Fast Forward: Cambodia, Round Two

We landed in Siem Reap, Cambodia, passed through immigrations, purchased SIM cards, met our hostel-provided tuk tuk and arrived at The Siem Reap Hostel all in a blur. 

With heads still spinning from the Full Moon Party, we barely made it to our beds before we were all in a deep sleep.  

One of our multiple napping locations that day...

I spent this past March in Cambodia, and although during this portion of our travels I would be playing tour guide I felt that it would be a shame for Caroline, Brad and Jennifer to visit the region and miss the breathtaking Temples of Angkor Wat or the emotional Killing Fields of Phnom Penh.  

Shirt in the Old City market

This trip, I spent less than a week in the country, but was very glad that our movement from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh and then onto Saigon, Vietnam was without major interruptions or delays, though we did have some interesting modes of transportation.  

I was lucky enough to use the time during their touring to catch up with my dear friends Caitlin and Laura, and spend the downtime updating my blog and journal.  

Paintings in the Old Market

On our first day in Siem Reap we slept until late morning, walked around the city in the blistering heat, visited the local market in the Old City, and decided around happy hour that it was time to get happy.  Our adventure lead us to Happy Special Pizza and after a few beers and two very happy pizzas, we were on the express route to extreme happiness.  The night ended in an attempt to be social at the hostel's infamous Happy Hour, but after realizing we were contented with one another as company we headed upstairs to our dorm style accommodations, laughed about life, and headed to sleep.  

The next morning our little group was off to watch the sunrise at the Angkor Wat Temple compound, which left me with the arduous task of sleeping in and finding coffee on my own.  

Hostel Wall Art

That night we took the night bus to Phnom Penh and arrived at The Mad Monkey Hostel around 8 AM. Our tuk tuk driver from the bus stop waited for us to eat breakfast at Brown Cafe and get some morning caffeine before he swept my travel companions away to visit the infamous and heartbreaking Killing Fields.  

As previously stated, this left me with time to myself which I initially thought would be spent at the Vietnamese embassy applying for our visas, but The Mad Monkey staff handled all of our visas for us for the price of $2 each, a fee we were grateful to pay to avoid any communication issues.  

The rest of the day was spent, as was the following one, exploring Phnom Penh and tasting as many Cambodian dishes as we could.  It was fun to re-visit the city and be able to share some information and insight with my friends, while also exploring new areas of town and learning from their observations and findings.  

Playing dress up in Phnom Penh

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Three's a Party: Ayutthaya & Koh Pu

Sunday night, just like the Wednesday before, I arrived to the Bangkok international airport to pick up another member of our travel crew: my youngest sister, Jennifer.   Caroline and I were still exhausted from our previous night’s adventure on Khao San Road with friends from our hostel, and were unfortunately not enthusiastic Bangkok liaisons when Jennifer arrived.  We were thrilled to see her, but also excited for an early bedtime of 2 AM.  

We had already decided that we would wake up early Monday morning, and take a Bangkok triple threat of transportation - SkyTrain, metro, and bus - to visit the kingdom’s old capital, Ayutthaya, which is about an hour outside of the city.  Afterwards we planned to return to the hostel, shower, pack our belongings and catch an overnight train to southern Thailand to begin our beach portion of the trip. 

That was the plan.  

Enter: South East Asian Shenanigans.

We woke up “on time” at 7 AM, and after a quick group census we decided that “a few more minutes” of sleep would be fine.  After getting dressed, eating breakfast, and finally getting out the door the clock read 10 AM, a much more humane hour for such adventures.  We got to Ayutthaya around 12:15 PM and promptly began haggling the nearest driver for a two-hour tour of the ancient ruins.   After settling on a price, we were off. 

We visited Ayutthaya Historical Park, Wat Yai Chaya Mongkol (The Temple of Auspicious Victory), and Wat Chaiwatthanaram, Wat Phra Mahthat that were important locations when the capitol resided here many generations ago.  Although they were all impressive, they ranged in levels of preservation which made appreiciating them difficult at times.  At one point we were staring at a small boulder that they said used to be shaped like a meditating Buddha…hmm, okay…?

Touring the city for two hours in the scorching sun quickly exhausted us, and we were ready to leave and catch our minibus back to Bangkok.  Our driver dropped us off at a train station in Ayutthaya where we realized that the only train was not going to leave there for another hour and a half – that definitely was not part of our plan.  We quickly ran out and found our driver enjoying an ice cold Coke with his new earnings still warm from our purses, and asked him to take us to the minibuses – a crisis was closely averted. 

After what seemed like forever in the minibus, presumably because the airflow was minimal to non-existent, we arrived at Victory Monument in Bangkok.  We then headed to our hostel where we showered, packed, and ate dinner.  Our train wasn’t going to leave for another two hours, so we relaxed and leisurely prepared for our departure.  We should have known better.

When we arrived at the train station we learned that there were “no tickets for train”, “today bus gone”, and “only tomorrow” – there was no way to get to Surat Thani tonight.  Great!  This was definitely not part of our plan. 

Thankfully, all of the buddhas we paid tribute to earlier in the day came through for us and got us the last three tickets on a bus for farangs (always a good sign…) and we arrived in Krabi Province in no time.  From there, we got a boat to Koh Pu since Koh Phi Phi sounded too touristy for the post-Bangkok bliss we were searching for on the Andaman Sea.  To be honest, there are too many islands to choose from & I'm sure we could have found paradise amongst many of them!

Like my time in Koh Ta Kiev back in March, the perfect days in our island paradise melted together.  Each morning we would wake up and trade the comfort of our bungalow for the comfort of our hammocks where we could listen to the waves crashing against the sand.  

Our days at Luboahut were spent alternating between lounging on the beach and passing endless hours swinging under the shaded trees, which afforded us a magnificent view of the open water.   Luckily for us, the entire side of the island was in “low season”, which meant we only had to share it with two other individuals…not too shabby!

It was an incredible few days, and our biggest concern was when we should leave for our next island adventure.  We opted to leave early Saturday morning and catch a bus, taxi, and overnight ferry to Koh Tao, which is a famous island located on the opposite side of the country in the Gulf of Thailand and known for their scuba diving and party scene.  Let the festivities begin!   

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