Siem Reap

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Today we had an early start as we had a cooking course at 9am. There were only five of us so we had more attention although this was not an advantage as the two women running it were very strict and didn't hesitate to shout if a detail was wrong!! First we made fresh spring rolls; having made these already in Vietnam we were pro at rolling them up without bulges or tears in the rice paper! Our next dish was Khmer Amok, a traditional Khmer dish which despite the jumble of ingredients proved to be delicious and was packed with varying tastes from many different spices. Our final dish was pumpkin or banana dessert. It comprised of fruit chunks, sugar, coconut cream and tapioca balls. As you can imagine, this was like nothing we had ever tasted before and is very hard to describe!! After cooking and eating what we had made, making us ridiculously full at only 11.30am, we were taken on a tour of the local market. It was very cramped and packed with people, some of the smells were definitly not favourable and the half dead and chopped up, blood streaming meat and fish made us feel a bit queasy!

In the afternoon we went on a tour of Tonle Sap Lake which had many floating villages. Luckily the group was small with only one woman and us. The tour guide spoke good english and described the floating populations' way of life and their jobs as fishermen. We floated along for about half an hour on a wooden boat just a bit longer and taller than a rowing boat. We stopped off and got out at the floating market. To our surprise local children walked around with pythons around their necks as if they were toys and a rickety enclosure housed around 25 crocodiles!! We kept our distance! We climbed up a viewing deck above the market and soon realised the wind was picking up and with dark rain clouds over head it was time to leave! By the time we had got back to the boat the rain was already torrential and the boat was swaying a lot from the wind! Knowing there were crocodiles in the lake, falling overboard was definitly not a pleasant thought!! As we began to leave the market, a boat collided with ours breaking the side of the boat! Panic set in but luckily the break was not low enough for water to come in although it was a bit disconcerting!! It turned out that due to the wind and rain, the rope that was attatched to the wheel that enabled the steering was caught around the udder. After a bit or sorting out and rearranging so we were sat one behind the other in the centre of the boat to balance it out we made our way back. We were all relieved to see dry land!!

In the evening we wandered down 'The Alley' which is the street adjacent to the market in search of dinner. There were many restaurants and also a street entertainer! Afterwards we headed back to our hotel for our free welcome massage which was much needed after the boat stress!! Our massage beds were next to each other which obviously resulted in some giggling that was hard to subdue!! Tomorrow we start our three day tour of the temples.

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