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So our last destination in South East Asia, well apart from Bangkok Airport, was Cambodia and we only managed to squeeze in a busy 6 days here. We flew into Phnom Penh from Phu Quoc via Ho Chi Minh City late on Tuesday. We had some problems with the hotel we had booked into and so had to make a few calls and sort out something else at about 8:30pm! Not a good start! However, we ended up at a beautiful hotel with a pool (although we didn't have time to test it out!). We had a lovely tuk tuk driver take us to the waterfront for dinner that night and so booked him for the next day. We visited the very moving Cheung Ek aka the Killing Fields (well one of them), where thousands of people were brutally murdered and buried in mass graves. Extremely shocking when this all happened just 30 years ago. Our next stop was to Tuol Sleng which was one of the prisons used to retain and torture academics, teachers, women and children…basically anyone the Khmer Rouge thought where too educated or a threat to their regime. This was once a school, as you'll see from the photos, and again it was very moving, especially to see photos of prisoners, tools used for torture and classrooms with blood stains.
So after a really upbeat tour of Phnom Penh we headed out to Siam Reap, where we had 2 days at the temples of Angkor. They are incredible…huge temples, with detailed carvings, set in beautiful forests and with palm trees popping up throughout the ruins. It was very hot and involved a lot of walking, but we had a good couple of days seeing the main sights of Angkor Wat, Angkor Thom and Ta Prohm where Tomb Raider was filmed and many more of the less visited (and therefore quieter) ruins. Angkor Wat is obviously the main attraction and it is amazing in its own right, but we also really enjoyed walking around the temples which have been left more as ruins and have tree roots interweaved around the sandstone blocks.
Finally we headed back to Phnom Penh for an overnight stop before getting our flight to Bangkok and on to Australia. Which actually turned out to be pretty tortuous.......to be continued (when we get good internet connection!!)
Love to all
G&A xx
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