoing her disgust "Oh, so long!" I ended up burying my toes in the sand in an attempt to hide my shame, they weren't even that long, but I made a mental note to clip them when I got back to the room.

On our final day in Sihanoukville we got a small boat out to some of the nearby islands for some snorkeling before stopping for some lunch at aptly named Bamboo Island. It was great to leave the mainland behind and see the islands of various shapes and sizes. The itinerary and timings for our trip seemed ever changing and we ended up waiting for our ride home on the beach for 2 hours in the sun. We returned to the mainland looking more like lobsters.

After a relaxing and very different few days in Sihanoukville we were back on a bus, Cambodian karaoke booming, and off to Kampot only a couple of hours east. Here we spent 2 days meeting the locals, cycling around the villages near by. It was such a great way to get a feel for the country. Seeing the children in their crisp white uniforms on their way home from school, on bikes that were way too big for them with younger siblings on the back, people running out of their houses waving hellos as we went by, everyone had a huge smile for us. Jill managed an early morning run which was consistently interrupted with enthusiastic hellos. The landscape is amazing too, skinny white cows standing out against the lush green rice paddies which stretch out as far as the eye can see, dotted with people working the land and the occasional water buffalo. I think it is safe to say that we like Cambodia a great deal.

After 2 days, some great food (if you are ever n Kampot head for Rikitikitavi's it's good) and experiences, it was time to move on once more, back to Phnom Penh for the water festival.

 

 

Phnom Penh

Our Cambodian adventure began in the bustling city of Phnom Penh. Well, it officially began at the border crossing from the Mekong Delta in Vietnam, which was pretty straight forward - off the boat, on to a mini-bus, off the mini-bus to wake a policeman to check our passports and visa, walk along a dusty road and back on the mini-bus to start the 3 hour bumpy ride to Phnom Penh. We fell in love with Phnom Penh straight away and celebrated the start of our Cambodian leg with a beer at the renowned Foreign Correspondents Club on the river front. It was really interesting and exciting to be in the place where so many of the foreign journalists came during the Khmer Rouge attacks, where they would kick back at the end of a long day and share horrific stories of what they had experienced. The bar was housed in a huge colonial building with balconies overlooking the Tonle Sap, ceiling fans cooling the tables and photos of the events covering the walls (along with a lot of gheckos) - there was a real sense of adventure.
We spent our first day wandering round the city and getting to know the cheeky sense of humour shared by most of the Cambodian people. We visited the central market, which is housed in a huge Art Deco dome. There were a labyrinth of aisles with stalls selling everything you could want and very enthusiastic sales pitches from the stall owners. We somehow ended up with his & hers genuine fake Ray Bans, a variety of scarves and a few books!
Weighed down with our purchases, we headed to the Royal Palace and Silver Pagoda. The various buildings were absolutely stunning and we easily spent 30 mins just sitting and watching the monks wandering round in their vivid orange robes.
That evening, we had planned on going to a highly recommended restaurant, where the speciality was deep fried spiders - yummy! Unfortunately there was a heavy thunderstorm and when we tried to leave our hotel, we were met by a fast flowing river where the road had been an hour before! After much deliberation we rolled up our trousers, put on our flip flops and waterproofs and waded out into the road/river. We made it to the nearest restaurant which turned out to be a Korean BBQ, which was actually really nice despite us having no idea what we were eating and just copying what everyone else in the restaurant was doing! 
The following day was very tough emotionally. We set off early to the killing fields just outside of the city. It was so incredibly sad to see what horrific acts Pol Pot and his army had done - thousands of innocent Cambodians tortured and killed and then discovered in this small plot of land years later. It was quite overwhelming to see, especially the display of the thousands of skulls unearthed and the mass graves which still had evidence of clothes remaining in them. We then visited the Tuol Sleng Museum, which was a school which Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge army had turned into a prison, where they would torture and interrogate their 'prisoners' before sending them to their fate at the killing fields. Again, it was very difficult emotionally to see this once mundane building - like any other school we had seen - and see the horrific events which took place. We felt that it was important for us to have seen these places, but were both pretty drained by the end of the day.
We set off for Sihanoukville the following day, pleased that we would be returning to Phnom Penh a few days later.

Enjoying a beer at the FCC

 

Monk watching at the Silver Pagoda

At the Silver Pagoda

The very humbling monument at the Killing Fields