Angkor Wat – Temples , Temples Everywhere

When people say they are going to Cambodia it’s normally an un-said assumption that they are also going to Siem Reap to see the beautiful ruins of Angkor Wat.
We were really excited to go to the ruins but at the same time we were a little worried that we had heard and seen so much of it online and in people photos that it would be a little under whelming.
We had been given the perfect plan of attack for this big complex by our friend (which i’ll post for you guys soon). We decided that because we have been traveling so much that just the one day would be the perfect amount of time for us in the complex…we were also warned from many people that unless you are a History graduate studying the building , you will probably be ok just doing the one day.
We payed our tuk tuk driver to take us to pick up our tickets the evening before from the Angkor Wat offices. This allowed us to see Angkor Wat while it was quiet (with the added bonus of the beautiful dusk light as the sun set).
The next day we woke up at early o’clock…4am…urrrrr and headed to see the rest of the temples. I am no expert what so ever on the history of the temples but I will say that my favourites were the temple of faces named ‘Bayon’ and the temple made famous from the movies ‘Indiana Jones’ and ‘Tomb Raider’ called Tah Phrom. Tah Phrom is recognizable because of the tree’s that have been left to grow out and around the buildings making the stone structures more jungle and artifact.
Pictures can’t do this place justice but here are a select few.

The town of Siem Reap itself is like an adult Pleasure Island from Pinocchio. We really liked it and it was a shame we didn’t have more time to spend there. I got to have a drink in ‘Angkor WHAT?’ and drink a Costa coffee (the british style starbucks) so I was a happy camper.

I don’t care what anyone says…this is a dinosaur carved into tha phrom

A great lightning storm in the sky’s of Siem Reap

Small and Tall do Angkor Wat

Koh Rong Samloem – Our Paradise Found

Oh Koh Rong Samloem. How I miss you!
As I write this we are in Indonesia and it has been a month since our visit to Cambodia’s Saracen Bay. I don’t think there has been a day that Lee and I haven’t talked about how we miss it. It honestly was our little paradise.
Saracen Bay on Koh Rong Samloem was our home for a week and also the place I was turning 29. Because of this Lee decided to book a slightly nicer place for us , which I wasn’t going to argue about. We choose the delightful Saracen Bay Resort which was 45 dollars a night. I am not exaggerating when I say they should be charging 200 dollars a night. This place was heaven.
We arrived via the fast boat from Sihanoukville (which you can read about here) and suddenly all the travel and pain was worth it. We were taken to our bungalow that was right on the beach and a few meters from the calm and still ocean.
The second we dumped our bangs, we threw on our swimsuits and hit the water. The water was so shallow you could just walk and walk in water warmer than any sea i’ve ever experienced.
There isn’t too much to write here since we spent a serene few days drinking gin and tonics* on the porch, swimming in the sea and star gazing.

no fridge…not a problem.

I spent a fantastic birthday the same way we had spent the rest of the week and it was incredible. The main thing to point out to all you techie bloggers out there is that there was no wifi. The first day I was almost strickend that I couldn’t instagram the incredible sea views but I quickly loved the lack of contact with the world and didn’t really want to return.

The incredible sunrise was worth waking up for

I did debate not talking about this place just to see if I could keep it a secret a little bit longer but I loved it so much that I want you all to instantly run there and soak up the sunshine. If you are looking for the real desert island experience then this is the place for you.
There were other bars to explore but everything closed at about 8:30 for food and 10 pm for drinks so if you are after a bit more of a party feel then Cambodia’s other island Koh Rong, is more for you. We really liked the quiet few days we had there. In fact we liked it so much that when someone compared Koh Rong Samloem to Gili Meno in Indonesia we instantly changed all our plans to add it to our list. We’ll arrive there in a few days so we’ll let you know how they compare.
We loved our little bungalow on Saracen Bay and we definitely will be back as soon as possible.
*We stocked up on snacks and alcohol before heading to the island because we heard it was expensive. It was actually quite affordable there but I’m glad we brought our own supplies.

Sihanoukville – An Unavoidable Stop Over pt2

The second day in Sihanoukville was a lot better than the first. We were quite far away from the main area so went for a walk along the beach. The beach front took a long time to resemble anything we were use to. It just seemed to be Cambodian people sat around in areas that were full of plastic chairs but with no bars or restaurants. And a lot of litter. We were starting to get a little worried until we came to the very end of the beach and found some real bars.
We took a seat in a comfy looking beach bar and were told by the staff that they were on the break and wouldn’t be serving anyone for a few hours. So we got up and headed as far as we could until children stopped hassling us and arrived at ‘above us only sky’.

Does anyone know what this lovely bird is?

The Cambodian ‘morning glory’ vegetable

This bar was our little savior in the town. We loved it here. Nice music, nice service and a great view. We sat here for about 3 hours because we didn’t want to head into they main area again. We organised our boat to Koh Rong Samloem in a local tourist building (as adviced by our hotel) and headed back to our hotel. We had a nap and woke up in time for dinner. We started to get ready to head out when Lee and I caught each others eye…looked at our laptop containing all of our unwatched Game of Thrones episodes…and ordered a pizza.
It was the best night we could have hoped for. We did also make a quick stop at a local In supermarket to stock up on supplies for our island trip since we had heard there was only one shop in Saracen Bay that only occasionally opened .. we bought the important supplies of gin, tonic, chocolate and soju. Very adult of us.
Do we like Sihanoukville? No. Is it as bad as you read online? It depends where you are since we did have glimpses of really pretty places and very nice people but I would view it more as a stop off before you head to one of the islands surrounding it. Then again this may have something to do with pooping my insides out, being attacked by ants and backed up toilets….who knows?

Sihanoukville – An Unavoidable Stop Over pt1

About a year ago Lee and I came home from work and ran up to each other shouting ‘have you seen Emma’s photos!’ a friend of ours had just put up the most beautiful photos of an island called Koh Rong Samloem in Cambodia. We decided that we had to check it out for ourselves.
As we started researching we realised that with the bus times and boat times it was inevitable that we would have to spend one night in Sihanoukville before catching the boat to Koh Rong Samloem. To begin with we were both happy about this since we love seeing as many places as possible. That was until I started researching the place. To say the reviews were bad is an understatement. People seemed to hate this little town. “oh well” we thought “how bad can it really be!” . The answer is that the term ‘so-so’ has been invented for this little place.
We arrived mid-day and we were instantly harassed for about twenty minutes while we walked to our hotel . People aggressively wanted us to get into their trams/tuk tuk/taxis. When we eventually arrived at our hotel we were pleasantly surprised. It looked really nice , despite being quite cheap and having awful reviews (but still the best reviews we could find).
It was at this point we discovered that we’d made an error with our planning and we had to spend two days in Sihanoukville. I can’t say I was happy but I was excited to make our own opinion of this little town. We walked for a little bit and found a lovely restaurant on the road. The people were nice , the food was cheap and the portions were plentiful…but most importantly …the beer was cheap. We returned to our hotel happy and upbeat for the next day. That’s when the hotel started to show it’s true colors. We tried to open our door but it refused to budge. We pushed a bit harder, both having individual ‘you must be doing it wrong’ turns. That’s when we noticed the door had obviously been kicked open a few times. Due to poor locks we basically had to break into our own hotel room. Once we huffed and puffed our way in we sat on the bed and I grabbed two glasses to pour ourselves a well deserved class of diet coke….this is when the inside of the glass seemed to be moving in front of my eyes. I refocused since I had had one beer at dinner…inside the glass were a million ants. This is when we started to look around the room and realise it was swarmed with them. The more our eyes adjusted , the more we saw. We jumped up and ran to the reception desk. The staff seem to clock off at a certain time so we were stuck in the ant room. Lee cleared them up the best he could and I headed to the bathroom. I wasn’t feeling great .
Not feeling great turned into my insides trying to escape…very quickly and very aggressively. This , as everyone knows, is not the best feeling when on holiday. But in Asia it seems inevitable. I let my body attack and finally felt slightly human enough to leave the bathroom. Being ill is an awful feeling and at that moment I didn’t think it could get much worse…that was until I flushed the toilet. Watching  the toilet water starting to go up instead of down puts dread into a human like nothing else.  I won’t go into too much detail here in case you are sitting down reading this with a lovely breakfast but to say ‘it was the worst of times’ in that bathroom probably wouldn’t sum it up. Lee and I have been together a long time but the things we’ve both had to deal with on this trip has matured our relationship extremely quickly…and luckily made us laugh a hell of a lot. Leaving that bathroom to face Lee and explain the horrors that awaited behind the door was not my favourite moment. Cleaning it up because I refused to let him enter the bathroom was yet another of my least happy memories.
When the ants, toilet and door were all distant memories and we settled down to sleep I was secretly dreading the next day and wishing with all my might that we could just leave for our island paradise the second the sun shone.
Sihanoukville – 1
Us – 0
(Luckily there are no photos to accompany this post !)

Saigon / Ho Chi Minh – A Blur of a Visit

When we arrived in Saigon we were welcomed by running into the beautiful Kaleena (from Kaleena’s Kaleidoscope and if you haven’t read it yet you should instantly follow this link and read all of her fantastic tales). Running into someone in a huge city should have been a huge surprise but the secret of Saigon is that it is mainly contained in about 3 streets. These three streets are located in the area called district one and are the main travellers hub.
We also met up with another friend from Korea who has recently moved to Saigon. She showed us the sights but mainly the gin…oh the gin!
We did see the war museum , or as Lee thinks it should be renamed ‘A photographic history of hating America’. This doesn’t mean that there isn’t’ truth on the walls of the museum. It just means that its a very one sided and extremely gruesome history told from the winners perspective. Please don’t get me wrong though, it is a horrifying history and needs to be told but it is worrying when rooms are called things such as ‘The real truths’ or when tanks are labeled ‘Americans death machine’ while Vietnamese tanks are labeled ‘Vietnamese liberation vessel’. It would have been fantastic to see a un-biased account of event which would still show the horrors the Vietnamese people and the Americans both experienced. But I don’t have a degree in History so definitely don’t have the right to an opinion on this place. It is still an interesting place to see either way.
We also indulged in our favourite past time and headed to the cinema. It was great. Quiet, cheap and with fantastic salted popcorn. The Vietnamese had a great sense of humour and laughed at everything which made it a great experience.
We also managed to see the 1920’s style post office as well as the Notre Dame cathedral. but we mostly spent our time eating and taking in the city. We sat on many tiny plastic chairs and guided our way across the terrifyingly busy roads.
I think it’s definitely a city to live in rather than visit…UNLESS you know some people to enjoy the city with. There is so much to do here but it’s more relaxed things that require insider knowledge.

Phnom Pehn – Our First Glance of Cambodia

Well it’s been a while since i’ve updated our little blog. Mainly due to just having too much fun. We have now moved on from Cambodia but I can’t wait to tell you all about our trip.
Neither of us had any clue what to expect from Cambodia. We wouldn’t have even have added it to our travel plans if it hadn’t been for the rave reviews from our friends. We knew we wanted to go to Siem Reap to see the temples of Angkor Wat but other than that we were a bit stumped.
Since we were heading there from Vietnam we decided to start in the capital of Phnom Penh and see what we could find.
What we found was a city on the brink of becoming a big cosmopolitan and a ‘must visit’ city. The Cambodian people were very kind and always smiling which made being in the city much easier but there were a lot of sellers trying to entice you to buy their wears at every turn. Unfortunately it also seems very popular in Phnom Penh to use your children to get money. I’m not a fan of this and it upsets me so much to see little kids being pushed to sell bracelets but PLEASE don’t buy things from them as you just proving that it pays to take your kids out of school. I know i’ve banged on about this before so I’ll stop my blog-rant but try to hold back as much as possible.
The highlights of this city definitely seem to be the palaces and buildings. Such detail is put into the surrounding architecture. A normal government building would have me taking pictures for far too long. Cambodian food is also a highlight. Quite a few people we talked to had suffered from food poisoning so unfortunately it is better to eat in  restaurants than on the street but hopefully this will change as the country grows. My personal favourite food was the Amok curry… a coconut, creamy yellow curry sometimes served in a coconut. mmm I miss them already.
Surprisingly Cambodia is a lot of expensive for food and drink than Vietnam. In Vietnam a beer and a meal would cost about 2 dollars where as here it would be closer to 6 dollars. Still incredible compared to our home in the UK but its worth noting if you are traveling here thinking it will be the same as Thailand and Vietnam.
The moments that will stay with me most from our trip to Phnom Penh will definitely be the time we spent in the war prison. This old converted school is haunting. The blood still paints the floors and the eerie feeling of the horrors that took place here still hang in every room. It is a disturbing place to visit that will pull your day down but it is something I’d recommend. I’m really glad we got to understand the country we were in a little more. It is also shocking when you realise how recent all these events happened in Cambodia and how every person we met on our trip near our age or older was effected in some way by the events put into place by Pol Pot and his Communist regime. I didn’t take any photos  , out of respect, while I was there . I couldn’t bring myself to snap anything in such a place but please take our word for it that it is a haunting place and one that should be visited.
We only spent three days in this city but I really liked it. I am excited to see how it changes and grows over the next few years.

The part of us that use to live in Korea found this Mr Toilet sign and the placement of these flags very strange (that’s north Korea by the way who have an embassy in Phnom Penh)

These creatures are called the Khmer and Cambodians believe that they come from these creatures. They believe Cambodia was underwater until one of their kind fell in love with a human and created the race we see today.

Casual street banana trees