Cambodia

Siem Reap - Battambang - Phonm Phen

It's about time I updated the blog with my Cambodia experience so far! 

My first stop after crossing the boarder at Laos was Siem Reap. We arrived late and checked into a pretty luxurious guesthouse, I had my own double bed and everything #flashpacker. Siem Reap was the first place that I had been in weeks that was actually buzzing in the evening, so much going on, the night market, pub street, harassing tuk tuk drivers... We got dinner and headed for bed. The next day I explored the city to get my bearings, was already in love with this place, it was not too big that you couldn't walk, but not too small as ther was so much going on. I got a really nice foot massage and purchased a few souvenirs. The city was only going to get busier as its was approaching Khmer New Year which is the time that the Cambodians celebrate new year. Everyone from all over the country gather in Siem Reap to visit the temples around this time. The following day was our first of three visits to Angkor Wat, an ancient collection of temples that are totally unique to Siem Reap. I had to get up at 4am as we decided to go for sunrise, a beautiful time to see the temples. I enjoyed getting some pictures of the temples, I thought I was tired of temples by this point but thee temples were so different that it was a new experience. By 9am it was too hot and I was too tired so we head back for a nap. I changed to another hostel that was one of my favourite hostels by far, a freezing cold pool, a cinema, yummy food and decent wifi, perfect! I spent a lot of time chilling whilst in Siem Reap, browsing th markets, escaping to cafes/restaurants with air con only. I had some delicious home-ey foods, like steak + gravy baguette, pastas, Burger King... All very healthy of course... The second day of temple visiting was quite good, but towards the end I was sure the tuk tuk driver was taking us to the same set of temples over and over again. By the third day of the temples it's fair to say I enjoyed the tuk tuk ride over the actual temple we saw which was over 45 minutes from the city. I had some really fun nights out around the new year, tradition is to squirt waters guns and throw baby powder everywhere in the street. It was rather fun. All the locals were loving life and it was lovely to see. I watched The Killing Fields film in the cinema in preparation for Phnom Phen which was a hard hitting one and crazy to think that this genocide happened just 30 odd years ago and in the country I'm in right now and it would have directly affected the local people that I have met. As my time in Siem Reap came to an end I experienced the classic backpacker issue, bed bugs. I woke up looking like I had a severe case of chicken pox and itching like hell. Of course only my skin would react in this way. The hostel were very efficient to be fair, closed down the room, washed all of our clothes and bags and everything that could be infested. Shame they could do anything about my poor skin but I was happy they did all they could. I was ready to move on after an enjoyable week and a half. Next stop was Battambang.

Battambang was certainly back to basics. We were treated from the bus from very excitable tuk tuk drivers if not slightly desperate to our custom. We went with a lovely young man who is learning English so he can one day be a tour guide which is his dream. That afternoon he took us to the bamboo train, which is a bit of wood with a motor that goes along a disused railway line, was pretty fun actually. We stopped at a 'station' to get a drink, and here you really see the poverty, no kids were in school, everyone in the village were desperate to sell you something, anything, for a dollar. We headed back to our tuk tuk driver and went out for dinner, there was a distinct lack of choice in terms of dinner, so fried rice it was! The next day we visited these caves, a number of them housed remains of bones from victims of the Khmer Rouge,, and one had a Buddhist temple built into it which was interesting. I did the most strenuous walking I've done since being in Asia that afternoon as we had to walk up steep inclines between caves. At the end we were able to witness a massive stream of bats flying out of one cave, they were heading to th marsh land to eat mosquitos. There was a line of bats come info out the cave for at least half an hour. I'm glad I saw Battambang but two days was enough so next stop the capital Phnom Phen. 

I didn't see a lot in my first few days in Phnom Phen as I was waiting to see the sights with the mother who was arriving into Phnom Phen a few days after me. It was a nice city to explore, great restaurants, interesting markets and a beautiful river front. I went to market that seemed to be solely aimed at local young women, clothes bags, shoes, make up and beauty salons were all that were available,e at this market and not and English speaking person in sight! I had some lovely, if not expensive, cocktails on a roof top bar by the Mekong river. I was generally getting excited to see my Mumma after all these months. I met Mum at the airport and enjoyed watching her first reactions of this country as we tuk tukked through the city. We arrived at our very luxurious hotel and enjoyed a swim and luncheon. The next day we went to The killing Fields and the s-21 prison, both where the most horrific acts of violence and torture were carried out by Cambodians on their own people under a crazy communist dictatorship. Very powerful places to visit. That afternoon we made the most of our luxury hotel and also had dinner at the posh hotel restaurant. Today we head to Sihanoukville, a beachy place, I don't think I've gone this long without seeing the sea in my life!

J x

13 days in Laos

The first thing I noticed about Laos was how underdeveloped it was and how poverty stricken it is. The people of Laos do not seem to be used to tourists and can cone across quite rude, I think this is partly due to cultural differences but I also think that some of those that work in the tourist industry don't do so because they enjoy it but because they need to put food on the table and with a lack of well paying jobs in Laos, they maybe have no choice but to interact with tourists taking over their towns and cities. 

Anyway my first stop which was Luang Prabang was a very small town, with your usual markets and street food. The best thing to do in Luang Prabang is visit this beautiful waterfall. The water was so blue and you can swim in it which is cool. Two days was enough in Luang Prabang, so next stop was backpacker central Vang Vieng. In Vang Vieng they have Friends cafes where they play episodes of Friends all day long which I very much enjoyed going to. Vang Vieng is pretty much all about the drinking and nightlife so had a couple of really fun nights out. I also did the tubing down the Mekong river, stopping of at two bars along the way (there used to be about ten bars open for this tubing activity but a lot of tourists actually died from drowning after drinking too much.) It was during this activity that my phone drowned (luckily it was the phone and not me!!) for some reason I decided to take my phone in the river i don't know why. This is explains the lack of pictures going up as I was using my phone as a camera so have a bit of a gap in pictures unfortunately. After a fun couple of days in Vang Vieng it was time to head to the capital city of Vientiane. To be honest I didn't do anything with my two days here, was feeling a bit ill and it wasn't a great place at all, not much to do and lots of things closed especially at the weekends. I had some nice dinners, some really tasty Indian food and on my second night Pizza 🍕 So Vientiane was just a stop over for me, to prepare myself for the sleeper bus down to the south of Laos. The sleeper bus was pretty much the most awful thing ever. You have to share a ridiculously uncomfortable single bed with a stranger for the entire journey. No option to sit up on a chair or anything. I couldn't sleep at all because I had about 50cm room and the roads were way too bumpy. Never again. I arrived into Pakse which was the town where you can travel to the 4000 islands from. Thank goodness I treated myself to a hotel in Pakse with amazing air con, my own room, bathroom, everything. Not much to do in Pakse but I had a good walk around and I also met up with my friend who I was travelling down to the islands with. The 4000 islands are scattered across the Mekong river, we went to don det island which caters for backpackers. Our accomodation was a little bungalow, which looked very nice but it was almost too hot to breath, we coped for two nights before having to move to a room with air con (and no cockroaches). Don det is by far the hottest place I've been to so for some reason we decided to do a bike ride in the midday heat. It's fair to say I nearly passed out but we made it down to a beach on a separate island for a nice swim. There is a little bit of nightlife on don det, mainly for Bob Marley wannabes...  But was still fun to head out to one of the three bars on the island. We also took a tour of the waterfalls and a boat trip to see the rare breed of dolphins that live on the Mekong. Our 'tuk tuk' was actually a motorbike with a tiny side car but we still managed to get the three of us on there, I was slightly scared for my life. Don det was fun for a few days but the heat was too much so we were very ready to get into Cambodia. We managed the boarder crossing on foot, after the hearing the horror stories we didn't know if we'd make it but it was ok, only had to pay an extra $2 on top of the visa which was defo going straight into the guards pocket. Feeling very happy to be in Cambodia, loving Siem Reap already! 

J x