Monthly Archives: August 2015
Si Phan Don (4000 islands)
Finally, the country I’ve been so so so excited about visiting! When we moved to HK, this was the one place I wanted to see and I was really looking forward to it, having heard so much great things about it from others.
The journey from Siem Reap to Si Phan Don was ‘interesting.’ We had to take a series of mini buses and each one seemed to get smaller, however there was the same amount of people in each one- resulted in lots of squashiness from a considerable part of the 10 hours it took. The Cambodia-Laos border is a gigantic joke. There’s all the usual tourist taxes and accepted bribes everyone has to go through, and security was non existent.
Once we arrived in Nakasang, a teeny village 25km from the border, we were herded onto a raft to wait for a boat. At this point, we noticed a group of men downing beer to the side of the raft. Oh wait……they’re the boat drivers? Excellent. Sometime later, we landed on Don Khone, one of the bigger islands and found our super cute guesthouse.
I think Sam and I are divided about Don Khone- I really liked it because it had a rustic village feel to it. We hired bikes and cycled out to rapids and waterfalls, temples and through rice fields. Sounds great, yes? Sam did not seem to think so. A) Sam is not the biggest fan of cycling and we have already done ALOT during this trip. B) It was either roasting hot or pouring down with rain. C) There was mud. Everywhere.
I LOVED IT.
We ate overlooking the Mekong in cheap restaurants, read in hammocks outside our room whilst looking at views like this, and slept a lot. What’s not to love?
After a couple of days, we traveled 4 hours to Pakse for a connecting sleeper bus to Vientiane, the capital. This was not the most fun I’ve ever had. All in it took 22 hours and although I’m glad we’ve done it, I’m not looking forward to the next one in a few days.
Down time
Caveat: I wrote this about 4 days ago, but we’ve been without internet.
There isn’t a huge amount to update in this post to be honest! We’re still in Siem Reap and have been relaxing to the max.
Having maxed out on temples, we’ve been relaxing a bit. We enjoyed a few rounds of minigolf at “Angkor Wat Putt”, a temple themed mini golf course. As well as being very cool, they also gave a free beer or soft drink for every hole in one, which we both managed. I was victorious on the day, although admittedly not by much.
Sizing up Angkor Wat for a hole in one.
The day after we moved to our current digs at Sojourn Boutique hotel (still in Siem Reap.) It had been recommended to us by our friends (hello Lizzy and Swiss) and I’d booked it in as a treat for Laura’s birthday. It’s an incredible hotel; very quiet, lovely pool to cool down when the suns out, luxurious rooms (with bath robes: I love bath robes,) tastey food and cheap cocktails.
Laura’s birthday was yesterday and her friends had lined up a swathe of treats for us. A nice afternoon in the spa (thanks Shirley and Ryan) followed with some white chocolate and raspberry birthday cake (thanks again Shirley and Ryan,) before going for “destination dining” in the evening (thank you Lizzy and Swiss.) We had a private terrace, a private chef and waiter, even a guy playing some sort of Cambodian xylophone as we tucked into an incredible three course feast (topped off with some baileys.) It was a wonderful experience and we were truly very spoilt.
It’s now going to be a rough crash down to earth. Tomorrow we have an 8 hour bus journey to 4000 islands in Laos, which is somewhat unsuprisingly a huge bunch of islands in the Mekong. We have a basic homestay booked and look forward to a day of cycling, before going on a 15 hour or so bus journey up to the north of the country to the capital Vientiane. Spotify is fully loaded up, Kindles are charged, and we’re ready to get back on the backpacking trails.
