Angkor Wat?

Trip Start Nov 12, 2008
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10
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Trip End Apr 30, 2009


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Flag of Cambodia  ,
Wednesday, December 10, 2008

Getting to Siem Reap should have been easy.  Booking a simple two buses from Sihanoukville to Siem reap (split into 4 and 4 1/2 hours journey time) we decided the best thing to do was enjoy the nightlife all the way through to our bus at 7am.  When 7am came around we remembered that ideas always sound better the night before.  Feeling like death and in an even worse mood, we were squashed into a rickety bus, force fed screaming cambodian comedy on the bus TV and surrounded by hacking, coughing spitting locals.  Worse was to come.  Somewhere along the motorway (insert dust road, potholes and mopeds with 500 chickens stuffed in cages on the back) the horror decided to grip me.  Sobering all too rapidly, stopping at a roadside stop (cafe would be to state the case far far too highly) I was confronted by my worst nightmare.  Eastern toilets aren't that bad when you get used to them, but this was an affront to the East.  Imagine the scene in trainspotting (the worlds worst toilet), then times it by 3.  Now take a rough stomach, a pounding head and insipid sobriety, and add a mad driver who believes any speed under 70 mph is a personal attack on his masculinity, and that yes, he really did own the road, both sides. 
The second leg of the journey was marginally better as my body aclimatised to the situation.  We were making good speed (again the driver seemed to believe in momentum and keeping it at all costs, regardless of traffic or even bends in the road).  After gaining the impression we were going to sweep into Siem Reap in good time, the bus driver decided to pull into another road side stop/dust exchange to help a stricken bus that had broken down.  Ever the good samaritan, he did so without telling anyone, then spent 1 3/4 hours messing around with an engine that would make a russian airplane blush.  Needless to say it was a fruitless venture.  Along the way we picked up ragtag bands of locals who seem to wait in the middle of nowehere and just get on and off randomly (the bus driver doesn't even stop the bus properly, the jump whilst its moving!).  I was awoken from a merciful slumber by the skinny bony claw of the chicken one of these passengers was carrying under his arm.  I can't complain, i've eaten enough of his cousins...
The guesthouse we found is very nice, set in an old French imperial building on the waters edge.  The room is at least two steps up from an Ecudorian prison cell with stairs that a marginally less steep then a ladder, they are a real test of agility with a backpack, even more so after a few cans of Angkor beer. 
Using this as our base we went off to explore the temples of Angkor.  What a surprise! I knew they were good but these were absolutely amazing, a definite definite place to tick off anyones list.  The temples are numerous, huge and beautiful.  They are spread over a huge area, some just little afterthoughts springing out of the jungle.  Others, like Angkor Wat are huge, intricately carved sprawling campuses.  Easily the best was the Bayon, those fantastic huge buildings with huge faces made of stones looking out over the setting.  Raz and I just kept exploring, going down little stairwells, climbing over rubble and taking turns that would lead into another awesome scene.  Finally we saw the famous temples through which the huge indigenous trees grow, their massive roots slowly strangling and warping the huge stones around them. The experience was greatly added to by the proliferation of monks in traditional clothes walking around, and bumping into the band Placebo who were doing publicity shots there after playing a concert at the temple the night before.
In the evening we availed ourselves of the local poison again, which they serve to you in a huge personal keg easily serving 10-12 pints, for the princely sum of $8.  From the cultural and historical highs of the daytime, the night went very quickly downhill...
We are still in Siem Reap (4pm wake up today - nice), trying to get to Laos.  I'm all for the bus, but this journey is going to be epic, and take literally days.  Looks like we're going to have to take a $150 hit and take a plane to Vientien.
Photos being burnt onto CD as we speak, hopefully get them online asap...

Bayeux!!
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