Hi All, Thought it was about time for the second part of the journey..Yep its a long one...So to begin where I left off.....After leaving Laos and surviving the Mekong River and boat ride, I opted for the mini bus (and better seating) and headed for Chang Mai (in the north of Thailand) where I spent a few days eatting McDonalds, oh and relaxing of cause with a couple of Americans I met on the ride. After sufficent McDonalds eatting to bring my fat intake back to normal, I decided it was time for an island off the coast of Thailand, so after another 16 hour overnight bus trip I finally arrived and settled in on my slice of the sand and turqoise water (which i endured for about 5 days) before deciding on my next move...CAMBODIA The ticket was booked and it began with an early start when i woke at 6am in order to pack my bags for the 7am bus ride and collect my washing I had arranged to be ready at 6.30am the night before. So i was packed and went to locate my washing only to find that there was no one to collect it from. After sitting on the steps for what seemed like 1 hour (was really 20 minutes) a man appeared and proceeded to try and find my clothes. After what i assumed was some great communication on my part, he jumed on his motorbike and waved (i thought he was going to get my washing) and happily waved back. Another 10 minutes passed and by this time another man appeared, so again i decided to ask about my washing and just finished explaining when my mini bus for the trip to Cambodia arrived....great! Luckily the driver spoke english and i told the epic washing story again, but it was no where to be found.....after a few knocks on doors of the workers who were still sleeping, it was realised my washing was tucked away nice and safe in a locked room, to which the man who left on the motorbike was the keyholder (or so we thought). After a few more knocks on doors of sleeping workers, more keys were located, my washing was rescued, I apologisied numerous times to the other ppl who were waiting in the bus (which was supposed to leave at 7am, with it now being 7.25) and we were on our way. The rest of the trip through Thailand to the border went realatively smoothly and we arrived at the border at about 2pm. After a few smiles and some picture taking i had made it into Cambodia (yay) and had made a few friends in the process. However we still had another 350k's to go to get to Siem Reap (no problem i hear you say?) Well we headed out of Poipet (border crossing) about 3.30pm (after several bus changes, for which I still dont know why) and the journey had begun. As it turns out the road to Siem Reap is not really a road and more like a dirt track with large potholes, so we settle in for what we thought was to be a 5 hour journey and held onto our seats. The first 5 hours were ok and then we stopped for a break and we realised we still had about 4-5 hours to go. As you can imagine we were all thrilled, everyone was eagger to get there and headed back for the bus after about 20 minutes of the allocated 40, only to find they were fixing our flat tyre and then some of the guys were needed to push the bus to get it started before we all jumped aboard. At about 9pm that night we arrived in Siem Reap and dropped off at the bus drivers guest house (suprise suprise) but my new found friend (chris from the Uk) and I decided to see what our options were, so after about 20 minutes of walking in the dark and using a tourch to try and locate where we were on the map we finally stumbled across a good place, where we dropped our bags and sighed with relief. We spent the next day wondering around the city and ended up on pub street that night, where we got talking to a couple of american girls, one of which was very drunk and we ended up helping her out of the toilet and the building, but not before arranging to meet up the following night for some food and more drinks. The next day Chris and I hired a tuk tuk driver and did the rounds of Ankor Wat ( a very large temple) and a few surrounding ones. Luckily Chris was my kind of traveller and we were both "templed out" by the early afternoon and decided to call it a day (most people get 2 or 3 day passes to see what we saw in half a day). After another good night and another day of wondering the city, we decided it was time to head for Phnom Penh (captial) and see what it had to offer. So another bus road (an easy 5 hours of a paved road) we arrived and set out to find some accommodation. Once found we roamed the city to get our bearings and enjoyed a few beverages along the way. The next day we hired a tuk tuk driver to take us to S21 and the Killing fields. S21 is basically an old school which was taken over by Pol Pot (mean man who tired to rule the country) and tourted anyone who opposed him, along with anyone who did not obey the rules (such as only being allowed to look straight ahead when walking), so as you can imagine it was quite a sad place. It was followed up with the killing fields, where men, women and children were taken from S21, as well as numerous other places to be killed, and dumped into mass graves. Howvever on the way back from these places, we decided to visit an orphange and get to meet some locals. We arrived at what can only be described as shack housing (where i thought we may be mugged), but the further we went into it, we were greated with more and more smiling children. We spent an hour or so chatting as best we could in one on the rooms the children sleep in (all 10 of them), before asking our driver to take us so that we could purchase something for the orphanage. We decided on a 50kg of rice each and after making the purchase we went back to the orphanage to make the delivery. I have to say it was the best $40 I spent on the whole trip and the people were so appreciative I wish I could of brought more. After cheering ourselves up sufficently (after S21 and the killing fields, which we met our amerian friends at again) we headed back to the guest house to get ready for our big night out on the town. It must be said that Phnom Penh is not a place you walk around at night, especially by yourself (as to put it bluntly, most of the people there have nothing and therefore they have nothing to lose my mugging the rich tourist). So we got our tuk tuk and head for the bar everyone knows called The Heart of Darkness, and arrived to see our American friends being ushered inside (it turns out your not allowed to hang around outside for safety reason) so after being "patted down" we were in. After a great night and a few too many drinks we decided it was time to go and once outside we were mobbed by touts offering rides (nothing new) so we opted for a motorbike and after a few attemps i finally managed to get on and we were off. The ride was short, but great fun and after waking up the guard to get into our guesthouse, it was straight to the room to pass out :-). The rooms were tiny and the ceilings were very low (not made for westerners, just like everything else in asia) and the beams were even lower. Up until this point Chris had managed to hit his head several times with no serious damage. So i wasnt really suprised to meet chris downstairs the following morning, and for him to show me the dried blood on his head where he had scraped quite a bit of skin from, after of course walking into one of the low beams, I managed to stay unscathed :-) After another day of wandering the streets, the tickets were booked for my next destination (Vietnam) and Chris to Laos. So after a few goodbyes and another 6 hour bus ride I arrived. So, that ends the Cambodia portion of the trip, I will try and send pics sometime over the next week, dont forget to tune in next time for ......Vietnam fights back! Take care and im sure ill talk to you all soon Lots of love Clare xxoo