Day 18 - Luang Prabang "All that horse knowledge actually is useful!"

Very early start (6am) to watch the Buddhist monks receiving alms from the villages ... as it turned out it appeared to us that most of the "villagers" were actually tour groups trying to capture that authentic Buddhist experience as part of their holiday! The monks did look impressive though walking down the street in single file in their saffron robes.
Back to the hotel for brekky, then a quick climb up Phu Si, a hill in the centre of town with a number of wats and lovely views from the top.
We were then picked up for our elephant riding trip, we were driven about 10km out of town to the elephant ranch. We rode an elephant together through the forest for about 30min, then we went to a small lake where we got to "bath" the elephants. This involved riding on an elephant as it walked into the water. Once it sat down (getting quite wet in the process), we scooped water on it and scrubbed its head/neck area. Kathryn thought it was heaps of fun, Mike was just trying not to fall off!!
After lunch we took a 15 minute boat trip to the village of Ban Chan, renowned for it's pottery (yep, Mike's worst holiday nightmare has just become a reality!). A quick lap of the village watching some quite skilled (and speedy) craftsmanship, with quite large pots thrown with manually operated wheels in just a few minutes!
Back to town, a quick walk over the bamboo bridge the other side of the Nam Khan river, and the days adventures were done!

Day 17 - Luang Prabang "Yum, they don't make those biscuits in my country!"

Went out after breakfast to book some tickets for the next day's activities, on returning to our room Kathryn caught the cleaning lady in the act of stealing some biscuits she had brought along from home. "They were in the bin" she said .... Kathryn knew they were from the bag she kept her supplies in.
We booked a tuk-tuk for a trip to the Pak Ou caves and the Kuang Si waterfall. The trip to the caves started off well, but when we turned off the bitumen road onto the worst dirt road we've ever been on, things started going downhill .... after 8 km of jarring, bumping, jerking, funny bangs and weird noises, the tuk-tuk stopped. The driver made a couple of attempts to restart it, but no luck .... we left him there while we walked to our destination (about 3km down the road). On arrival we spoke to the people there and sent them off to help our driver, while we conitnued onto the caves, their claim to fame being hundreds of Buddha statues of various shapes and sizes.
After the caves, Kathryn managed to beg a lift from a tourist boat heading back to Luang Prabang. On arrival back in town, we flagged another tuk-tuk to take us to Kuang Si, some of the most picturesque and prettiest waterfalls we've ever seen. It's a popular swimming spot, but we didn't go in as it was too late in the afternoon and too cold, we settled for a visit to the Sun Bears and a climb up and over the top of the waterfall.

Day 16 - Siem Reap to Luang Prabang (Laos) "I'm sorry, we can't let you into the country, everyone who works here wants to go home"

Slept in on our last day in Cambodia .... off to town so Kathryn could get a massage, and finally managed one after two aborted attempts - the first due to jackhammer noise on the other side of the wall, and the second because of a strange massage technique requiring donning a pair of pyjamas. Mike spent the time while waiting for Kathryn fruitfully doing nothing useful at all (except drink coffee), which he is becoming quite good at on this holiday.
We met up with Mr Kao back at the hotel for our trip to the airport, where he told us that his son had been bitten quite badly by a dog the day before, and as a result we managed to learn how the Cambodian health system works - you queue outside the front of the hospital with everyone else until it's your turn for free treatment.
The flight to Luang Prabang was interesting .... we got to chill out on the tarmac at Pakse airport when it stopped there to pick up more passengers, it felt more like a bus trip than an air flight!
On arrival at Luang Prabang airport we were very amused to find that the customs officials were very keen to help us through so they could go home .... to the extent of filling in Kathryn' paperwork for her while she went to the toilet! Lucky we didn't have anything to declare!

Day 15 - A quiet day in Siem Reap .... "I used to be a size 9"

A quiet day today after the temple explorations of the last couple of days. We slept in (until 8am!) and after breakfast Kathryn went to the hotel counter to confirm our flights to Laos tomorrow. While there she noticed that the exchange rate for Australian dollars was only US$0.50 - this was a big drop from the rate of $0.70 that was there for the previous couple of days and which we had already taken advantage of. The hotel had finally worked out that their exchange rates were a little out of date .... they would have found this out when they banked the AUS$190 that Mike had already changed!! It's a bit sad when you think US$0.70 is a good deal ......!
We then headed into Siem Reap to avail ourselves of some free WiFi so we could update the work of literary art which is this blog. Some shopping in the market (again ....), and then off to some of the more tourist oriented shops to see if there was anything we'd missed .... after two quick stops it was apparent that all we'd missed was the 500% markup they charged. Needless to say we didn't buy anything.
Back to Siem Reap, a quick look in the Night Market where we discovered the new massage technique of Dr. Fish. For only $3 for 15 minutes, you can put your feet into a pool of fish and watch them eat your dead skin from your feet. One guy there was very popular with the fish .... while we were laughing at him and the others there, he said "I was a size 9 before I started ....".

Day 14 - Siem Reap and even more temples "Can I have a t-shirt please?"

More temples (of course!), though a more leisurely day as today we did the 26km "large circuit", with overall fewer temples and greater distances between them, with the bonus of fewer tourists as well. We also added in a visit to Banteay Srei (a further 21km), Banteay Samre, and the land mine museum. We are both amazed at how many people travel all the way to Siem Reap and seem only to visit just the two or three main temples ... the number of people at Angkor Wat would have been in the thousands, but at some of the smaller, but still very interesting temples, at times we felt as if we were the only ones there.

At one stage after Kathryn had delivered one of her "care packages", the kids crowded around us and kept asking for more t-shirts. As we had no more with us Kathryn threatened to take off her shirt ... when she started to lift it off the kids started screaming ... and so did all of the tuk tuk drivers who were watching. At this point Mike decided it was in his best interests to keep very very quiet ......

After temples, back to town, more shopping (much to Mike's dismay), dinner, and back to the hotel for a well deserved rest .... these holidays are such hard work (or so Kathryn kept telling our tuk tuk driver Mr. Keo).

Day 13 - Siem Reap and the temples "You mean you've lost your glasses again???!!!"

We spent the whole day exploring temples .... started at Angkor Thom and Bayon (the temple with the large faces), and from there explored a number of other temples, on what is known as the "small circuit" (17km). Each temple comes with its own set of locals trying to sell cold drinks, books, and souvenirs, which did get a little tiring after a while, though Kathryn managed to give out a number of her "care packages". plus 5 pens, and about 457,000 hair ties. The day was quite sunny and warm, so we both were quite hot and tired by the time we got back to town around 5pm. A bit of shopping at the night market, an attempt to replace Kathryn's lost reading glasses (yes, that's two pairs she's lost now), Thai food for dinner.

Day 12 - Battambang to Siem Reap "Best boat ride I've ever been on ....!"

Early start, the trusty Mr Mo took us to the boat ramp to meet the 7am boat. A wonderful journey awaited us .... first along the river for a while in the cool morning air, eventually reaching narrow water ways (wide enough for only one boat), and past the floating huts of the river dwellers. Amazing scenery and birdlife, and a great way to see how the river people live. We climbed onto the top of the boat and worked on our suntans while we enjoyed the magnificent views.
On arrival in Siem Reap 7 hours after we left, our boat was swamped by hordes of tuk tuk drivers looking for customers. We had arranged for a driver since transport to town was free with our boat tickets ..... but of course our driver still tried to charge us $10 on arrival.

A quick ride into town after checking in, then off to see sunset over Angkor Wat, which is as amazing as you would expect. We booked our tuk tuk driver for the next day. After heading to Siem Reap for dinner at an Indian restaurant, it was back to our hotel.

Day 11 - Battambang Countryside "Hello Kitty!"

Mr Mo and his uncle collected us this morning on a motorbike each, no such thing as helmets or any kind of safety here as we head off down a road so dusty we have to stop & buy facemasks. Mike was sure everyone was laughing at him in his Hello Kitty face mask. We climbed to the top of Wat Phnom Sampeau, where we saw another monument to the people killed by the Khmer Rouge, next to the hole in the cave where the victims were thrown to their deaths.

Off to Wat Bannan next, where we were hassled by a woman telling us "slow slow" and wafting us with a giant fan as we climbed the 358 steps to the top. After several attempts we finally persuaded her that we were quite capable of climbing without any assistance. Nice views at the top, then back to the hotel where we had been moved to the most ridiculously large room in the whole of Battambang.

We walked into town and sat on a balcony in a restaurant relaxing for a while, then dinner at the Asian Beer hotel, where we were greeted by 20 young girls all bowing to us as we entered, which Mike thinks would be a good thing to introduce in Australia.

Day 10 - Battambang - "Why do your arms and teeth look funny, are they real?"

Our moto driver Mr Mo picked us up at 9am and took us to the market to check out what was on the menu for the night. We passed frogs, snakes and dog legs combined with a dead rat lying on the path. We then drove to the bamboo train due to become extinct in January. Being a single track train whenever you met someone coming from the opposite direction someone had to take their "carriage" off the tracks until the other person passed. Being the "foreigners" i.e. paying more money than anyone else we embarrassingly had right of way until we came across one overloaded with fuel then we exited for them. We then drove around checking out the Wats (temples) in town & finished off at the orphanage. We took exercise books and pencils and were taken on a tour. The young children were very clingy including one little girl (covered in sores) who had only been there 10 days after being taken off the streets. They had quite a discussion pinching the skin on Kathryn's upper arm. Whether they were discussing the colour or fat remains a mystery, although Mike says it was the fat. One of the boys picked up that there was something strange about Kathryn's teeth (translated by the carer), the horrified look on his face when Kathryn removed her plate was priceless!

Day 9 - Phnom Penh to Battambang - Don't leave your shoes outside or the monkeys will steal them!

Long bus trip from Phnom Penh at 9am, finally arrived at La Villa in Battambang around 2:30pm. Cute large attic style room. Battambang is the second largest city in Cambodia but it feels like a country town, nothing like Phnom Penh. Unbelievable amount of garbage around the place, the public park along the river was full of people relaxing after work, but also full of rubbish, quite disappointing to see after the neat and tidy gardens of Phnom Penh.
Spent two hours walking the town and ended up eating back at the hotel, though we did stop in to look at a local restaurant first whose main feature was a very loud singer, so loud we could hear him making strangling noises while we ate dinner back at our own hotel.