Cambodia so far

So, lets get the travelling situation out of the way first, before explaining where we have been, and what we have seen.

Currently, Alex and I are travelling with 2 guys from Germany, one called Hannes who we originally met in Hampi (India) and his friend, Toni, who met up with Hannes for South East Asia. Ant, on the other hand, is currently travelling with a guy from Thailand called Sab, whom he met in Thailand on new years eve. Sab is pretty loaded, as he gets given money by some guy from Singapore for coming on holidays with him. It works out great for Ant as Sab is paying for everything for him, including the 5 star $260 dollar a night hotel. Not that I'm jealous, in our $2 a night hostel. Ant is now in Vietnam, so hopefully we will meet up with him there.


First stop in Cambdoai was Siem Reap, probably the most famous place in Cambodia for being home to the place they dub (like a hundred other places we have visited) the eighth wonder of the world, the Angkor Wat temples. We hired bicycles and travelled out there, occasionally hitching rides on the back of tuc tucs. It was a great day cycling around, temple to temples, stopping once to feed the monkeys some banannas a local kid sold us. The first temple we saw, the most famous was impressive, and supposedly the largest in the world. However, it would be more interesting with a guide to explain the carvings to you, but being lowly travellers thats the kind of luxury we do not extend to ourselves.

Our favourite temple was the one where some of Tomb Raider was filmed. Nature is slowly taking over, as huge tree roots snake their way through the ruins, making for some crazy sights. Whilst it is amazing, the pictures make it look better than it is. In Hampi you felt like a proper explorer, climbing over temples without another soul in sight. In Angkor Wat there are lots of tourists around, and your imagination cannot run away with you as much when a Chinese person shoves past you hitting you with their 20 inch camera lens on the way past.

The rest of our time spent in Siem Reap was less exotic. We played counter strike in an internet cafe a few times (England vs Germany of course) and got a couple of fish spa's ($1 for 20 minutes with a free beer). The Germans had friends who are also travelling who we met up with and one turned 20 years old whilst sat in a fish spa. That was a surreal experience for me, sat with a beer in hand, having my feet nibbled by fish, whilst a group of Germans sat around me singing happy birthday in German.

After we had exhausted the extensive cultural opportunities of Siem Reap we travelled down to Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia. Don't get any mistaken ideas of a bustling metropolis however, it isn't particularly busy. I met up with Ant that night to watch Man United in a bar. Sab came and kindly bought me a few beers and some tea. The next night they came on a night out with us and Sab paid for all our drinks pretty much (including a $40 bottle of gin) as well as paying for Hannes to get completely into a fish spa.

Our cultural experiences in Phnom Penh involved going to the killing fields, one of the sites where Polpot murdered thousands of Cambodians as part of his genocide. The tuc-tuc drivers offer a trip there as part of a package where afterwards you go to a shooting range, which seems like some kind of sick humour. It is essentially just a field, but it has a great audio guide explaining everything, making it worth a visit. The worst bit is the teeth lying on the floor, where the rains have washed them up from the mass graves, or the killing tree, which soldiers used to swing babies against before chucking them into the graves.

Whilst in Phnom Penh it was my mums birthday...happy birthday mum.

We moved onto a place I cannot pronounce or spell next...please wait whilst I google the name...thank you...Sihanoukville. When we arrived we could not find a room for love nor money. It was Chinese new year and the place was packed. Eventually a guy in a hostel told us he had been sleeping in the attic of a bar, so we headed there and slept there for a few dollars. It was literally wooden floorboards, with a plastic mattress but it was better than sleeping outside.

After a few beach days we rented scooters and headed out to some waterfalls. Whilst crossing over one Alex fell over and lost his sunglasses and a sandal over the edge. We managed to retrieve the sandal but the sunglasses are probably sitting atop a 5 year old Cambodian kid. I happened to catch Alex mid fall in a photo.

The day after I went diving with Hannes and Toni which was a lot of fun. for $65 you got a 2 hour boat ride, breakfast, 2 dives, lunch, and a 2 hour boat ride back. I had a really bad stomach (if you know what I mean) and everytime I equalized I nearly followed through. I was sick on the boat on the way back, and for some reason felt the need to explain to everybody that 'Im not sea sick'.




And that almost takes us up to today. We are now in Kampot, where we will explore some caves in a national park before moving onto Vietnam.

We are having a great time, and hopefully we will meet up with Ant again soon. 150 days down...so far so good.

Thailand...a real update

Okay so lets start this blog entry with a quick disclaimer... Anybody who was hoping for some amazing update because of my last entry of "what happens in Bangkok stays in Bangkok" will be dissapointed. There is no crazy "Hangover 2" storyline about to unfold here. The only times I have been sick was when I ate nuts on 2 separate occasions!

We spent the majority of our time in Bangkok on 3 streets, the main touristy streets around Kho San Road. They are entirely geared towards tourists, with various comedy t shirt stalls and bars covering the streets. I think that you are supposed to spend a lot of your time in Bangkok going out at night...drinking. And true to the stereotype, thats what we did. There are plenty of places to go and it is easy to stay out until 7am. We saw a guy when we arrived with a beer, looking worse for wear. We saw him every day, no matter the time, with a beer in his hand. We left Bangkok and came back a few weeks later, there he was. At least we didn't hit it that hard!

I suppose the craziest thing we got up to was going to a ping pong show, just to see what all the fuss was about. Alex didn't come with us, but we went with a few German guys, one of whom we originally met in India and happened to bump in to. It wasn't to impressive really, you aren't missing out on anything if you haven't seen one. Just makes you feel a bit seedy!

We did go out and see a few sites in Bangkok. We all saw the worlds largest lying down Buddha (yet another worlds largest <insert some sort of pose or building material here> Buddha ticked off the list) in a temple complex nearby. I managed to get up early one day and walk down to the grand palace complex before just wandering around the city for a few hours with my Ipod in. The grand palace complex is pretty gaudy, but very impressive. The sunlight bounces off all the jewels and gold to dazzle you whichever way you look, and you can't help but start taking copious amounts of photographs. The emerald buddha (you guessed it...the worlds largest emerald buddha) housed within has to be the most jewel bedecked item I have ever seen. 

We spent Christmas in Bangkok, which was very strange. I didn't really like it to be honest. Not because of Bangkok but just because you should be at home for Christmas. We did manage to find a great Christmas dinner in an Irish pub, complete with complimentary santa hat and party popper (we even had mince pies). We still had a good day, just not quite the same as home.

We wanted to get down to Koh Phangan for the new years eve full moon party so we headed to a nearby island in the south called Koh Samui on the 30th ready to get a ferry over the next day.

The full moon party was as expected really...pretty mental. The beach is lined with stalls selling buckets of alcohol, all with deadly mixes and stupidly cheap, whilst bars blast out songs so everybody is just dancing on the beach all night. There are fire spinners who should enter Thailands got Talent or something as they are stupidly good. After a while they get out a large skipping rope and set it on fire...

Whichever genius thought "lets get a giant skipping rope, set it on fire, then let hordes of drunk people try and jump it until it burns me" is a fool...but a genius nonetheless. I thought it was dumb at first, but then once I had drank a few buckets I got involved (sorry mum and dad) as did Ant (sorry Ant). Alex just filmed us.
The countdown is a bit hazy, but I remember large scaffolds with fireworks on and lots of cheering...thats enough for me.

Alex and I managed to make it home the next morning on a ferry, Ant wasn't so lucky and got stranded for around 4 days because of storms. With some typical Ant luck he met some rich Thai people who he quickly befriended and stayed with for free until he made it back to us.

Back on Koh Samui we waited out the storm and went to watch a Thai boxing match which was a lot of fun. We put a 10 Baht (20p) bet on each match just to make it a bit more exciting.

My favourite island was Koh Tao, the next one we went to. The island and beach were just a lot nicer in general, and I also learnt to scuba dive and trapeeze, both entirely new experiences for me.

My accomodation was included with my scuba diving training so I didn't see too much of Ant and Alex whilst on Koh Tao, being with the other people from the diving school. I had so much fun that I signed up to do the advanced course straight afterwards. I think the highlight for me was the night dive. I absolutely loved it! It felt like I was exploring some alien planet, with only my flash light showing me the creatures of the deep.

To celebrate my birthday Ant and Alex took me out for a steak dinner and a drink on the beach which was nice of them. I had to be up at 6am the next day to dive so we couldn't have a big one. They went back to Bangkok the next day to sort out visas but I stayed to finish my course.

After finishing diving some people from the dive shop went to do some trapeezing which I did (the video is at http://vimeo.com/35093459). That was a lot of fun, and a bit scary being up 10metres high. In the evening we went out for a korean BBQ and then got drunk on the beach. In one bar I was playing a nice innocent game of connect 4 with my dive instructor. What she didn't tell me was that if a guy loses then he has to go behind the bar, drop his trousers and get spanked 10 times by the barmaid...I lost. And jesus, the barmaid did not hold back with that stick. I did get a free gas chamber out of it though. Yeah, apart from that I loved Koh Tao.

Back in Bangkok Ant has gone to meet up with his Thai friends who he met at the full moon party so I haven't really seen him. Alex and I have been to the Tiger Temple today, which is a weird experience. Essentially I think those monks may have lost their way.


It is supposedly a sanctuary containing over 100 tigers, 2 lions, and 3 bears. However, it is a massive tourist trap. Once you are in you can go and crouch next to lots of tigers and pet them whilst a volunteer takes photos of you. The rest of the time you can wander around, seeing monks vaguely abusing tigers to get them into nice poses for photos. There are rumours that the tigers are drugged to make them docile and it wouldn't suprise me at all. They all look pretty monged out. Still...a great photo, no? I don't have much of a conscience regarding that kind of thing anyway, and they didn't really look unhappy (just very very sleepy).


And thats Thailand. When we have passed through Cambodia, Vietnam, and Laos we may spend a bit more time in Thailand to see some more countryside. Depends how much time we have I guess. Ant is still with his Thai friends so hopefully he will catch us up in Cambodia the day after we arrive.

One week in Bangkok

What happens in Bangkok stays in Bangkok...