South Africa & SE Asia 2008

Day 72 – 78 Phnom Penh – Siem Reap – Battambang – Pursat – Kompong Luong – Kompong Chhnang – Phnom Penh

Firstly, this route was going to be done in reverse but the buses from Phnom Penh towards Kompong Chhnang only go early in the morning so we ended up going to the only place we could get a bus to at midday – Siem Reap. 

Siem Reap has defintily been developed to cater for tourists, but in quite a sophistocated way. In the main town there are dozens of very attractive looking restaurants and cafes with international food and there are boutique gift shops and galleries everywhere.  Blue Pumpkin is a pretty cool place upstairs to have a coffee, and Angkor Wat seems to be one of the busiest and cheapest places to drink.  There river running through the town make it a picturesque place to wander happily.

We spent 2 days seeing Angkor Wat temples, which was great but definitly enough.  We did the main small circuit on the first day and then Banteay Srei, the Landmine museum and the Rolous group on the second. My favourite temple was the Ta Prohm  (also known as the Lara Croft temple) – it is all ruined by tree overgrowth, trunks grown through walls and ceilings. Interesting how something so natural looks so much like a film set (even if you havent seen the film).

Next we headed to Battambang, a dusty town and spent the afternoon napping in our not so “Royal Hotel” room, but i did make one circuit of the market square in search of Lays crisps. Well Battambang was only a stop of point for us anyway due to the lack of afternoon buses in Cambodia… 

Pursat was our next destination so we got an early bus there the next morning.  We wanted to stop hear in order to see the floating village of Kompong Luong, which you get to by tuk tuk (45mins) and then take a boat around the village charged per hour. Apparently in the past there have been some problems with the locals there towards tourists they can get quite aggressive about the price of the boat, and accounts of being robbed, but there are police patrols now (which we saw) so i think its stopped.  We really enjoyed the trip though, despite the very unfriendly boat driver, we sat in a friendly woman’s house and briefly chatted to her.  The village is made up of a large proportion of Vietnamese who live on boats and houses floating on steel drums and wooden rafts.  Intially a floating village conjoured up images of primative houses in my head but it is quite developed. There is a petrol station, a mobile phone shop, beauticians, mobile fruit sellers, chicken coups all floating and an enormous amount of friendly children playing in their paddle boats.  Pursat itself is just another dusty town…

Next we headed to Kompong Chhnang paying the cost of the fair to Phnom Penh (?) and you have to apparently say you want to get off there otherwise they wont stop.  So we found our guesthouse, thanks Lonely Planet – another real gem which looked and smelt circa 1960, and went in search of a moto driver who had heard of Ondong Rossey – a nearby village who make clay pots.  After having no luck , the only English speaking tourist orientated moto driver in town managed to find us. We headed for the hills on the back of his moto and had a lovely drive down dirt roads, clay red in colour, through fields with the hills in the distance. We stopped at a couple of houses to see some pot making action and went on to an excellent look out point, where all you could see was green far into the distance.

Several questions have been raised during our time in Cambodia. Why do women wear mathcing trouser and button up top pyjama sets as day wear. Why do male Cambodian grow their fingernails? And why does one country need so many egg pots we saw being made the clay pot village (definitly not for export as explained to us) – when no one really eats boiled eggs, and even if you do get one in a cafe you rarely get an egg pot…

We headed back to Phnom Penh to collect our passports from the Chinese Embassy and to go to Ho Chi Minh City the next day.  A cold drink and some food other than rice and vegetables was welcomed in the capital after our dusty town tour. It was worth it though  to go to places with only a few or now tourist visible.

Days 66 – 71 Phnom Penh, Cambodia

The journey from Don Det to Phnom Penh was certainly memorable.  We were so closely packed, uncomfortable and so sweaty it was impossible not to make friends on that trip and boost morale.  There was the mutiny-bonding early on when we intitally refused to squeeze another person onto the row of seats in the minivan.  Seriously how many people do you want to fit in, “we’re twice your size” the south London boy and i were telling the driver – knees banging.  But we got there in the end, after changing mini buses about 4 times (i lost count) and eating several baguettes through the day.

 It was great to be in Phnom Penh and we went to the riverside to find a bed, finally getting into it at 1am after some hot food.  We had a lovely room…which we left after 2 nights to go somewhere more affortable…which apparently means a room with a low ceiling you can’t stand up in, and an awful fan. It was nice, clean and cosy though…

In Phnom Penh, we made the most of being in a city and went all over in tuk-tuks, glad to have so much to explore.  We went to several bars and restaurants along the riverside, the Heart of Darkness Club (which was a last resort as the Salt Lounge was definitly not a club as suggested), we went to a shadow puppet performance, the top of the shopping centre (view from the restaurant is good), the central & russian markets, the Killing Fields and the S-21 museum, and off course 2 trips and several hours at the Chinese Embassy…

All in all it was enjoyed.  Note – there dont seem to be any buses in the afternoon in order to leave Phnom Penh, so we ended up getting the only bus at 12.45 to Siem Reap even though that wasnt our plan.