Hello hello,
As you have probably guessed from Facebook we have been in Australia over a week now but we are behind on the blog so just think as it we are still in Cambodia!
A short journey in a minibus from Sihanoukville and we ended up in Kampot, a small French town with not much going on but there was plenty to see in the countryside including the famous Kampot Pepper plantations. When we got off the minibus, a tuk-tuk driver persuaded us in taking us around the countryside all day for 20 dollars and arranged for him to pick us up the next morning. We decided to rent a moped out and travel 30km down the road to Kep which was meant to be a good day to visit a few beaches and visit the national park.
Hiring out a moped was a big mistake, I'm sure we have said this several times but I don't learn. The road we travelled on to Kampot was probably better than the main roads in England so I assumed it would be okay to travel further down the road to Kep on a moped. What a mistake......I don't know where to begin. There was no tarmac in sight, just mud and gravel, roadworks all the way including having to dodge JCB's on our little moped, and so much dust that when I left my shirt was white and I came back with a orange t-shirt. Even my teeth had a layer of dust on! When we got about two-thirds of the way we basically slid off the road as it was a gravel road and we ended up bending the key and paying a local 2 dollars to use a hammer to smash it back into place. 5 dollars was a bargain as the man who gave us the moped could have charged as much as he liked because he had my passport as a deposit. As you can imagine Georgia was not impressed, and has now definitely decided no mopeds again!!! We decided to leave Kep and head back, luckily we didn't fall this this time. When we arrived back to the hotel and in one piece ( I had a few cuts on my knees), we decided to go to the local cinema and watch the 'Killing Fields', it was a film about the Killings In Cambodia, which was worth the watch. Everything shuts at 9.30pm, so we headed back to the room as we were up early for our tour the next morning.
The next morning our tuk-tuk driver arrived on time just as planned . We took a tour to the countryside, the first stop was at a local fishing market, there was not much to see here, so we headed back into the tuk-tuk and went to see some salt fields. The salt fields were huge and they had barns filled with every kind of salt you can imagine. Next stop was to visit the pepper plantations; we stopped for lunch here. Georgia was upset that she couldn't buy any fresh pepper because we wasn't sure if we were allowed to take it into Australia, nevertheless we had Kampot pepper stir fry for lunch and were satisfied with that. The next stop is where all the action starts...
We were on our last place to visit the temple in a cave ; it had started to rain and the roads became even worse although we didn't think that was possible Our tuk-tuk got stuck in mud literally in the middle of nowhere. We both got out and attempted to help our driver get his vehicle out of the mud. We were covered in mud and almost fell over ourselves, it was quite a funny experience when we look back. We eventually stopped and almost made it to the caves where our driver mentioned we had to walk the rest of the way as the road was so muddy. We couldn't walk it in our flip flops as the roads were so muddy from the rain so we took off our shoes and walked in mud for about ten minutes to get to the cave. By this point we were laughing and Georgia wasn't even saying it was my fault! We walked about 200 steps or so to get into the cave, there wasn't anything too impressive about the caves but the experience to get into them was funny. Our driver had to hold Georgia's hand to walk across the river back. There was no bridge just a tree trunk to walk across, Georgia wasn't confident enough to walk over it on her own so she had to have the trusty hand of our driver, who then gave her a flower at the end of it for all her hard effort ;) We have a load of photos but haven't managed to upload them onto Facebook yet!
We then took a 2 hour drive back to our room, with many locals on the way back saying 'hello' to us in their small villages. There isn't much to do/see in Kampot and we had a couple of nights spare before we headed to Australia, so we decided to visit the capital of Cambodia again; Phnom Penh....
Phnom Penh
We got a mini van to Phnom Penh , we paid 2 dollars extra to have the VIP van, In Cambodia you don't take notice of VIP anything, if anything VIP means your in for a treat and not in a good way. The minivan was literally VIP with free WIFI to help pass the journey, leather seats that were still intact and a free water of bottle... smiles all round!
We got to Phnom Penh and checked into our room, our hotel told us all the things we could do and see, the problem being we had already visited here before and do most of them all. Phnom Penh is really busy and dusty ,as is most of Cambodia . We decided to walk around in the blazing heat to go see the Royal Palace, we made the mistake of walking 2 miles or so in the heat, got to the palace and only had our debit cards which they didn't accept, we decide to go back and go early the next day to avoid the heat and actually bring money this time. On the way back we visited a pagoda that was close to our room, and of course there is always a entry fee for
the tourists. The pagoda itself was similar to what you see all over South East Asia , fancy Buddha's and similar decorations. That night we ended up in A Indian restaurant and the food was really decent. We ordered far too much and had to take it away, our plan was to keep it in our fridge in the room and have the Naan bread for breakfast the next morning. The next morning came and we went to the Palace which was worth it as mentioned before we had seen and done everything Phnom Penh had to offer. We seemed to walk for ages in Phnom Penh, that night we rewarded ourselves with a night out after all the walking we done over two days. The night out consisted of a walk to the river front, people watching which ended up with a girl tripping and falling flat on her face (hope she;s okay now though). The weather in Phnom Penh was really hot and sticky, so we took refuge in our air con a lot of the time. We visited a Russian market with no Russian in sight.I bought Georgia a back scratcher for a dollar, which was a good investment haha. The next day was time to leave for the airport , our flight had a stop over in Malaysia so we got a hotel at the airport for a few hours to have some sleep and shower. Phnom Penh left a better impression on us this time as we wasn't depressed from visiting the killing fields this time round!
We was really looking forward to leaving Cambodia and heading to Australia.
Next Stop Australia.....
James and Georgia
As you have probably guessed from Facebook we have been in Australia over a week now but we are behind on the blog so just think as it we are still in Cambodia!
A short journey in a minibus from Sihanoukville and we ended up in Kampot, a small French town with not much going on but there was plenty to see in the countryside including the famous Kampot Pepper plantations. When we got off the minibus, a tuk-tuk driver persuaded us in taking us around the countryside all day for 20 dollars and arranged for him to pick us up the next morning. We decided to rent a moped out and travel 30km down the road to Kep which was meant to be a good day to visit a few beaches and visit the national park.
Hiring out a moped was a big mistake, I'm sure we have said this several times but I don't learn. The road we travelled on to Kampot was probably better than the main roads in England so I assumed it would be okay to travel further down the road to Kep on a moped. What a mistake......I don't know where to begin. There was no tarmac in sight, just mud and gravel, roadworks all the way including having to dodge JCB's on our little moped, and so much dust that when I left my shirt was white and I came back with a orange t-shirt. Even my teeth had a layer of dust on! When we got about two-thirds of the way we basically slid off the road as it was a gravel road and we ended up bending the key and paying a local 2 dollars to use a hammer to smash it back into place. 5 dollars was a bargain as the man who gave us the moped could have charged as much as he liked because he had my passport as a deposit. As you can imagine Georgia was not impressed, and has now definitely decided no mopeds again!!! We decided to leave Kep and head back, luckily we didn't fall this this time. When we arrived back to the hotel and in one piece ( I had a few cuts on my knees), we decided to go to the local cinema and watch the 'Killing Fields', it was a film about the Killings In Cambodia, which was worth the watch. Everything shuts at 9.30pm, so we headed back to the room as we were up early for our tour the next morning.
The next morning our tuk-tuk driver arrived on time just as planned . We took a tour to the countryside, the first stop was at a local fishing market, there was not much to see here, so we headed back into the tuk-tuk and went to see some salt fields. The salt fields were huge and they had barns filled with every kind of salt you can imagine. Next stop was to visit the pepper plantations; we stopped for lunch here. Georgia was upset that she couldn't buy any fresh pepper because we wasn't sure if we were allowed to take it into Australia, nevertheless we had Kampot pepper stir fry for lunch and were satisfied with that. The next stop is where all the action starts...
We were on our last place to visit the temple in a cave ; it had started to rain and the roads became even worse although we didn't think that was possible Our tuk-tuk got stuck in mud literally in the middle of nowhere. We both got out and attempted to help our driver get his vehicle out of the mud. We were covered in mud and almost fell over ourselves, it was quite a funny experience when we look back. We eventually stopped and almost made it to the caves where our driver mentioned we had to walk the rest of the way as the road was so muddy. We couldn't walk it in our flip flops as the roads were so muddy from the rain so we took off our shoes and walked in mud for about ten minutes to get to the cave. By this point we were laughing and Georgia wasn't even saying it was my fault! We walked about 200 steps or so to get into the cave, there wasn't anything too impressive about the caves but the experience to get into them was funny. Our driver had to hold Georgia's hand to walk across the river back. There was no bridge just a tree trunk to walk across, Georgia wasn't confident enough to walk over it on her own so she had to have the trusty hand of our driver, who then gave her a flower at the end of it for all her hard effort ;) We have a load of photos but haven't managed to upload them onto Facebook yet!
We then took a 2 hour drive back to our room, with many locals on the way back saying 'hello' to us in their small villages. There isn't much to do/see in Kampot and we had a couple of nights spare before we headed to Australia, so we decided to visit the capital of Cambodia again; Phnom Penh....
Phnom Penh
We got a mini van to Phnom Penh , we paid 2 dollars extra to have the VIP van, In Cambodia you don't take notice of VIP anything, if anything VIP means your in for a treat and not in a good way. The minivan was literally VIP with free WIFI to help pass the journey, leather seats that were still intact and a free water of bottle... smiles all round!
We got to Phnom Penh and checked into our room, our hotel told us all the things we could do and see, the problem being we had already visited here before and do most of them all. Phnom Penh is really busy and dusty ,as is most of Cambodia . We decided to walk around in the blazing heat to go see the Royal Palace, we made the mistake of walking 2 miles or so in the heat, got to the palace and only had our debit cards which they didn't accept, we decide to go back and go early the next day to avoid the heat and actually bring money this time. On the way back we visited a pagoda that was close to our room, and of course there is always a entry fee for 
We was really looking forward to leaving Cambodia and heading to Australia.
Next Stop Australia.....
James and Georgia
No comments:
Post a Comment