Blogs from East, Cambodia, Asia - page 26

Later that day we caught the bus to Stung Treng. Stung Treng lies on the Mekong River further north, and is a very popular way of either crossing between Laos and Cambodia. Unforunately, not many tourists chose to spend any time in Stung Treng, which is actually not fair, seeing that it is a vey charming town. However, a pretty tight schedule didn't leave us much time to enjoy the town, or so we thought. We arrived quite late, and of course were greeted by several guest house representatives touting their guest house. We decided to follow one guy to his guest house, but were rather disapointed with the standard of the place. Yes, it was very cheap (US$3) but it was dark, dirty, and musty. When I pointed out the squat toilet to the guy, ... read more

After a quick overnight in Phnom Penh (enough time to know there's a whole lot more I need to see and do there!) Johanne and I headed for Kratie, which is a small town situated on the Mekong River. It's super mellow with not a whole lot to do but explore the outskirts and relax... fine by me! That afternoon we rented a couple of bikes and went for a ride around the area and were greeted by every single child in the area!! They all wave and yell hellooooo... They are incredibly cute, as I'm sure I've already mentioned. We got bombarded by a bunch of younger boys also on bikes and one in particular was SO keen to practice his english he just kept asking question after question. Johanne's an elementary school teacher back ... read more

After an entertaining border crossing we now arrived in Kratie, Cambodia. We hung around town long enough to see the rare Irawaddy Dolphins but then got the next pick up out of there and headed for Sen Monorom. The journey was memorable, to say the least. 2hrs in a cramped (or so we thought....) pick up, followed by a 2hr wait in the boiling midday sun, and then it was onwards for another 6 hrs on top of a different pick up (with 8 other unlucky souls) along a very bumpy dirt road. The fun really started when it started to rain..... The reward was worth it though and we spent 3 days in a beautiful spot in the middle of nowhere. Waterfalls to swim in, villages to explore and a great bunch of people to ... read more

Hello and welcome to Cambodia, my third country of this south-east asian tour! After 2 weeks in laos, we felt it proper to move on, and our visas were running out! Post our 10hour bifter bus ride to pakse, we eventually caught a small truck further south close to thge Laos-Cambodia border. This truck was only small, yet 32 people were either sat down, squashed in, or hanging off the back of this truck (about the size of your car dennis!). Sweat was felt in abundance! Our destination was the area known as Si Phan Don (or 4000 islands) and basically is a massive region on the Mekong River of thousands of islands, varying in size from small to mahusive!! We stayed on the relatively small island of Khome, which was the least touristy of the ... read more

AHHHHHHH! Cam-bod-ia!! What a first impression! First I suppose a major update is in order seeing as Vang Vieng was my last entry! Looking back, we enjoyed the north of Laos more than the south, but still had a ball travelling south from Vang Vieng to Vientiane, the capital, to Savannakhet, Pakse, Tadlo, and Si Phan Don before leaving Laos. We called Vientiane our "business trip". The city itself is busy with activity including the morning market, which runs all day by the way, and an awkward duplicate of the arc de triomphe on the main boulevard. The city offered lots of very french-influenced architechture and we made the warm, fresh, baguettes a staple in our diet in Laos in general. We stayed 2 nights in Vientiane and filled the days with extending out Laos visas ... read more