Cambodia

Angkor Wat itself

We left for Siem Reap on Monday the 25th of September. We took a taxi to Mo Chit bus terminal, we got there at about 08:20 and there was a bus at 08:30 which we decided to take, even though we'd been planning to get the 9 or half 9 one, we decided to get on the road as soon as possible. After 4 hours on very uncomfortable seats, we arrived in Aranya Prathet. We took a tuk tuk from the bus station to near the border for 80 baht and then had to walk through a massive market selling clothes and the like. I was feeling pretty suspicious because I expected people to be trying to get us to pay extra for our Cambodian visas, but we got surprisingly little hassle. We walked to a resteraunt where we went to the toilet and then headed across the border.

First we had to go through emigration on the Thai side, and then we applied for our visas at an office on the Cambodian side. You can pay in US dollars ($20) or Thai Baht (B1000). You get $1 for every 37 or so baht, so dollars are obviously better value. When I handed my passport in, one of the guys taking the passports told me to pay in baht because it would be quicker. Another fella told the girls they could pay an extra 100 baht for faster service. We ignored both these bozos and waited ten minutes and then got our passports back.

Then we got a free shuttle bus to Cambodian immigration and queued for ages with our heavy bags on our backs. Then stamped our passports and visas about 13 times and let us through to Poipet. We waited for about 15 minutes for a shuttle bus to the bus station where, we were told, we could get all sorts of transport on to Siem Reap. When we got there there was either a bus for $10 per person, or a taxi which was $15 per person. We opted for the taxi and bargained them down to $50 for the whole thing.



The road to Siem Reap was crazy. It's full of potholes, massive potholes and after four hours we all had sore heads and were starving, having not eaten in over 12 hours. Our taxi driver took us to a guesthouse he had advertised on the bonnet of his car. He said if we didn't like it he'd take us somewhere else, so we had a look and it was nice. We got one room between the four of us for $11 per night (I should mention that they use US Dollars in Cambodia, and also Cambodian Riel. There is about 4000 Riel to the dollar although it fluctuates a lot. It felt strange using American currency, and I'd rather try to support the Cambodian economy a bit more, but the people prefer dealing with dollars).


Water feature in Angkor.

We decided to spend the next day around Siem Reap to see what to town had to offer. There's not a whole lot there, it just seems to exist on the back of Angkor Wat. We went to an Irish pub, Molly Malone's and had dinner, and had a look in a market, and then we went back to the guesthouse to see the sunset in Angkor Wat. Tickets to Angkor Wat are $20 for a one day pass, $40 for three days and $60 for a week.



We were going to spend three days and if you bought your ticket after 5pm you could get in free that evening. Our driver was charging us $20 a day and for the sunset visit we paid $8 (everything seems expensive when it is put in dollar terms and Angkor Wat itself is very expensive). Unfortunately for the sunset it was very cloudy so we didn't get to see it.


This temple is the most popular spot for watching the sunset.

The next three days were interesting. We saw a lot of the temples around Angkor although they did all start looking the same at times. There are also a huge amount of people trying to sell you stuff there outside every temple - from cold drinks and whiskey to postcards and books - and they get really persistent, but it is cool in general.


The (extremely steep and narrow) steps leading up to Angkor Wat, the largest religious building in the world.

On the third day we saw only two temples (which were quite far away from the main attractions) and then we went to the floating village.


This is the view from our drivers house.

We had to pay $8 each to rent the boat, but it was really cool. The village is on Tonle Sap Lake and the houses are all built on stilts above the water. In the dry season the villagers move to a different village as there isn't as much water there. The Lake is connected to the Mekong river (which rises in China and flows through Laos, along the Thai border, through Cambodia and into the sea in Vietnam) by the Tonle Sap river.



Half built house on the way to the floating village


We also took a spin around town on this smaller, man powered boat. That's our car driver steering. They had an alligator farm in the village too, there was a cage with about a dozen alligators in there which are kept for their skins.


Adrift in the middle of Tonle Sap Lake
The Tonle Sap river is interesting because in the dry season it changes the direction it flows - in the wet season the Mekong's level rises and the water flows down the Tonle Sap into the lake, then, in the dry season, as the level of the Mekong drops, the Tonle Sap river changes direction and flows back into the Mekong. It turned out that our driver for the four days was from the floating village and we stopped in his mother's house for lunch and a can of Crown Beer. Sheena thought we were going to have to pay, but they never asked us for money. Afterwards we took the boat out to the massive Tonle Sap Lake, it felt like we were out at sea, rocking around in that tiny boat. It was strange to know that in a couple of months the water level would have dropped dramatically and where we were would be dry land.



This little kid was roaming the streets of Siem Reap. We got free popcorn with drinks in the bar where were drinking so we let him finish off one of the plates and Sheena gave him some of her 7Up. He was a really cute kid and he was so happy to spend time with us.