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Cambodia, what a place! So diverse, the friendliest people, with some of the worst recent history. Some of the worst roads in the world, but the most people trying to maintain them.
We crossed into Cambodia at Poi Pet heading for Siam Rep, along the notorious National Highway 6. This road almost all dirt track, with potholes up to three feet deep and 12 feet wide. In addition it is towards the end of the wet season, and it is completely flooded in many places. The journey is 120 km, and we expected that it would take about 3 hours. A long time for so short a distance, but the actual journey was closer to 12 hours! The bus got stuck in rivers and overflowing paddy fields along the way and we had to all get out and push the bus to get it moving, along with 20 or thirty Cambodians truck drivers who were standing around at the time as their truck had washed a few meters downstream, or the wheels had sunk below the mud.
In the end the driver of the bus just told us to get out and walk as there was another bus waiting on the other side of a particularly bad area. We ended up having to walk in the dark for two hours in water up to our waists to get through it, but it was all OK in the end, just a little wet. A cool beer when we eventually arrived was all that kept us all going.
The reason we headed for Siam Rep (translated to Thailand Defeated, a little cheeky for somewhere so close to the border of Thailand) was because of the Angor Wat Temple complex. It was featured in the film Tomb Raider, which I imagine most of you will have seen. Lush temples built in the 12th - 16th century, abandoned and reclaimed by the forest.
Angor was the main trading hub for South east Asia when it was built but fell by the wayside some time in the indeterminate (I don't know) past. It was discovered in the late 19th century and restoration proceeded for many year until war broke out, it has since been ravaged by Pol Pot and a merry band of looter striping away much of the intricate carvings.
The complex is under restoration again, but only in parts. Some are left more or less as they were found, with enormous trees enveloping the walls and rooms. It is a fantastic display of the power of nature.
Anyway enough of the history lesson. It was a superb place to go and I think I have some amazing photos, but you will have to wait for them. I will continue this shortly, but for now a cool beer waits.
PS I am in Saigon now.
Cheers,
Ferg
First of all I am not in Bali, so no worries there, but I don't think I will be heading to Indonesia any more. An in addition will be heading fairly sharpishly through Malaysia as well. Wolf and myself are currently in Nha Trang of which you will hear about later.
Anyway, on to more pleasant things. The journey from Siam Rep to Phnom Penh way as usual in Cambodia, bumpy, and we got through it simply by watching the kids, and dining on big fried spiders which incidentally like everything else taste like chicken.
Phnom Penh is a cowboy town, where the gun is king and armed robbery is rife, so we did not really spend much time 'out on the town'. We did however spend an inordinate amount of time relaxing and chilling out by the lake watching the dragon flies turn to bats in the evening and drinking banana lassies. Heaven.
After a day or two of that we realised that we had to move once in awhile and headed down to the coast to Sihanoukville, Cambodia's beach town, and for once the roads were in good condition. We spent a day there ambling along the beaches doing a little rock climbing and a lot of burning in the sun. It was also the first time I had seen the sea since I arrived.
Well cutting many a long story short we got back to Phnom Penh and headed out to Vietnam. The roads were apparently un-serviceable even for Cambodia, which is saying something. We had to wait a week or two or take a few boats through the Mekong delta. So we did.
It felt like some poor Hollywood flick, sitting on the roof of the boat watching the scenery skim past and perplexed looks of the local people, with awesome thunderstorms breaking overhead. There are plenty of people in Vietnam that hide from Westerners thinking we are 'American GI' back again.
After two days of travel by boat, mini bus, barge and coach the thought of a bed was all consuming.Thats all for today campers, just the essentials.
Fergus Stevens
I hope I am not boring you all too much with my drivel. Saigon is a great town, and it is quite something to just wonder around watching people going about their daily lives. It still freaks me out a little being propositioned by professional women on the street corner, but a simple "no thank you" with a smile and they leave you be.
We spent a few days in Saigon, wandering around and in the evening playing silly games with the vendor children selling books, postcards, chewing gum and plates of spring rolls that looked as though they were fresh last year.
We made a trip to the Chu Ci tunnels round Saigon, which were used by the Viet-Cong to great effect during the war with America. Crawling along these tunnels was very different and it has to be said rather nerve-racking. The tunnels themselves are at most two feet high and very long. We crawled along about 70 meters of a section of tunnel leading into an old command bunker. It was so close and humid, the dark oppressed and you could imagine the fear the Americans would have felt as they tried to enter these enclaves. Knowing that round any corner there could be a trap or a rifle waiting.
Wolf shot of a few rounds on an M60 heavy machine gun to pass the time. It is the kind of thing that Rambo or Arnie carries round. And the amount of noise it made was astounding. Walking back from the shooting range you could hear the gunfire cracking in the distance through the jungle, and unsettled every one we were travelling with. The life of a soldier is not for me. You get to play with some big toys, but at the end of the day, it is all for a reason.
After Saigon, we headed out to Delat in the central highlands. At 1500 meters the coolness of the air was a relief. In the evening we even had to wear jackets! The scenery is, in some respects, very reminiscent of Scotland, except for the Vietnamese, the sun, and of course the bamboo.
We spent a couple of days there visiting waterfalls, local tribes, avoiding the local motor cycle guides and generally communing with nature. A couple of university students from Delat befriended us and every evening we would go out for dinner and drink incredibly strong coffee. We would talk about Vietnamese culture and in return the wanted to know how to swear like sailors. So being the good Samaritans were are, we obliged.
From Delat we went down the coast to Nha Trang, which is very much the party town of Vietnam. The only reason we had to leave in the end was that it was so damn expensive on our very limited budgets. We ran into almost everybody we have met so far on the trip and each time it was insisted that we have celebratory drinks and dancing. The diving in Nha Trang is supposed to be pretty good, however we decided to wait until we hit Thailand as it is supposed to be that much better and we have plenty of time there.
We are in Hoi An, a town filled with tailors. At every corner we are offered suits, shirts, dresses(!), and anything else that could be sewn. We arrived in Hoi An after a 12 hour night bus journey. And were immediately tricked into buying shorts and shirts. They did a great job and it is quicker to have clothes made for you here than it is to wash your own.
That about bring us up to date, next we head to Hue, then Hanoi. So take care everybody, and have fun.
Ferg
Yet another one of my little updates on where I have been and what I have been up to.
The story today starts from where I left you last in Hanoi. From Hanoi we were making for Savanakhet, in Lao. After 24 hours on buses being abused by chickens sacks of rice and peeing kids we arrived in Savanakhet. As soon as we arrived we wanted to keep moving, but being late we decided to try and find some where to spend the night. There was nothing we could find to commend this place to us, the few travellers we met said that it is the first place in Lao that they did not enjoy. In fact the only thing of a positive note was that we could see Thailand across the river.
After a night in an exceedingly dodgy hotel, with power cuts that affected only certain rooms of the hotel at some times, the shower refused to work and everywhere were ants and cockroaches!
Surprisingly enough the next morning we decided to leave and went straight to Vientiane the capital of Laos. The trip was eight hours and passed through the most remarkable of scenery. Gorgeous mountains filled with beautiful jungle every turn made by the bus we found ourselves wanting to stop and have a quick hike into the undergrowth.
Vientiane, is quite possibly the steepest capital city I have ever seen. There is little traffic, 80% of the cars on the roads were diplomatic vehicles and the rest were from the EU or UN. Many of the streets were not lit at night and combined with the extensive open sewer system, walking around at night can be hazardous to your hygiene.
A couple of days by myself and wolf were spent in Vientiane, seeing the sights and taking things slowly after spending a long time in non-stop movement. Meeting friendly monks, visiting enormous golden stupas, and chatting to people we met. Through chatting to other travellers we heard about this town Vang Vieng, which was not mentioned in our guide books but was supposed to be a outdoor haven. Taking the bus, we ended up on this strip of dirt that served as the bus station and airport for the village. We should only see a few huts and were wondering if we have been the victim of a prank. But sure enough after crossing the runway building appeared and we were is this touristy village filled with backpackers.
We managed to spend six days there kayaking, cycling, swimming in deep lagoons, tubing down the river, exploring enormous caves and trekking in the jungle searching for more caves. To say the scenery is spectacular is not going nearly far enough. If you can try and imagine the most gorgeous of tree-covered-steep-sided mountains, with all the strange sounds, cries and screeches of the jungle below. Through the jungle is the river, with red and purple dragon flies skimming over the surface. All is pristine and all is beautiful.
But unfortunately I was rapidly running out of time, having spent more time than I should have in Vietnam. I left Wolf to continue his adventures in Laos starting with Luang Probang. I headed back to Vientiane with my new best friend Emma.
We arrived in Vientiane, and every hotel we tried was full except one which ended up being more expensive and less hygienic than the one in Savanakhet. We are making our way for Chang Mai, Thailand for some dancing plants and jungle trekking.
So just a brief account today, more in a while.
Cheers
Ferg
Another of my little updates to inspire your days. This one is going to be a little difficult as I seem to have done so much recently but have not had a huge amount of time to enjoy that luxury of sleep.
Crossing over the Friendship bridge from Lao to Thailand was a fairly uneventful experience, in-fact it has been the most organised and chaos free border crossing so far. The only thorn in our side was that we left Lao with around $100US worth of the Laotian Kip, which is about 4 months salary for the average person there. The street side currency exchange ladies, managed to give us one of the worst exchange rates ever and we walked out 1 minute later with $60US worth of Thai Bhat. The only thing that puzzled us was that we could have sworn that we had got a good deal for about 4 hours until we went over the numbers and realised that we had been royally stitched!
Anyway we were heading to Chiang Mai in northern Thailand and first had to make our way to a town of a reasonable size to catch the bus. The town in question was Udon Thanie about 50km south of the border. It is a town that gets very little tourism and within minutes of arriving we had a small crowed of people trying to help us in buying the ticket we needed. In the end a man in a restaurant indicated that we should wait for a moment, so as soon as we sat down he jumped on his moto and sped off down the street. Ten minutes latter he reappeared with his sister who spoke English and she took us to the right ticket office and everything was sorted.
We still though had 5 hours to wait and our now friend 'Boom' took us off to see an orchid nursery. Here a man has spent the last twenty years breeding orchids in order to be able to extract their essence for perfume. His orchid Udon Sunshine is apparently the only variety with which this is possible, and they did smell fantastic.
The highlight for us however was his dancing plants. The good doctor in his spare time had managed to breed these plants that when you sing to them in a smooth even voice, move their small top leaves back and fourth. Batteries not required. It was absolutely incredible to see, and I found out that these plants seemed to appreciate my singing! The alternative is I guess was that they were writhing in agony. The 30 Bhat (50 pence) you pay to see the plants is sent to the local hospital to help care for HIV/ AIDS victims. If you are ever in Udon, then do go and see this.
We arrived in Chiang Mai the following morning and checked into one of the nicest places that we have stayed in so far. We were in Chiang Mai for a little trekking and so signed up for a three day trek, with the guest house. We spent the day catching up on a little sleep and headed down to the night market to pick up a few things. The night market of Chiang Mai is pretty enormous and caters almost wholly for the tourist market. The thing that surprised me most about Chiang Mai was the number of tourists! Over the last few weeks we have been part of a small contingent of tourists who got to know one another following more or less the same trail.
Chiang Mai was full of new faces and we saw nobody we had seen elsewhere on our trips. Well that is not strictly true... Emma ran into an Irish guy she had met four months ago in Australia, and he ended up on the same trek. A strange coincidence, but it just shows you that so many people visit the same places for more or less the same length of time all over the word. There really are passageways through out the world which certain groups of people move through.
Anyway the trek started rather strangely. We got about three quarters of the way to the starting destination, about 15km from the Burmese border when the guide pulled over and asked if it would be OK if we went to another place to begin the walk as he said the queen was in the area and that the army would not let us through. We were a little sceptical, but if he had said nothing, none of us would have been the wiser. The reason it turned out later was that the previous group’s guide got himself in an argument about opium transport out of the tribal villages and into Chiang Mai, and had been shot and killed. We knew nothing of this until we got back after the trip, as I do not think that many people would have continued.
We got to our revised destination, a local Karen hill tribe and we all spent the night in a bamboo hut on a steep hillside. Our group consisted of about ten of us including one guy, Freddy, who had quite possibly the stinkiest feet ever know. People complained so much that he had to leave his shoes not just outside the hut but across the other side of the path and in a bush! That night people were still complaining of the smell. But in the morning we discovered that there were a couple of cows tied under the hut, that kept very quiet, but their natural aroma seeped into the accommodation. Poor Freddy!
The Second day consisted of about 8 hours of walking. Ranging from crossing the tops of jungle hills and followed by moving though dark jungle streams. In the streams everybody got leaches attached to their feet and legs. I managed to get four and the bled for two days as I burned them off before they were finished drinking my blood. After a little bit of river rafting, including a 6 foot drop off a waterfall we got to the second nights accommodation. The local people of the village were celebrating a festival and we were all plied with rum and whisky no matter how much we protested. The local costume was incredibly bright almost fluorescent pinks yellows and greens, and was a throw back to the good old days of the eighties. The evening ended with a lot of dancing and fireworks, followed by fierce hangovers in the morning.
The last day started with elephants that we rode through rives and down paths for most of the morning. The surprising thing about elephants is how quietly they walk. They are not especially fast but even when walking over gravel they appear to be a lot quieter than humans walking over the same surface.
The elephants dropped us at the mouth of an enormous river cave, filled with snakes, bats, stalagmites and stalactites. The cave was about 4km long and it was rather wet as we scrambled through in the dark. My little torch was next to useless and all I was able to do was light up the ground immediately in front of my feet, but it was enough, just.
Anyway It was a fantastic three days and I left the following evening for Hue Hin, about 4 hours south of Bangkok, we went down on the overnight train and got very little sleep over the night as it was rather uncomfortable. On getting back to Bangkok I had to say goodbye to Emma who was leaving for India that evening and carried on south to Hue Hin.
Hue Hin is a well developed costal resort favoured by the king of Thailand and local Thais. It has also been adopted by middle aged overweight couples on two week beach holidays. In addition it’s full of men with their young Thai 'girlfriends' most of whom seemed not even to know the names of the men they were with. It was a little depressing to see it so obviously, so often.
However after all that it does have a great beach, fine, white sand, and if you walk down to the end of the beach going south you come to the Monkey Temple. The Monkey Temple gets it name for fairly obvious reasons. There are plenty of the blighters hanging around. I have never had a good relationship with monkeys, starting from when I was very young and got savaged by a load of them at London Zoo when I had wandered off by myself. In India I learnt not to go near them when they were getting aggressive by the Taj Mahal, and in Vietnam one almost tried to take my finger off when I offered it a banana.
My next stop was back to Bangkok to head over to the Kankcaburi and the bridge over the River Kwai. I went on an overnight trip as it sounded like it would be a lot of fun. On reaching the bridge we rafted under it without much of a song and dance other than working out how to fit 10 people onto a raft made for 6. The solution of course was to squeeze everybody on and hope that we had enough buoyancy to stay afloat. Two people fell in to the river as soon as we got mid stream and ended up swimming under the bridge. Oh well at least all that happened to me was my feet were a little wet.
The museum and the cemetery were very solemn reminders of the grim aspect to the construction of the Death Railway, which actually started (or ended) at the bridge. During its construction more than 12,000 of the 60,000 allied prisoners of war died from disease, sickness malnutrition and exhaustion. The Japanese kept no records of these deaths and it was not possible for anyone else to do so. The original bridge was downstream a thousand feet and made of timber, remnants of which are still in place at the museum. The film incidentally was actually made in Sri Lanka. After this we got on the train and chugged up to Nam Tok along the death railway. The whole route was built by POW's during the second world war and every rock was hand broken and placed by them in appalling conditions. The work included the construction of Hellfire Pass so named as work continued into the night the area was lit by flaming torch light. Hellfire pass is carved into the side of a steep hill over the river and a dangerous curved wooden bridge take the train across.
The rest of the trip was much more pleasant to think about and consisted of swimming in gorgeous waterfalls and sleeping in floating huts on a beautiful lake, with the odd elephant or two thrown in for good measure.
I am back in hot and steamy Bangkok and heading back to Chiang Mai tonight for some Thai Massage and cooking courses.
Take care and keep enjoying yourselves.
Ferg
After my adventures in Bangkok I got in a bus back up to Chiang Mai thatevening.
I really enjoyed myself in Chiang Mai before and was determined to do soagain, and see some more of the city. The main reason for the trip wasfor self improvement. I was going to learn a little about Thai Cookery,and a fair amount of Thai Massage. It was the festival of Yee Peng when Iarrived and all day and all night the sound of fire works break theair. During the day, it is relatively quiet with a stray firework beinglit on average once a minute, usually by one of the monks. In the eveninghowever all hell breaks loose, with informal re-creations of battlesraging around you constantly. You head home after getting caught in thethick of it with a case of shell shock. Your ears are ringing, the smellof gun powder clogs your nose and you can't quite remember the way home asyou are now feeling quite dazed and confused. The festival lasted 3 daysand to tell you the truth it was a relief when it was all over.
I decided that I had better brush up on my culinary skills as I have notcooked for myself since leaving on this trip. There is little point in metrying, as it is more expensive and wasteful, if it is even possible, forfor me to cook than it is to go to a restaurant or eat in the hotelshere. The cooking course was a lot of fun, as we learnt to whip up sixgood dishes. The real question is if I am still able to make springrolls, and Pad Thai, as they would be very useful.
The Massage course was really rewarding and I was given one-to-oneTuition for eight hours a day for three days. By the end of it my hands werehurting and I needed a massage myself. I learnt a lot in a short periodof time and completed round about 25 hours of massages before being letout to try it in the real world. And just a few days later I had a fewvictims to try out my skills on.
My last day in Chiang Mai I visited Doi Sutep which is on a hill 16 kmfrom town. I thought that this would make a nice stroll for the morning.It was quite a bit harder than I had imagined and by the end of it wassimply dripping in sweat in the hot and humid air. As cars and truckspassed, you could see the drivers and passengers shake their heads atme with pity, while others laughed. I think they thought I was mad andthree hours, a blister and three litres of water later I was inclined toagree with them. The temple itself was a glittering golden structure thatshines on the top of the hill overlooking Chiang Mai populated by friendly monkswho seem to enjoy talking to stupid tourists who know very little aboutBuddhism.
After my educational experience in Chiang Mai I decided it was definitelytime to see a beach or two. Krabi on the Andaman Sea is in the South Westof Thailand and at this time of year is one of the driest places. I metup with wolf again here, and headed off down to Riley Beach where all theclimbers show off their stuff on some of the most stunning sea cliffs Ihave ever seen. I was not feeling the need to be humiliated at that pointand, so just wandered around and did my own thing. One of the best thingswas if you found the scrabbling route up behind one of the cliffs on EastRiley you could make you way fairly easily up to the top of the cliffwhich was around 4 times higher than the climbers were getting up to. Yougot some fantastic views across all three beaches, and up the coasteither side as well. After a few nights in my little bungalow it was timeto move on, so I went just a little bit round the coast to Ton Sai Beach.Here the rocks were no longer vertical but curled right overhead. Thegood climbers from the previous beach were replaced by traineeSpider Men. Clinging to surfaces that were parallel to the ground in amanner that seemed to defy gravity. I could not even manage to make onemove up the cliff before I realised that I just was not cut out for thatkind of sport. At least for the time being.
I left Wolf again, happy as Larry, and headed across to Ko Phi Phi. Theisland where the film "The Beach" was filmed. It was however adisappointment and was far from being the tropical Utopia that wasportrayed. It had more of the feeling of Benidorm, and the accommodationwas all very expensive. After just a single night there, I was on themove again on to Ko Lanta, which was for me at any rate a Utopia. Wideopen and empty beaches, relaxed evenings and I had a beautiful bamboobungalow all to myself.
Time just seemed to flow effortlessly there and before I knew it I had tomake my way down to Singapore to catch a flight to Australia.
I headed out to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia and arrived in the middle of abig festival. With just 12 hours there I knew that I had to move on toSingapore as all the trains, and buses were booked up for the followingday which was my last full day in Asia. So the same evening I arrived Iwas back on a bus! Having spent the previous 24 hours on the bus I wasnot that happy to be on the move again, but needs must.
Singapore was quite a change to the rest of Asia, in that it was possiblefor me to drink the water and every where was clean. But at the end ofthe day it is just another city, a bit hot and humid, and only 100kmnorth of the equator.
So not a very good tale today, but that's the way the cookie crumbles.
Ferg