Scambodia!

We arrived in Siem Reap via a very "not so" tourist bus. The guy who was supposed to pick us up from our hostel to take us to the bus station was 20 minutes late and the bus he took us to was DEFINITELY NOT a tourist bus. After much deliberation and hand gesturing with the bus driver, we boarded the bus, only to be met by a sea of curious Cambodians faces. I think that the fact that we were along for the ride surprised these locals just as much as it did us. It was obvious that we'd been scammed, as our taxi driver took the money that we'd paid for the tourist bus and bought us much cheaper tickets on a local bus. The give-away was the fact that after he dropped us both off next to the bus, he high tailed it out of there VERY QUICKLY. I was still bending down to pick up my backpack and his car was off and running.

Anyhoo, we saw some interesting countryside and happenings along the way, as the bus did NOT take the highway that it was supposed to. There were a couple of very interesting service stops along the way as well - not for the fainthearted…! On one occasion, one of the local woman decided that the queue for the loo was too long and proceeded to hike up her skirts and squat down in front of everybody!

The drive there was also extremely dusty due to the fact that we travelled along some secondary dirt roads for large parts of the journey and the driver had the vents open, so we were sitting in the bus in a cloud of dust. Many of the locals on the bus had face masks on & Don and I had to resort to breathing through our t-shirts.

We arrived in Siem Riep (at the wrong bus station of course) more than 2 hours later than we were supposed to - with no driver waiting to pick us up (he was waiting at the main bus station). After negotiating with a tuk-tuk driver in order to procure a decent rate for a lift to our hotel, we were dropped off there, had a quick shower & headed straight off to Rup temple to see the sun setting over the jungle.

Our first morning in Siem Reap saw us rising at 4h30am to meet our tuk-tuk driver, who took us to see the sunrise over the most important of all temples - Angkor Wat. It was breath taking! Then on to the monumental magnificence of Angkor Thom - last capital of the Khmers, with its Elephant Terrace, the Terrace of the Leper King, Phimeanakas, Preah Paliley and the stunning Bayon temple. Wow! This was my favourite temple of the day, as it is so different from the other temples. I literally went snap happy here! This 12th century masterpiece lies at the very centre of Angkor Thom and is an archaeological wonder of symmetry and grandeur.

We then continued on our exploration of the Angkor Temples at Ta Prohm where some of the scenes from the movie Tomb Raider were shot (no Lara Croft running around unfortunately for Don). The temple has largely been left in its natural state since its "re-discovery" by French explorers and is showing signs of neglect. The authorities are now starting to rebuild some of the structures and carry out renovations, as many of the domed roofs and walls have already collapsed due to the encroaching trees and vegetation.

After that, we headed off to Phnom Bakheng to watch the sunset. This time with Ton Le Sap Lake in the foreground and a mass of jungle stretching out in the distance.

After 14 hours of temple climbing and site visits, we were knackered and headed back to Siem Reap for some R&R.

Our last day in Siem Reap was spent wandering around the markets and streets and we ended up spoiling ourselves with pedicures & foot massages at a really nice spa. Before we knew it, it was all over and it was all aboard the night bus to Sihanoukville…