Cambodia: Sihanoukville

We got the bus from Phnom Penh down to the beaches of Sihanoukville for some well deserved beach time after all the history lessons of Cambodia. We decided to stay in Led Zephur Hostel on Serendipity Beach. We had heard that this was the more lively section of Sihanoukville and was advised to seek accommodation on a more chilled area, however we felt that a more busy location would be suitable for some party time, and we could always do a day to another more quiet area for some relaxing. On arrival at the hostel we were amazed to find a Sunday roast on the menu and quickly jumped at the chance - we were not disappointed! After months and months of seeing pictures every Sunday on Facebook and getting suuuuuuuper jealous, we finally had our own roast dinner to devour, oh god the gravy!

After stuffing ourselves silly we took a wander down the road to the beach front. We were soon ambushed by a group of small children trying to sell us string bracelets/anklets. We politely refused their offer but they proceeded to follow us anyway and it wasn't long before we had a group of them join us at our table while we ate. We didn't mind though, we had lots of fun chatting with them and taking selfies. Bethan was sporting a 'double bun' hairstyle that day which was quite the hit with the children. They kept asking why she had a hairstyle that looked like a cat - "meeeowwww" haha! It was cute to make these little friends because for the remainder of our stay they would spot us on the beach and come over for a while to sit with us. They even made us all friendship bracelets of our favourite colours for no charge whatsoever.

With everyone in high spirits we spotted a fire show going on at JJ's Playground just a few bars down, so we headed over for a closer look. We were happy to find an amazing drinks offer - buy one get three free, for a tiny 40p! We settled onto a table and were mesmerised by the skills of the fire show. It wasn't long before one of the guys, Danny, decided to join us and even convinced Rebecca to have a go herself. As you can imagine this didn't end well, Rebecca attempted to twirl the fire stick around a few times and decided it was too hot so dropped it on the floor. The table next door seemed very impressed with Rebecca's efforts and decided to leave us 2 beer towers as they were heading back home and we proceeded to dance the night away - thanks Mr Hong Kong!

After that heavy night we decided to check out the more chilled area of Sihanoukville, so asked a tuk-tuk driver to take us to Otres Beach. We were met with just a few beach shacks along the beach front but decided to take refuge on a deserted section of the beach under a palm tree. We had a wonderful day dipping in an out of the sea and sipping fresh coconut water. Soon enough the sun was setting so we went into one of the restaurants for dinner, where we were treated to one of the most beautiful sunsets we've seen to date!

So that's our Cambodian Trip all over with - now for a 20 hour bus ride back to Bangkok to apply for our Myanmar Visas!

Dinnerrrrrr!

Serendipity Beach

Drinks with Danny

Courtesy of 'Mr Hong Kong'

Otres Beach

Otres Beach

Sunset at Otres Beach

The Happy Wanderers

♥

Cambodia: Phnom Penh

Next up on our tour of Cambodia was the capital city of Phnom Penh. We arrived into the city at around 6pm, so plenty of time to find our hostel and get some dinner. After bargaining with the tuk-tuk driver to get a reasonable price, all five of us squeezed into the car and we were off on our way. Checking into the hostel was such a hassle - the owner definitely talks too much! After a chat at the bar for over 30 minutes we finally got shown to our room. We were so hungry we decided to just get food at the hostel and get an early night. Rebecca got more than she bargained for when she got offered a side order of tarantula legs, not one to turn down a challenge she ate them with no problems. We were not completely happy with this hostel so decided to move to another the next morning. Our new place was called Eighty8 and was much nicer and even had a swimming pool!

We arranged a tour of the Killing Fields, S21 Jail and Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum for the next morning. The Killing Fields are a number of sites in Cambodia where more than 1 million people were executed and buried by the Communist Khmer regime under rule of Pol Pot during 1975-1979. However the total number of deaths resulting from disease and starvation during this time is estimated to be around 2.5 million out of a population of 8 million. Anyone suspected of connections with the former government were targeted and taken to these out of town areas for interrogation and usually executed within 24 hours of arrival. The most well known killing field is located in the village of Choeung Ek, around a 40 minute drive from Phnom Penh. Here there is a dedicated Buddhist memorial site which includes a stupa filled with over 5,000 skulls of the victims recovered from the mass graves in the area - some just tiny babies. Each of the skulls had been scientifically analysed for age and sex of victims and colour coded according to the cause of death. We all felt so shocked just how recently all this horror had gone on and that we knew almost nothing of its happenings. Even though it was a very eerie place to experience we felt like we learned so much.

Next stop was the S21 Jail and Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum. This former school was transformed into a jail and was used to house victims before being taken to the nearby Killing Field. On arrival at the jail each victim was photographed, beaten and forced to write a very detailed story of their lives right from childhood, as a way to access the possibility of connections with the former government (a punishable offence). This often led to the capture of their entire family who were then also brought to the jail. We made our way around each of the five buildings, reading stories of the way victims were treated and of all the awful torture techniques that were used. We also learned how the guards used the old school gym equipment in the courtyard as a way of torturing victims for information. Again, it was such an overwhelming day for us especially since such horrific torture methods are almost unknown to us. It really hit us hard, again, like the killing fields, that none of this was discovered until 1979 and only because a journalist happened to stumble upon the stench of rotting bodies and followed it to the prison. Sorry for the graphic descriptions but it is really hard to talk about such tragic events in short - we wish that people knew more about this in the Western world because we felt really naive ourselves for being so ignorant to such horrible events.

We're very sorry for the lack of pictures here but we felt that taking photographs at The Killing Fields and S21 Jail was disrespectful. And we didn't really do very much else. As a city, Phnom Penh was our least favourite in Cambodia - largely because there was no real character to it and nothing really to rave about other than the above - which, although extremely interesting, was rather depressing and exhausting. We only stayed for 2 days and then decided to head on to Sihanoukville!

Cambodians love their king

Phnom Penh Palace

Enjoying your chips there?

The Happy Wanderers

♥

Cambodia: Battambang

Next stop in Cambodia was Battambang, a little town not too far from Siem Reap. Despite being Cambodia's second most populous city, it has a real small town feel which we really liked after the hustle and bustle of Siem Reap, especially at New Year's. The city centre itself is quite compact and we walked around it all by foot in barely no time at all. After the 5 hour journey on a local bus which was an experience in itself, we arrived at our hostel, Chaya Hotel, which we had booked as a 5 bed dorm. What we actually got was a box room with 4 mattresses on the floor and two ceiling fans which looked like they might fall into our heads at any moment. Not ones to complain, we snuggled up on our giant floor bed and researched what we wanted to do that day.

We managed to hire a tuk-tuk for the day for around $12 between us all which was a bargain. First stop was the Bamboo Train (the  term 'train' being used loosely). It was literally a large bamboo platform mounted on train axles and was powered by a small go-kart engine. We sat on little pillows while our driver drove us down the track. The journey consisted of an hour of clickety clacking along misaligned tracks and very rickety bridges. It was a single line track so when two trains meet the one with the fewest passengers has to disassemble their train and move off the track for the other to pass. It was certainly an experience but a very fun one at that.

Next up we visited the Killing Cave of Phnom Sampov. From the outside you see beautiful lonesome caves in the Cambodian countryside but inside you learn of the tragic genocide horrors that occurred just a few years ago. The cave is located halfway up a mountain which is covered with beautiful temples and beautiful lookout points over the village below. There is a concrete road and looooooads of steps up the mountain and back down again which peek into caves - the most fascinating being the Killing Cave. The cave is huge inside, complete with a huge reclining golden Buddha lying across the whole cave. As you walk down the stairs into the cave, however, the atrocities that occurred in this spot become increasingly apparent. A massive cage full of bones catches your eye on one side of the room while on the other is another memorial of human remains in a glass box. The bones belong to all different types of people who were killed by the Khmer Rouge in the cave itself. At the top of the cave is the natural skylight which the Khmer Rouge marched people to, lining them up, then bludgeoning them and letting their bodies fall into the cave to eventually die. It's a really eerie place to visit but it really made us appreciate how lucky we are to have such freedoms in our lives. We didn't stay down in the cave too long because it made us feel really drained and uneasy so headed back onto the mountain track to get a glimpse of some more of the beautiful views around us.

After exploring the mountain for a while we headed back down to ground level to find the Bat Cave. At 5:30 every evening around 3 million bats fly out of the cave in the mountain into the wilderness before returning back 12 hours later. We're not the biggest fans of bats but this was actually pretty cool to see! 

The most exciting time in Battambang, however, was the decision by Rebecca to get her hair cut at a hairdressers. In typical Rebecca form, this was a spur of the moment idea. After a mini debate with the lady in the shop who barely spoke a word of English, she managed to agree a deal of $4 for a dry cut. Minutes later (speediest haircut in history) Becca emerged from the shop with inches off her hair, and unfortunately off her fringe too. And an inch is definitely a lot in fringe terms. See below for the transformation!

All in all, our whistle stop tour of Battambang was a pretty good one. We learnt a little about the French colonisation of the town and the horrors of the Khmer Rouge regime, saw some pretty cool sights, and also got ourselves a well deserved rest after the busy few days in Siem Reap. Win!

Next stop - Phnom Penh!

Bamboo Train

Phnom Sampeau Temple

Phnom Sampeau Temple

Phnom Sampeau Temple

The bats leaving the cave

Beautiful Sunset

Nice Fringe Bec!


The Happy Wanderers♥

Cambodia: Siem Reap

So here we were, about to embark on our 60 hour adventure across four countries, eventually ending up in Siem Reap, Cambodia. First we had to get a 6 hour train from Bangalore to Chennai where we had to wait a few hours before our flight to Kuala Lumpur. Arriving in Kuala Lumpur, we had about an 8 hour wait before our flight to Bangkok, so we got comfortable at the airport, did some shopping and had some food. Finally in Bangkok, we were to wait a further 12 hours before the first train of the morning to Aranyaprathet which allows land border crossings into Cambodia. We decided booking a room for this amount of time would be silly as we'd only had a few hours sleep anyway, so we donned Ko San road with our backpacks for some more food and a place to sit and wait for the hours to pass by. After about 4 hours in the same place, we gave up and decided to would be best to head to the train station where we could hopefully find a quiet place to rest for a few hours, so we hopped in a taxi. We found a suitable area and it wasn't long before 2 guys from England joined us as they were waiting for a morning train also. They were so funny, telling us how they'd spent their night on Ko San road, they really helped to pass the hours and before we knew it we were in the queue buying our tickets and jumping on the train. The train took 6 hours from  Bangkok to Aranyaprathet and really was awful! It probably didn't help that we had not slept in over 48 hours by this point and the guard on the train wouldn't let us lie down on the seats to rest, even though nobody wanted to sit in the seats next to us - it was so frustrating! Finally at the border and our journey wasn't over yet. We then had to queue at the Thailand immigration for our exit stamps, then walk to Poipet Cambodia immigration where we had to fill out forms and hand over our passports and money for visas. This was at a cost of $20 for a single entry, 30 day visa which took around an hour - all in all a total of 2 hours to cross the border. Next we were taken to a nearby bus station where we purchased bus tickets directly into Siem Reap where we were FINALLY greeted by our free pick up to our hostel! Words cannot describe how happy we were to see our beds at the Angkor Wonder Hostel - can you believe we had an entire double bed each! 

We had plenty of rest the first night, and got up bright and early the next morning to surprise our new Happy Wanderers at the airport. We were lucky enough to have two friends join us from home for the remainder of our trip - so now we were a massive group of five! It was so amazing to see Rebecca and Sophie's faces as they came through arrivals to see us waiting there for them, we were all sooo excited to see one another! We had a proper catch up during the drive from the airport and wasted no time getting out into the city for some well deserved welcome drinks.

The next evening was New years Eve, so we got all dressed up in preparation for a massive party. Siem Reap is well known for its party atmosphere along the amply named 'Pub Street'. We set off nice and early at 7pm to begin our evening with a nice meal and a few happy hour cocktails. It wasn't long before a few drinking games were in play - our personal favourite 'He's perfect but...'. It was soon time to hit the bars of Pub Street where we were met with one massive street party. It was a real effort to push through the crowds to enter any bars for drinks. However, we didn't mind we simply joined in the celebrations. After hours of dancing and now covered in every alcoholic beverage you could imagine (classic Bethan!) we decided to call it a night - not without a stop off for a large order of Nutella pancakes, yummmy! 

On New Years Day we didn't do very much at all. We wandered around the markets of Siem Reap and treated ourselves to a foot and leg massage, very much needed after all the dancing of the night before. Next we relaxed in a really cool coffee shop called The Blue Pumpkin, which we later found out is a chain store within Cambodia. We decided an early night was in order as we had to be up before sunrise for our visit to Angkor Wat. 

First Hindu, later a Buddhist temple, Angkor Wat is the largest religious complex in the entire world. It is Cambodia's most famous attraction, even appearing on its national flag. Design and construction of the temple took place in the 12th century and was used as the Kings state temple and capital city. We hired one of the guys who works at the hostel as our guide for Angkor Wat. We got up at around 5am to drive the 6km to the entrance of Angkor Wat. Here we joined the queue to purchase our day passes which cost $20 (three day pass $40 and 7 day pass $60). The queue didn't take longer than 10 minutes, however nobody warned us of the photograph that gets taken to put onto the pass, we were all still half asleep, looking very attractive indeed! We hurried along to the Angkor Wat temple to see the sunrise, which we have to be honest was completely ruined by the crowds and crowds of people. It was a real struggle to get a good photograph. We decided to get a head start of the crowds and entered the temple long before everyone else got going. This was a probably the best idea as it meant we got to roam around in side the temple with almost no bother from anyone. Then once we were done inside Angkor Wat, we got a much better view of the structure as the crowds had thinned out. For the remainder of the day our driver took us to numerous temples throughout the Angkor Wat park and after almost 8 hours of exploring we were truly exhausted. 

Here are some of our favourite pictures from our time in Siem Reap:

Our 60 hour journey across 4 countries

And then there were..

Five!

All ready for New Year celebrations!

Heeeeyyy Pub Street

Happy New Year!

Sun Rise at Ankior Wat

The worlds cutest driver!

All worn out after all the activities...

The Happy Wanderers 

♥