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Cambodia –Siem Reap
Friday 13th November – Thursday 19th November
Our flight to Cambodia left Laos at 4.30pm. We flew with Lao Airline, another rotor plane with propellers. This made us slightly nervous as it was Friday the 13th!!!! Not the best date to fly. We arrived safely at Siem Reap at 5.30pm. We got a taxi into the town to look for a guesthouse, we hadn’t pre booked anywhere, and the search began. Luckily the taxi driver was pretty helpful, we had looked up a guesthouse on the internet in Laos, called Rosy Guesthouse. So we got the taxi driver to take us there first, sadly they were fully booked. The taxi driver then took us somewhere which he recommended. So we ended up checking into the “King Angkor” guesthouse. For $8 a night it wasn’t bad, the rooms were huge with 2 double beds. We were pretty tired by now so we just chilled out for the rest of the evening.
We were up at 9am after a very hot and sticky night, the fan in the room didn’t actually make the bed as the room was so big!! A cold shower later and we were soon sorted. We headed out for some breakfast, stumbled across Pub Street, 200m long full of pubs and bars. After breakfast we decided to walk over to Rosy Guesthouse to see if we could book a room for the rest of our stay in Siem Reap. The King Angkor was ok but the people who worked there were really pushy so we didn’t want to stay there for the whole time. After looking at Rosie’s we had a general stroll around the town and a quick browse at the market. We stopped off for a beer on Pub Street, here we got talking to some Aussie dudes. They were already pretty drunk, there were 3 of them. The old man (Bob) his son (Dillon) and another guy (Pete). They also had 2 local girls with them, which at first we thought they may have been “working girls” but we soon realized that they were their girlfriends. We got chatting about Cambodia, they gave us some good tips on where to go and what to see. They also told us a lot about Australia, they are from Queensland. They also gave us their contact number to get in touch with them when we were in Oz. 3 hours soon passed, that was the afternoon gone!! We headed back to the guesthouse where we freshened up for dinner. Enjoyed a nice Mexican meal, it was hard to find traditional food in Siem Reap so we had to cheat and go a bit western!!
Today we checked out of the King Angkor and headed to Rosie Guesthouse. It was a lovely guesthouse set within the old part of town, so it had more character and was away from the hussle and bustle. Took a good 15 minute walk along the river from town. When we arrived our room was just being cleaned, so we sat down and enjoyed some breakfast. The place had a nice restaurant/bar area and a lounge area where you can chill out and play pool. Once the room was ready we went and unpacked, the room was small but very nice and modern. On the way to our room we discovered the balcony terrace area….it was huge full of comfy chairs and loungers, defiantly one of the nicest places we have stayed so far. Once we were sorted we played a few games of pool, here we got talking to one of the local Tuk Tuk drivers who worked for the guesthouse. We then booked our tour for the temples, we were lucky as he told us that if we went to the ticket office today at 4pm then we could buy our ticket for the following day and it would include sunset tonight!! Once booked we had a few hours before he would be picking us up, so we headed along the riverside and had a look around the market and of course a few cheeky beers on pub street!!!
Richard…our Tuk Tuk driver picked us up at 4pm and took us to the ticket office to buy our temple pass. $40 later “ouch” we headed straight to Angkor Wat for sunset. It was full of tourists, which was a little annoying as every picture we took someone was in it!! The sun set about 5.30pm and it looked amazing, the colours off the temple was beautiful. We had a little look around before it started to get dark, it was nice to get a taste of what the temples looked like for our day ahead.
A super early start….up at 4am!!! Richard picked us up at 4.30am and we headed back to Angkor Wat for sunrise. When we first arrived it was still pitch black, we tagged along with some other tourists who were organized and had a torch with them. It is hard to explain the grand scale of the temple of Angkor Wat but when you first arrive you walk up a stone walk way, which then takes you through the outer temple. Once inside you can see the famous Angkor Wat in the distance, in the middle is grass land and on one side there is a lake. Along the middle is a stone pathway where you can walk straight up to the main temple. We found a good spot for sunrise just in front of the lake looking straight at Angkor Wat. The sun took about an hour and a half to fully rise, this was one of the prettiest things we had ever seen. The sun rise came from behind the temple, at first the clouds were a lovely purple colour and ended up a light blue haze. The atmosphere was amazing, once it had fully raised it was 6am. Off we went exploring the main temple. The temple consisted of many steps which took you to all the different parts of the buildings. The main temple itself has started to decay and there were many restoration sites around, however you can still see a lot of the original markings within the stone walls. It was pretty interesting trying to imagine what it looked like all them years ago. When we had finished looking around we stopped off for some breakfast, yes they still had street stalls selling food and gifts within the grounds!!!! We were dragged into one street stall by a guy claimed to be called “ Mr. Bond “ we enjoyed some scrambled egg on toast and a coffee to help keep us awake!! One temple down and our little legs were already hurting hehe…one good thing was that it was still early so it wasn’t too hot…YET!!!!
Around 8am we found Richard and made our way to the next temple. Angkor Thom , the largest one of the temples. This was loads of temples within a square mile wall, the elephant temple, a pyramid temple which was being restored by some French students. There was also a series of what looked like guard towers, a total of 5 towers which were about 40 meters high and pretty impressive. Angkor Thom which is the main temple, consisted of many different faces carved within the stone. An amazing site however a lot of the building had fallen down and was passed restoration.
On the way to Ta Phrom Temple our Tuk Tuk driver stopped at some smaller temples allowing us time to explore. There were 4 in total, all pretty similar until the final one which was huge. The only way to explore this one was by climbing loads (hundreds) of narrow steep steps. Kimmy had a moment where Ryan had to calmly encourage me up the steps, it’s hard to describe, and the steps were about 60 meters high and extremely thin. If you were to fall then to put it bluntly….you’re be seeing bright lights in the clouds. If this was in England there would be no way that anyone would be allowed to climb the steps…health and safety really doesn’t exist. Finally once we reached the top we were taken back by the amazing views around. There were also some easier steps on the other side of the building, these were a lot easier to climb down. Letting ourselves cool down we were then taken to Ta Phrom…for all of you that have seen Tomb Raider then you would have heard of this one!!! Part of the temple was set in one of the tomb raider films. This was both of our favourite temples out of all of the ones seen. It was unbelievable, actual trees were growing through the remains of the temple. These were no ordinary trees either, they were the biggest and most amazing looking trees ever seen. It was like a maze looking around the site and we were lucky not to get lost as it was so big. We finished all the temples around 1pm and we can truly say that we were shattered. Climbing steps in 30 degree heat isn’t overly fun. The whole experience of the temples was impressive and amazing. Not even the photos will show the beauty of the architecture.
We got dropped off at the guesthouse where we showered and chilled out for a few hours enjoying some late lunch. Once a bit more awake we headed down to Pub Street, where we bumped into the German couple we met on the Halong Bay tour. We enjoyed a few beers with them before they headed back to their hotel. This was the same night we got addicted to salty popcorn…one of the bars were given out free popcorn all night!!!! Ryan didn’t even like popcorn until this night….he was then highly addicted.
We treated ourselves to a lie in this morning considering we did get up so early yesterday. Had breakfast at the guesthouse, Ryan enjoyed his British eggs, chips and beans!!!! The owners of the guesthouse were from England (Norwich) and had recommended a hotel spa complex if we fancied some time out around a pool. This took our fancy so we hired a couple of bikes from them, which 75% of the hire money goes to charity…our good deed of the day! A 15 minute cycle ride and we reached the hotel. It was a lovely 5* hotel, we payed $3 each to enjoy a day sunbathing around the pool. The pool area was lovely, it even had a Jacuzzi which we were allowed to use!! After 3 hours of chilling out the clouds started to darken so we thought it would be sensible to head back before we got caught in the rain. This didn’t happen as on our way back the heavens opened…we got drenched!!! So much for the rainy season being over. For dinner we headed to the bar with popcorn….both enjoyed yummy local dishes. Mine looked interesting but tasted lovely, it was aubergine with beef…however it looked a little like cat food!! Lucky the lighting was rubbish and it tasted good. Over the course of the evening we got chatting to a British guy who lived in Cambodia, it turned out he had actually gone to school at St Edmunds in Canterbury. Also in the bar behind us were these 2 crazy Russians which were getting through the vodka shots like they were water….they were very comical.
Today was a day of strolling around the markets and the remaining part of the town, which we hadn’t seen yet. The markets were huge selling everything you can think off. I brought a few bracelets and picked up a little something for Marcie. The day was broken up with the odd beer here and there, we also treated ourselves to the most amazing chocolate brownie dessert in a place called “The Blue Pumpkin” it was delicious.
Our last day in Siem Reap before getting the night bus to Sihonoukville. Headed out for breakfast in town, found a really good place which served cheap meals. Ryan had bacon and scrambled eggs while I enjoyed pancakes with apple. For the rest of the day we chilled out on the balcony terrace catching up on the journals and skyping people!!!! The night bus picked us up about 7.30pm…..
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