Phnom Penh

Arrived 6/5/2011

The street sellers - they walk up and
down the streets all night trying to
 sell you books, dvd's and braclets

Well riding into Phnom Penh was not too bad, in comparison to Bangkok anyway.  The city is much smaller and it was not until I was about 10km out of the city that the roads started going crazy with traffic.  Finding a place to stay was interesting everywhere in the city is jam packed, everything and anything is crammed into to a space.  I have ended up in Nordic House along 136 Street (most of the streets in Phnom Penh are named by numbers and rather randomly as well) a nice place but have struggled to sleep with all the noise outside – the hard life of a light sleeper.

Thought this was an interesting way to
describe delicious

As the countdown lowers the green starts walking faster then runs in the dying seconds. Funny to watch but don't get distracted and watch it in the middle of the road!

The crazy clothing stalls 

And yes, as I mentioned in my previous blog my first night in Phnom Penh was enjoyed by having Travellers Diarrhea.  Luckily it was only a 24hr case and nothing more severe it is not much fun!

The market from outside

First day in Phnom Penh in ended up just hanging in my cave room (no windows) until midday where I summoned the strength to go downstairs have some food and change rooms to one with windows and natural light!

Day 2 proved to be much more exciting with the body reasonably recovered and itching to do something.  I checked out the central market (Phsar Thmey) a cool cross shaped building (pretty massive too) with stalls everywhere.  It was all mainly clothing, jewellery and food and outside the market was ringed with moto’s, tuk tuk’s.  Every 30seconds you were asked “Motorbike Sir?” “Tuk tuk Sir?”  Gets a bit tedious after a while but that’s their job.  Anyway wondering through the market was fun got myself a new top to cycle in (old merino falling apart and sick of constantly stitching it together) we will see how it lasts… The clothing stalls are about 3m x 3m and all crammed with everything, real pot luck of what you find.  The central part of the market was all dedicated jewellery – diamonds, gems, gold, silver, plastic I’m sure some great imitations there.  During my time squeezing past people and between stalls I saw one lady with a massive plate of mangos balanced on her head just wondering through no idea how she did it.

The central jewellery section

So I succumbed to a moto driver outside the market.  We agreed on $7 to take me to The Killing Fields and Toule Sleng Genocide Museum and whatever else I wanted to see to go to around the city.

The Killing Fields of Choeung Ek

This was the most infamous killing field of the hundreds or maybe it was thousands located around Cambodia.  It was an old Chinese cemetery that was converted into mass burial sites.  One mass ‘grave’ was around 10m x 5m and something around 5m -8m deep containing some 400 bodies, sick.  There was a central monument 17 shelves high (approx. 10m) filled with the skulls, bones and clothing of many who were brutally killed there.  Some of the skulls you could see deep cuts that were made by the axes used to kill them.  Incredible, horrible, sickening you just didn’t really know what to think.  I would suggest a good feed before you go there!

What I hadn’t realised about Khmer Rouge regime was that it was instigated by the poor people of Cambodia to try and make everyone equal.  The powers to be trained and brainwashed the young population to torture and kill anyone deemed connected to the government and who they thought intelligent enough to fight back.  Not really the right way to go about things.

Read the sign - sick

Some bones and teeth slowly uncovered from the rains 

Some of the things banned to take into the museum

Toul Sleng Genocide Museum

An old school that was used as an interrogation (by torture) centre.  This was where some of the people thought to have knowledge of the old government were tortured to ‘expose’ all evidence and knowledge they.  It was more they were forced to say.  Either way they were killed there or sent to a killing field.  Walking around the place was really eerie, there rooms had the beds and some of the instruments left in them, barbed wire enclosing all the buildings and seeing all the rows of holding cells.  You’ll be happy to know there were a some survivors but in general it was pretty heavy going and as much as I wanted to see everything I wanted to get out of there!

One of the torture rooms

The cells

Right this is actually making me feel sick writing about it so I’m going to stop.  You definitely have to see these places if you come here though to grasp a real understanding of the brutality and scale of it all.

Day 3 I just had a general wonder around the place.  Checked out the big clock and wondered up to look at Wat Phom behind only to see an inviting sign saying foreigners only please pay $1 for entry.  No Thanks.  Monkeys on the grass as I continued to wonder around nothing out of the ordinary. 

The big clock - watch out for the seconds hand!!

To continue my education on the history of Cambodia I checked out a 40min doco about the land mines in Cambodia.  They are everywhere and it makes me quite nervous to go much off the beaten track.  Seems most injuries and fatalities are in the country over farm land.  Monsoon rains shift and sometimes raise old land mines so not only are there loads of them undiscovered they move!!!

So that was Phnom Penh and brings me to general disaster number… probably up to about 23 now.  Paying for the room.  I handed over a big smacker - $100US.  The lady looked at it and said “No sorry I cannot take this it has a cut in it, it is not legal tender here in Cambodia.”  Say what!!!??  That was given to me when I exchanged my money in Thailand it better be legal tender throwing that kind of money away is several days of living and a big kick in the nuts!  Had to pay with a different but I’ll be finding somewhere that money can be used or changed.

On the Way to Phnom Penh

5/5/2011


Before getting to Phnom Penh I stopped over at Takeo which was nothing special apart from most likely being the place where I picked up a bug for some travellers diarrehea.


Just a few pics and a video along the way (doesn't want to load currently will try again later - I think I have managed to load it now!!! 15/5/11).  

No matter how small the roads get there is always a big truck lurking somewhere

Ploughing by cattle

Local transport

Roads for everyone

Kampot and Kep

3 and 4/5/2011

how to properly load a truck

Kampot didn’t have much to offer.  I was originally going to stay two nights and spend a day cycling up to the Bokor Hill Station (10km out of Kampot and about 20km up a hill).  This was a resort constructed in the 1960’s by the French that overlooked the district and is set in the Bokor national park.  It is now abandoned and is like a ghost town.  Thought it would cool to see it and bike through the national park but after checking the road on my way over to Kampot I found out it was closed due to construction and no access was allowed.  Oh well saved me busting my gut up the hill, was looking forward to the view though!

Some of the traffic along the way...

The Salt and Pepper Bakery - my shelter and good
food, cookies and all!

So off to Kep the following day only 25km away which was lucky because I was super closer to getting caught in a massive downpour on my way over.  Luckily got to the turn off and the Salt and Pepper Bakery where I stopped for a good feed and the rain to stop before continuing on into Kep. 

Kep was another nice beachside town,  pretty quiet and a nice relaxing atmosphere to the place.  Took a wonder up to a weirdly overgrown Temple that I couldn’t figure out if it was still used or not.

Along the beach frontage at Kep

The guesthouse I stayed at was run by a French man who was on a one year contract to see how he enjoyed it.  He was a funny fella, super enthusiastic about Kep, owned a wobbly pool table and was a great cook.  He bought a big barracuda for me for dinner and infused some amazing flavours into it.  It was awesome!  Got talking with guy from the UK who had lived in NZ for a bit and reminisced about times in NZ and the pies eaten.  Looking forward to one of those again, Hororata Pub chicken and mushroom pie with cranberry sauce on top!  I had previously seen a place in Kampot called Homestay Café which apparently is famous for its Kampot pie – they had the meat but no dough so no pie. Gutted.  Nice German couple that ran the place, but nice doesn’t get you pies!

The long steep staircase up and then there was more

There were loads of these carved animal statues, gold one side of the temple and silver the other but everything seemed very much abandoned but the temple still looked well maintained apart from the jungle starting to overgrow it.

The view from the Temple and the statue with a four sided face.
It's creepy as it is always looking at you!

Who wouldn't want this statue in their town...

Veal Renh

Arrived 2/5/2011

This is Ny

On my way down to Sihanoukville I stopped in at this town for a lunch break (being about halfway and getting dam hungry) and met a Cambodian fella who spoke pretty good English.  He worked just down the road and his parents ran the food stall I was at. 

This is me.  Bokor Mountains in the background

So to make for an easy trip from Sihanoukville to Kampot (back the way I had come previously) thought I’d make a stopover at Veal Renh and see my new mate Ny (pronounced Knee) again.  He gave a wee tour around the local area and taught me some more Khmer that my language book didn’t have – although the lonely planet book rates itself as an essential guide to get you around it doesn’t teach you much about food! Ny taught me how to get my hands on a meat filled baguette...finally I had seen so many and never been able to communicate what I wanted! The closest I had previously got was a stale plain baguette.


Had a few drinks and a bit of karaoke (English and Cambodian) to finish off the day.  Old school pop songs (Britney Spears, Atomic Kitten…) which the videos were of some 1980’s tourist information show for Europe – quite random.  I felt like a dick singing along but they didn’t care and no one else could hear me!

Some of the rice fields around Veal Renh

mmmm Baguette

Leaving Veal Renh

Sihanoukville

29/4/2011 – 01/05/2011

This ended up being a town of many surprises and interesting experiences for me.

These bad boys are about 1m long!

The Golden Lions of Sihanoukville

So the whole day riding to Sihanoukville my body was doing funny hot/cold flushes.  I started thinking about Malaria and that silly wee bit from the night before – body not regulating heat properly, I don’t feel sick or anything tho, I should be fine.  On and on it went for the day, the broken wheel disaster didn’t matter to me anymore, I just didn’t want Malaria!  Called Elo for some doctors’ advice and felt re-assured that I didn’t have Malaria, good. Stopped worrying which was probably half the cause.

Malaria scare gone it was off to dinner.  Happy Herbs Pizza for some good old cheesy pizza!  A good feed, felt like a fat bastard afterwards and had a lightning display to watch while eating – fantastic!

The Pizza

Strolled back to my room even with some leftover for lunch tomorrow.  Chillaxed and watched a movie, then slipped into watching another.  It was getting pretty late so might hit the hay.  Stand to do the usual bathroom stuff and not able to focus properly and feel a bit unstable walking around.  Maybe I just got up too quickly.  Off to bed. For the next few hours I couldn’t help myself from laughing, what the heck is going on.  Thoughts started going through my mind; ‘Happy Herbs’ Pizza and an odd comment someone made sitting across from me “Do all the pizzas have herbs on them?”.  I start feeling super hungry again and later in the night woke up with a bit of cotton mouth.  I think those pizzas had some ‘happy herbs’ in them alright!

The Scooter... and a nice sunset

The next enjoyment of Sihanoukville was renting a scooter.  NZ license should be all good, didn’t think twice about it really.  Driving here is pretty ad hoc anyway.  Crusing around just checking out the sights and I come across a group of police on the side of the road randomly checking vehilces.  I get directed to pull over and show my licence. Well apparently a NZ licence doesn’t stack up and after a bit of talking with them I was ‘fined’ otherwise known as a bribe in Cambodia for the police.  $10US then I was told I would be ‘allowed’ to drive in Cambodia. Messed up!  Continued on my sightseeing being cautious to avoid another police stop.  Went around the back of the town and took a nice winding road down to the outskirts of the town then the scooter starts to stutter. Putt, putt…putt…dead.  Out of petrol. Apparently they don’t give up a full tank to start with and with my speedo and full gauge un-plugged (really helpful!)  I had no idea. So I parked up and started walking to find a petrol stand (there are stalls randomly along the roadsides with 1 and 2 litre bottles of fuel) then a tuk tuk comes past – perfect! $3 odd later I had some petrol to get me back to the rental place.  So an eventful scooter ride! $5 hire, $10 police bribe and $3 for petrol, might think twice hiring a scooter next time. 

The luxuries in Sihanoukville and even an air con room!
Love the red bed cover.

Snorkelling trip.  Throw in a little bread and the fish come swimming

Our transport (motorised long boat)
and beach we stopped at for a fresh cooked lunch

The road in and out of Sihanoukville - a wee market village
which you may mistake for dump yard...

Sre Ambel

Arrived 28/4/2011

An easy 40km for the legs today.  Thought I’d be able to find an aircon room but Sre Ambel is a very basic town. Streets are red clay and some limited concrete and seal.  Cows have rule, one is currently mooing outside my room, and unfortunately rubbish is not worried about here – pretty disgusting really but amazing to be able to see how people live and function here.

This is the main intersection

Another night with the mosquito net which half blocked the fan.  Too hot so I slept half in and half out of the net.  Got some strange bite during the night on my arm which gave me funny hot/cold flushes and made my arm feel like pins and needles every now and then.  I’m sure it’s nothing and will go away in the morning…

Anduong Tuek:

Arrived 27/4/2011

A day that I will never forget.

I can't remember what the lady called these
(maybe some form of lychees?)

Super tasty! 

I was warned of massive mountains I will have to pass over and told I should stop at the first river crossing of Tatai 20km along.  Nice accommodation and I could re-assess and see if I wanted to get a bus instead.  Tatai approached pretty quick, I felt good and the hills weren’t so bad so I continued on.  The hills then became big and ridiculously steep.  Near the top of the first hill was a conveniently situated drink stall. Stopped, downed some water and fizzy and wrung my top out of sweat.  Within in 3 minutes I was soaked again, the sun was scorching and hardly a breeze in the air, the only relief was descending which was comparably shorter!

What you get when you sabotage your own bike!

So things were ticking along until I did the stupidest thing possible while riding, let alone cycle touring!  Admire the lush scenery and not pay attention to the road, fall off and go head over heal over my bars? No. Ride the wrong way and not realise? No.  Hear a funny sound (not bad just a wee noise) coming from the front wheel, think, oh I’ll just rub my shoe against the rim and see if that flicks off some dirt and stops the noise? Yes.  The result was that my shoe caught the wheel and ripped four spokes, clean snapping them off at the nipples (screws that hold them into the rim) – Calvin what have you done?!!! You idiot what did you expect?  You’re in the middle of nowhere and you have rooted your front wheel.  WHY??!!  Why would you do such a thing!

The two spokes that didn't make it

The wheel couldn’t even turn so had to stop there, part way down a hill with no shade in the middle of the day and the sun was stifling hot!  I had taken 6 spare spokes and now I had to put into practice what I thought I knew about replacing spokes.  Everything came off the bike and lay in the sun roasting away.  And I mean roasting – all my water went from lukewarm to hot, any tool left in the sun became too hot to touch again and a I left a piece of bread out for about 30seconds and it was half toasted by the time I ate it. 

Two spokes munted, two spokes salvageable.  Somehow it worked and I managed to straighten the wheel again and so far (a day later) it is holding strong.  I really hope that wheel lasts the distance now, I still cannot comprehend why I thought of such a stupid action – I don’t really want to make this trip any harder.  Will be resupplying on spokes when I get to Phnom Penh.

The rest of the day was fine, in fact really good progress 100km of hills and a nice wee guesthouse to stay in but all I could think about was the second it took for me to destroy my wheel!

Please remember this is a PG site and derogatory comments about my stupidity should not be placed…

The floating village

The Locals...forgotten their names now too.

Toilet and bathroom in the corner - shower was a
bucket and scoop worked pretty well

Just in case the contractor forget the plans they
could refer to the sign for details...

I think the elephant would come off better if hit when crossing

Watch out for the mysterious fog?