Cambodia to Bangkok

Friday November 15:

For our last full day in Siem Reap, we decided to make use of the tuk-tuk. The tuk-tuk is a sort of motorcycle drawn carriage. The thrill-seeking tourists ride high in a two wheeled trailer (complete with bench, awning, steps, and a very high center of gravity) which is connected to the motorcycle by a trailer hitch. It's fun, and only slightly totally scary. It's not the high speed turns which are unnerving.

Once you go around three or four you realize there is only a one in twenty chance you're going to tip over. Rather it's the driving style these driver apply to their trade. For example, when making a left turn, they don't cross the path of the oncoming traffic. Instead, they just start driving the wrong way down the wrong side of the road, directly into oncoming traffic. It works surprisingly well.

There were two highlights of the day's tour. The first was climbing to the top of a large hill, upon which a temple was built. There are elephants that can take you up and down the hill, and while we saw them walking around, we decided to ascend by foot. From the top you have a spectacular view of the countryside for miles and miles (and miles and miles and miles and miles...). To the southeast you can see the entire grandeur of Angkor Wat framed by the Cambodian jungle.

The other highlight was going to Preah Khan, a fairly large complex which is in a fairly poor state of ruin. While much of this area (as well as other sites in Cambodia) have been restored and preserved by groups like UNESCO, this one still has many collapsed corridors. But the spectacular aspect of these ruins are the immense trees growing throughout the ruins, which are slowly, but certainly, destroying it brick by brick. Three hundred foot trees root themselves not in malleable earth, but the giant stones that make up the temple.

Kelly also bought some more souvenirs. Nothing is more darling than watching Kelly mediate the purchase of trinkets from a gaggle of grade schoolers. After dinner we got a beer at the local expatriate bar and then went to bed.

Saturday November 16:

After the harrowing plane ride from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap, we decided to take a relaxing boat ride down the Tonle Sap lake and river back to Phnom Penh. We were told it would take 5 hours as long as we got the "fast" boat, else it would take anywhere from 18-36 hours. Having a plane to catch on Sunday morning from Phnom Penh, we were sure hoping that we got the right boat!

The morning started when our taxi driver picked us up to take us to the boat. Remember how I told you our driver had these expectations that he would be driving us everywhere during our entire stay? Well, we had let him down the previous day by deciding to take the tuk-tuk instead of his taxi. We thought we'd try to sort of make it up to him by having him purchase the boat tickets for us and having him drive us to the boat. He was a bit abrupt that morning, trying to tell us that he asked someone else to drive us to the river. We insisted that he do it because we knew he spoke English better than most and we didn't want to get into any bad situations.

It was a pretty tense ride to the boat (both Andrew and I were afraid he'd just drop us off in the middle of nowhere) and ended in a partially flooded out narrow dirt road in which the wheeled traffic was at a standstill. We were not at the boat yet. The boat leaves once a day at 7 am and we were not moving at all. Finally, we determined that the only way we'd get there was to trek it. Luckily it was only about half a mile there through lots of thick mud and crowds. We got on the correct boat (or at least we confirmed that other English-speakers also thought it was the fast boat going to Phnom Penh). It left at 6:50 instead of 7, leaving at least one passenger on the dock.

Oh, the relaxing boat ride - it was 5+ hours on the top of a speedboat (there were no chairs up there, we were literally sitting on the top of an enclosed speedboat) with no protection from the sun except our sunscreen, no bathrooms, no food (we had a few granola bars in our daypack), hanging onto the boat hoping there would be no sudden stops or turns. Adventure travel!

When we made it to Phnom Penh, we were bombarded with taxi driver/guesthouse touts trying to get us as customers. They were very aggressive and in our faces and we refused them all. Instead we found a restaurant for lunch then flagged a taxi with a firm destination in mind. Having been exhausted from our eventful day in the sun on the top of the speedboat, we admit, we didn't do much in Phnom Penh besides eat and sleep.

Next day - off to Bangkok!

- Andrew & Kelly