Tediously Travelling to Thailand

Today we arrived at the last country both me and Lauren are visiting together. We got the 8am bus heading to Bangkok, which was only ten minutes behind schedule - basically on time by Cambodian standards. We had asked for a bus that went all the way through; where you weren't required to take all your belongings off at the border and get on another bus the other side. However that's exactly what we had to do.

We arrived in Poipet, the border town around 11:30 and got off the bus with all our luggage. First we had to go into the Cambodia departure office, fill out the departure cards and get our passports stamped and fingerprints scanned. This was fairly straightforward. The queues are fairly short and there was quite a few open desks each with their own queue.

Next we had to walk about five minutes to the Thai immigration arrival office. We got arrival cards and joined a queue for 'foreign passports' that was waiting to go up some stairs. Being in Asia, some people didn't understand the long line waiting at the bottom of the stairs and just pushed round the side. This led to a mad dash and scramble up the stairs when we were eventually allowed up and a hectic situation where everyone was trying to get through one door into a room  to join a queue to reach the immigration desks. The queue snaked around the room and moved very slowly. It took us two and a half hours to get through to the other side. At one point I saw two ladies who were told to go back as they were in the wrong place hand some money to the immigration office worker and he let them continue. Unfortunately we didn't have any money either otherwise we would have bribed him to get to the front of the queue.

Once we had had our passports stamped we had to put our bags through a scanner and into Thailand we went. We met with the bus company and the other passengers outside KFC just down the road from the border. I got a drink and some chicken nuggets. Then we all piled into minibuses and off we went. After about 30 seconds we were stopped at a police checkpoint. All the doors were opened and about 3 of our passports were checked. We were counted numerous times and told to put our seat belts on. There was lots of discussion but we had no idea what was going on. After a while they shut the doors and we turned round and went back to KFC. We think the issue was that the girl on the front seat didn't have a seat belt available for her to use. The bus organisers told her she'd have to get a motorbike through the checkpoint and then she could just get back on the bus. We all found this a funny suggestion by it didn't ever materialise. Eventually (we think) the organisers just put her on a different mini bus. We went back to the checkpoint where we were repeatedly counted again but this time we were given the all clear and off we went to Bangkok at around 3:15pm.

Hour an hour later, we reached another check point. Thankfully this one we whizzed through. We had a 15 minute petrol and toilet stop and then about 5 minutes later we stopped again at another petrol station. That's when I noticed the check engine light was on.  The driver had the bonnet up and was banging something and continually turning the engine on and off again.  I have no idea what he did but after about 15 minutes he got back in the minibus and we continued on our way, check engine light still on.

We had one more toilet stop around 7:30pm and then we made it to Bangkok. The traffic was absolutely crawling and it took us forever to get to our destination. We were dropped off near the busiest backpacker road and we got a tuktuk to our hostel, arriving over 13 hours after we left Siem Reap. We checked into our room, which we currently seem to be sharing with 4 Spanish boys and then headed out to the nearest shop. There was a market type thing just across the road and I got some chicken pieces and then a drink from a nearby shop. Chicken and a drink seems to be the thing to have today. Then we returned to the hostel, showered and retired to our beds.

Souvenir Shopping

This morning we had a nice lay-in, going down to breakfast at 9:45. Then we headed out to spend the last of our Cambodian money as tomorrow we move on. We went to the post office and the market in search of stickers and other souvenirs. It was very hot again and just standing outside for a minute was enough to you sweat. We were out for about two hours and then we returned to the hostel.

We spent the afternoon, as per usual, by the pool. Around 6pm we had dinner at the hostel as it was cheap and convenient. I had Lok Lak, which was a beef stir fry, with rice. It came with a sauce which I tasted first, before pouring it over the food. It turned out to be a very peppery sauce, but it was still very nice.  Lauren had a chicken burger.

After dinner we went and got changed out of our bikinis and went out to spend the rest of our money at the various nightmarkets around the town. Despite there being many many stalls, they all seem to sell almost the exact same thing. There wasn't much variety. They either sold then same tshirts, the same jewelry and souvenir items, or very similar paintings. Lauren bought two tops and I got a shot glass to add to the collection. I've been getting one from every country - I can't remember if I've mentioned it previously. Then we returned to the hostel to pack. 

Sunrise at Angkor Wat

Last night after I posted yesterday's post and everyone on our room was in bed we had a little bit of excitement in the form of a power cut. All the sockets, the WiFi, the lights and the aircon were affected (obviously). This meant we couldn't charge our phones and wee were probably going to bake to death. A further problem of not being able to charge phones was that they were almost it of battery  (in most people's cases) and they were required for alarms as 4 out of 5 of us had to get up at 4am this morning as we were heading off to see the sunrise over Angkor Wat. Thankfully after the majority of us had fallen asleep, the power came back on and all was well.  Lauren had to get up and turn all the lights that had come back on off as everyone else was asleep.

We got up at 4am and were picked up by Mr Han's (see TukTuk Tour post) nephew, Mr Dara, in his tuktuk. We whizzed off to get entry tickets at the ticket office which has been moved recently to a location completely out the way. We got there and waited along with scores of others for the ticket office to open at 5am. Sunrise and sunset are very popular times to visit the temples. It cost $37 for a one day ticket which had our photo on it, presumably to stop you giving it to someone else. We got back in the tuktuk and went off to the Angkor Wat complex. There was quite a few people there already when we got there and we jostled around a bit for a good spot to stand on the edge of the reflection pool, which is basically a large pond. And then we stood there until the sun came up behind the iconic towers. We were probably stood there for over an hour but it was beautiful. The sun rose very quickly when it did eventually come up.

After the sun was up, we ventured inside the temples to have a wander round. There was intricate carvings on many of the walls which were quite impressive since it was built around the 12th century. We queued for about 30 minutes to get into the Bakan temple on the middle of the Angkor Wat complex. We had to climb up some very steep stairs to get into it but there was a nice view over the complex from the top.

We wandered round, absolutely sweating, until about 8:45am. It may have been early but it was still at least 30°. We got a drink and went to the loo before returning to the tuktuk. Under the seat of the tuktuk Mr Dara had stashed a cool box and he offered us some bottles of water. We were very grateful. 

We hopped back in the tuktuk and Mr Dara started driving towards our next stop, Angkor Thom. On the way we saw a whole load of monkeys on the side of the road and Mr Dara stopped so we could take photos. We were able to get really close to them. There was some younger ones play fighting while the mother watched.  This soon stopped when the dad came over and pulled them apart. 

At the entrance arch to Angkor Thom we got out the tuktuk and walked along the bridge which has large statues of faces lining the road under the archway. On the other side we got back on the tuktuk and continued to the Bayon Temple at Angkor Thom. This temple originally had over 50 towers but now only had around 30. It took ten years less than Angkor Wat to build, 27 as opposed to 37 years, using stone carried by elephants from far away mountains. We did actually see some elephants today. People were able to get a ride on them from outside the entrance arch to the side of the temple, but a) we had a tuktuk and b) we've seen many things about how riding elephants, especially using seats on their backs, is cruel and they are often mistreated. 

Despite Angkor Wat being the iconic landmark, and being very impressive form the outside, both Lauren and I agreed that the Bayon temple at Angkor Thom was more interesting in terms of detail and decoration. This temple had many many Buddha heads carved out of stone watching over you in every direction. It as pretty cool. We looked around this temple before going back to the tuktuk and going to our final stop for the day.

Ta Prohm temple was slightly less well preserved. There were concrete blocks on the ground and trees had grown in and around the building, which had created some quite interesting sights.  This temple is where the film 'Tombraider' was filmed, but having not seen the film, this didn't really excite me that much. We walked round and took photos before heading back to the hostel. 

As we were driving back we came across another group of monkeys so Mr Dara stopped again for us and we got out and took photos and watched them. There were some very cute tiny baby monkeys being looked after by their mums. One mum just had a grip on the baby's tail to stop it running off. I picked up a bit of discarded food and gave it to the baby. It was so cute. Two other monkeys were sitting on a parked motorbike. One was chewing on the seat, trying to rip the mirror off and admiring itself in the mirror. It was quite amusing to watch although I don't think the motorbike driver would have appreciated it.

We got back to the hostel around 12:15pm. We had been out for almost 8 hours and we were very hot and sweaty. We got into our bikinis and went and sat by the pool. We got some food to keep us going until dinner and spent the rest of the day lounging in and around the pool.

Around 6pm we dried off and put some clothes on so we could go out for dinner. We went down a road called 'Pub Street' which is basically full of bars and restaurants. We stopped at a restaurant where I had stir fried beef and cashew nuts with rice, and Lauren had spag bol.
We then returned to the hostel, showered and collapsed onto our beds. It has been a long but awesome day.

Entrance to Angkor Thom

Ta Prohm

Pagodas, Fish and Pools

This morning we got up at 9 and had breakfast at the hostel before going out for a wander. We walked a shirt distance to Wat Preah Prohm Rath, a fancy pagoda by the river. It had a huge statue of a sleeping Buddha at the back of the temple. We looked round there for a while and then headed to the Independence Gardens. The gardens were a bit plain so we just sat on a bench and had a cold drink before getting a tuktuk back to the hostel. 

It was gone 12pm by the time we got back. I decided to give the hour long food tour run by the hostel a try but Lauren wasn't interested.  It wasn't until 2pm so we sat with our feet in the hostel pool to keep cool until it was time for me to go on the tour. Below is a picture of the description of the tour.....

It turned out to be a bit of an inaccurate description. A group of 5 of us, 3 middle aged Canadian woman, myself and a Brazilian called Filipe, walked over to the market with our guide. Our first taster was a plate of beef/egg and noodles. I had beef and it was really nice, but it was quite a basic Asian dish.

Next we went to another stall where we were served a plate of tasters of different fish (and some tofu). There was crab, octopus, long bean wrapped in fish, and meatballs which were apparently made out of fish. I tried and liked them all. They all tasted pretty much the same. This was the most exotic the tour got. We were also given a drink of sugar cane juice mixed with pineapple and orange, with lots of ice, which was actually quite tasty.

Our third food stall was a dessert stall. I tried sticky rice with peanuts. It was slightly warm. It tasted OK but I wasn't a huge fan and didn't finish the bowl. And that was that. Our guide bought some fruit from the fruit stall and took it back for us but obviously I didn't have any. It was a bit of a disappointment ask had wanted to see some weird and interesting foods which we hadn't really done, but at least I tried some new fish....

The rest of the afternoon was spent with Lauren by and in the pool. We had a early dinner, did some snack shopping for tomorrow and retired to bed.

Pudding. The second on the right is the one I had.

Bye to Battembang

This morning we had a lie in until around half ten and then got up and packed our stuff and checked out of the hostel. I'd been awake since around half 7 as the room was just so hot. It was only as we were leaving and I was turning off the fans that I discovered that despite it being on the highest number, 1 was actually the highest setting.

We settled our bill and ordered lunch from the hostel as we were being picked up from there at half past 1. We ate our food and then hung around for an hour until half 1, then we hung around some more. Time keeping doesn't appear to be Cambodia's strong point. The bus eventually turned up around 2pm and on we got. It was a four hour drive to our next and final Cambodian stop. We stopped around half way for a break. There was one point of the journey that made one couple put on their seat belts. All I knew about the incident was an urgent sounding horn, followed by the bus swerving a little and breaking,  and the sound of something hitting the bus. The driver didn't stop so I assume it wasn't a person but I have no idea. A French dude sitting at the back stood up and looked out the back window with some haste and concern but I couldn't understand what he reported back, as I don't speak French.

We arrived at Siem Reap around 6:15pm and got our bags from the bus. We wee greeted by a Cambodian dude with a sign with our names on. Mr Han's nephew apparently. We had tried to stop Mr Han from leaving us obliged to use his nephews tuktuk services but we hadn't been successful and we were too polite to tell him to go away. So we have made arrangements with him for a tour on a future occasion. He dropped is off at our hostel for free as well so couldn't really say no.

We dropped our bags off and sat on the beds for a bit, which are wide and really high with nothing to stop you rolling off. Then we went out for a wander towards the night market. There are fairy lights everywhere and everything looked so nice. I don't know if they're a permanent fixture or if they are for the new year celebrations happening in a weeks time.  Lauren bought an anklet and we both got drinks. It was still very hot. We returned to the hostel and I skyped mum and we sat in the nicely air conditioned room before going to bed.

Tour by TukTuk

This morning we were picked up at 10am by the tuktuk driver who dropped us off at the hostel yesterday.  We had a full day tour arranged to see some sights around Battembang.

On the way to the first stop we went past a roundabout with a huge statue of a man with a black stick that was apparently magic and helped defeat his enemies. He later become king apparently. Our first stop was at the Bamboo train. Exactly as it sounds, it is little bamboo carts on a train track that you can ride up and down. It was a single track line so if you met any carts coming the other way you had to hop off and the driver would disassemble the cart and put it to the side while the other went past, before reassembling and getting back on. It was pretty cool. The carts went quite fast. We went one way and then back again ten minutes later.

Next we drove out to a rickety bridge across a river to take some photos. On the way the driver, Han, was pointing out all the different fruits growing in the fields. We saw mangoes, pineapples, bananas, coconuts, chillies and lemongrass  (not technically fruits). We also saw peanuts. We stopped and he showed us them by digging a couple out from the soil. I never really realised peanuts grew underground. We also looked at a pagoda and then drove a couple of metres to a Muslim fishing village.  It had a mosque; I'm not sure if that was the only thing that made it Muslim or if exclusively Muslims lived there but that's what Han called it.

Next we drove and stopped next to an empty market. I was a bit confused as to why we had stopped and then Han pointed at the tree. Hanging in the tree were loads of huge fruit bats, hanging upside down with their wings fluttering. It was a bit strange as you expect bats to be hidden away in a cave, not hanging off a tree in broad daylight.

Our next stop was lunch and an old pagoda. We had loads of time at this stop as we had to get the timings right for another place. We had lunch first at a little pop up restaurant at the bottom of the pagoda. The food was actually really nice. We sat around for a while, summoning up the strength to visit the pagoda. We had to climb 358 steps (I counted) in the 35° heat to reach the pagoda ruins. It was hard work. We had a look round the ruins and then headed back down the steps for a drink. We left around 2:45pm-ish.

Our final stop was at some caves. We got motorbikes around the points of interest as it was a long way to walk, we would have died in the heat and we're lazy. The first point of interest was at a temple and the killing caves, where the Khmer Rouge used to throw people down into caves to their deaths. There was a little temple in the cave band a huge sleeping Buddha statue. The temple has a sort of shrine filled with skulls of some of the killing cave victims. There was also a very dark cave area behind the temple bit with some bats in.

The second point of interest was at Pkarslaw cave,  which was less of a cave and also had a temple in it. It was here we first saw the monkeys. They were just hanging around. We saw a mother and her baby and got pretty close to them to take photos. 

The third point of interest was the top of the hill and a third temple,  not in a cave. There was amazing views over the very flat landscape from the top and the temple was pretty nice. There was also a whole load more monkeys, some eating coconuts, some eating ice cream.

After these places we went back down to sit at the bottom of the hill under an entrance to a cave. At around quarter at 6, hundreds upon hundreds of small bays started flying out the cave and off into the distance in one long stream. We sat and watched for a solid 20 minutes while bats flew out and they were still going when we left. It was remarkable. They were a lot smaller than the fruit bats we had seen earlier. It was quite a sight. We then got the tuktuk back to the hostel after a very enjoyable day. We had some food and then called it a day.

5 Pagodas and a Non-existent Night Market

Today we had a very easy day as neither of us got much sleep last night. We hung round the hostel for a while, having breakfast and relaxing. Around 12pm we were able to check in to our room so we took our bags up there and then came back down to complete the paperwork. We sat around the hostel until around 2pm, planning the rest of the trip and then decided to go for a wander round the town, as we are going out of town activities tomorrow.

Our hostel is on the road along the river so we wandered down, stopping at 3 different pagodas on the way. The first one seemed to have accommodation for monks out the front of it. It was basically a block of flats but was a lot dirtier and scruffy-looking than you'd have thought for where such spiritual people live. Most of the pagodas we saw today in general were a bit more unpolished than all the ones we'd seen so far. Presumably this was because they were local temples rather than big tourist attractions.

The second pagoda had a nice garden area and the last pagoda had a fancy entrance way. All of them had a lot of (what I guessed were) tomb type monumental turrets around the main building and a lot of them had coloured strips of cloth draped over them. We don't really know why. It might be something to do with the impending new year celebrations.

We stopped for a drink between the 4th and 5th pagodas and looked for the night market which had been pointed out to is earlier by a tuktuk driver. He told us it started at half 3 and was along the river but we couldn't find it anywhere. Instead we just carried on to the 5th pagoda which was near the hostel, completing our circuit.

We got back to the hostel,  sorted ourselves out and then around half 6 had dinner at the hostel.  I had Ban Chao  (sp? ) -  khmer pancakes filled with pork, beansprouts and onion. Lauren had spaghetti carbonara.  

Then we went back to the room, which was like a sauna and laid down very still in an attempt not to over heat.

Bugs, Buses and Battembang.

Today we have spent the whole day hanging round the hostel and mooching round the town. It's been absolutely chucking it down for the last 2ish hours, and the streets have streams running down them, deep enough to cover my flipflops in some places.

At around 7:15pm a tuktuk turned up and we were told that this was our pick up for the best. So we piled in, along with 3 others and all our bags and headed off in the torrential downpour to get the bus. It was supposed to leave at 7:30pm but it was gone 8 by the time it did eventually leave.

Instead of the usual sleeping bus, this one had double sleeping compartments on one side and single 'beds' on the other. They were all fully reclined you could lie down flat and even with both of us in a double one there was more room. There was also charging points, although ours didn't actually work.

We stopped at half 10 for a half hour break and then continued on our way. We made it to Phnom Penh around half 1. I'm not entirely sure why they send the bus that route, as I'm sure it's a lot longer, and there is another bus that goes to Phnom Penh, but that's what happened. We had another toilet stop just before 4am and eventually got to Battembang sometime after 8.

It was not a fun journey.  I couldn't get comfortable, I was too hot and there were fairly sizeable bugs everywhere. I was a bit paranoid they were going to crawl in my ear or up my nose while I was trying to sleep. My knee also started to ache for no apparent reason, and Lauren's back was hurting. Neither of us got much sleep.

When we got off the bus we were met by hoards of tuktuk drivers and we got one to the hostel, where we arrived at around 8:30am, and that is now where we are sitting and relaxing. 

Back to the Mainland

Today has been pretty chilled. We got up late-ish and checked out of our accommodation. Then we went for breakfast. Lauren had beans on toast, I had the chocolatiest chocolate pancakes. Then we just sat in the bar admiring the view and relaxing for a while. Then we went and sat in the basket chairs. At one point a little Cambodian girl came running up to Lauren and climbed into the basket chair with her so she could have a swing. Then a little boy came and stood next to me. I indicated to him he could climb up and he came and sat on my lap and we were all just swinging about on the chairs. Lauren got her phone out to take a photo and the little girl was so happy,  playing with the different filters on snapchat (a photo app that allows you to customise your photos in different ways - see photos). Lauren got up to take a photo ad the two kids piled into the one chair and Lauren took different photos with the different filters and they were giggling away. They had huge grins on their faces, it was so cute. Eventually their mum called them and they went running off. It was a nice little addition to the day.

At around 2:30pm we went and had a drink then headed to one of the piers to get the boat back to the mainland. Koh Rong is an absolutely beautiful island and I was quite gutted to be leaving.

When we got back to the mainland we headed straight to the hostel,  the same one as before,  jumped in the showers and went out for dinner. The place we went had live music and we sang along with the dude and his guitar as he played some tunes. We also tried out the local cocktails which were 2 for 1, meaning it was two for $3.50. I had a pina colada, Lauren had a Woo Woo. We drank those and then headed back to the hostel and to bed.

Sun, Sand, Snorkeling and Storms (3rd April)

To our delight,  this morning we woke up to blue skies and sun. To our horror we discovered we are both covered in bites, presumably received whilst out at dinner last night. We were extra pleased about the weather as we were booked onto an all day boat tour round Koh Rong.  Unfortunately the skies did not stay blue for long and we spent the majority the day racing the storm round the island, getting caught a couple of times in the rain. This didn't stop us from enjoying a fun day though.

Our first stop of the boat tour was a random place off the coast of the island in the middle of the sea for a morning swim. It was still sunny at this point and the water was lovely and warm. Lauren and I were lazy and used the optional life jackets to just float about in the water. It was only a short swim as we had to head off to make it to our next stop before the storm came in. We had originally meant to be stopping at Coconut Reef for some snorkeling, which I had been looking forward to, but due to the weather this just wasn't feasible.

The boat ride to our next stop was very rocky as the boat went through the waves. We got very wet and there was a lot of water in the boat. At several points it felt like the boat would capsize with just one big wave.  It was fun in a scary kind of way.

After what seemed like a long time we arrived at our stop. There was no piers at any of the stops so we were just using the ladder to get down into the sea and wading to shore. We visited Preksway village which is the largest village on the island. We looked at the village school which was built and funded by a Norwegian family. There were no kids there today; it's a holiday period at the moment apparently. Next we looked at the biggest temple on the island. It's still being built but the foundations are there and there's a Buddha statue inside to it's a sacred place, meaning no shoes are allowed to be worn inside, even by the builders.

Next we saw a pagoda, constructed mainly out of wood. It was quite different to all the fancy pagodas we have seen elsewhere. We then wandered through the village, stopping at different houses and shops, trying different things. I tried Rice wine, soy milk ad aloe vera juice. I didn't like the wine, the other two weren't bad. Also on offer were baby figs but I didn't try those. We crossed a bridge over the river and saw some monkeys hanging off a couple of the houses, which was pretty cute. We then stopped at a house/shop where they made and sold coconut oil. I didn't buy any but I did heed the advice to not stand still under a coconut tree. The weather managed to stay hot and sunny the whole time we were in the village but by the time we reached out next stop it had clouded over and we didn't really see the sun again all day.

We then went back to the boat and sailed to Lonely Beach where we had chicken skewers and rice for lunch. Lauren and I kicked a football about for a bit and then we finally got to do some snorkeling. We didn't see that many fish but there was lots of plants which were pretty cool. It started raining whilst we were in the water but it wasn't much of a problem since we were wet anyway.

After we had snorkel led we went back to the boat and attempted to do some fishing. We didn't use a rod, we just had what was basically a roll of twine with some bait on the end. I kept getting mine caught on someone on the opposite side of the boats. Hardly anyone caught anything. Neither me or Lauren managed to catch any fish. Eventually we gave up and we sailed to our next stop; Long Beach.

Long beach used to be in the top ten beaches in the world, until the Royal Group built a pier at the end of it.  From what we were told the Royal Group are in the process of turning this beautiful island into a large holiday resort  Long beach is 7km with amazing blue water and white fine sand. Lauren and I played frisby and volleyball in the beautiful warm water with the majority of the group (there was about 20 of us). It was getting cold and dark at this point so we had a bonfire on the beach. Unfortunately we didn't get much benefit from it. It was short lived due to the incoming storm clouds causing up to head off.

Our last stop was probably my personal favourite activity of the day. We dropped anchor in the sea and got in with our snorkels to see the glow in the dark plant based plankton. It lit up when you moved in the water as a defence mechanism.  It was like tiny little dots of light when you waved your arms about in the water. It was pretty cool.

After this we headed back round the island to where we started. We had done a whole circuit of the island, and as we sailed back we could see the sky in the distant being lit up by lightning. We arrived back at around 8pm. It was a very short walk back to our accommodation where we showered and got dry for the first time in a while, before going out for dinner. We then returned to the hostel and collapsed after a very long and busy day.