Day 27 - Countryside cycle tour and Tara 'Hell' Boat tour

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Day 27 - Countryside cycle tour and Tara Boat

We were up and about at 6.40 this morning. We were both well rested after yesterday's marathon chill out! The early start, and rice drop visit really wore us out!

This morning after a lively breakfast in the hotel, we are booked to do a Countryside cycle tour with a company called Backstreet Acadamy. It is a social enterprise dedicated to impact. They work with many NGOs and disadvantaged communities to help them create a tour experience by helping them to access the tourism market, building better livelihoods and dignity through providing them with education, training, income and respect. It's good to use organisations like this if you can!

Our tour guide for the day, Soy Kosal, was outside our hotel, ready and waiting for us at 8am with our mountain bikes. Introductions done, and we got straight off!

It's another hot day, we are well prepared, soaked in factor 50, 100% deet, full shoes and water to drink. Our ride is 25k.... It can't be that hard.... Can it? lol

The cycling is quite easy, it's the quality of the roads, paths and tracks that make it so hard! My backside is quite meaty, so not too bad, but poor Helen hasn't really got much fat on hers, she's really feeling it!

We got out of the tourist areas into the local, rural side, the scenery hits you straight away, beautiful, lush and green. Although Kosal informs us that even though it is the rain season, they have not had enough rain yet, which is a problem.

We pass locals planting vegetables and rice, moving the cows and buffalo around, and reaping vegetable harvest, which is sold to the hotels. They are very proud of the organic crops that are grown, sold and used here.

We pass a funeral at a temple, where the whole village attend the send off.

We stopped at a fishing house that is Government controlled. When the rain does come, this area will be all under water, so it is important that the fishing is controlled to allow sustainability. Therefore this is a good thing for the locals to have in place.

Further down we stop at a hut for a bit of shade, and a drink of cold water. The locals are so welcoming. We are invited to sit in the hut, which is actually their home. It's very simplistic, even bare, but they are really happy to chat with us, talk about our lives and families, their lives and families, comparing the two. It was so nice to share with them. We all enjoyed our 20 minute stop, laughing with each other.

The next stop was Chreav village. This had a small local market where we tasted local cake; Krok cake. It is made of balls of sweet rice that have bean curd inside. They were really sweet. A bit too sweet and heavy for me, Helen seemed to enjoy it more. They eat this as a sweet snack.

Further down the market Kosal interpreted for a tourist who was buying fresh fish. He more or less hot what be needed ... In the end!

We moved on to the fruit stall where Kosal showed us how to recognise a ripe water melon; it's all in the little bit of stalk, if it is dead and brown, it is ripe, if it is green, it needs leaning longer.

We set off off on the rerun ride to the hotel. I have thoroughly enjoyed the tour, but am now ready to finish!

We return, happy, but again, tired! The only thing that can help is now ..... Costa coffee!

We decided to push on after the coffee stop as there are a couple of things we want to buy before leaving Siem Reap.

The first thing we need is more money! Some of the ATMs do t take our card, some only give Tiel, we want dollars, it took us quite a while to find what we needed, but got the eventually!

Money in pocket, off we go! I got some nice big hoop gold earrings. A Cambodia key ring for Andrea ( I always get her one from every country I visit!), Helen bought a nice silver ring.

Shopping done, we return to Costa for an iced lemon tea before we go back to the hotel to get ready for the boat trip later. This Costa is so close to our hotel, it's dangerous!

My arm has managed well today, considering what I have put it through. It's really aching now, but still improving. I think the more I use it, the better it will get! I'm not using any support on it now either!

We got back to the hotel, showered and sorted, in the reception area waiting for the pick up for the Tara Boat sunset and evening dinner trip. So far 15 mins late, which is unusual here!

Well...... Where to start! That wasn't good, not one bit of it.... Oh, I lie, the only good bit was getting back!

It as appalling, nothing like the website suggest. There is some serious poet licence going on there! We just rechecked the website, I think I'm in a different world to this advert after what we just experienced.

They where over an hour late, we got into a shabby taxi, not the air con, safe driver minibus as advertised, we got on a barely seaworthy crappy punt of a small boat, not the Tara mini-boat as described with health & safety conscious experienced staff! He was about 14, laughing and giggling when the boat was stuck! We stopped on a floating crocodile farm where the girl pointed to the hole in the floor where the crocs where, she ran us around the souvenir part, then we were off! She did point at the odd floating house and school as we passed, I was so pleased to see the big boat, Tara, in the distance. I felt really vulnerable, and definitely not safe! That was until we got nearer to it, OMG! It was an absolute wreck! I'm really not a fussy person .... But even I have standards, even if they are s bit low at times, this was way below, even for me!

On the website, it states cocktails, and shows a lovely looking buffet. I was looking forward to that......no, that's not how it was at all. The boat was actually moored at a 35 degree angle. The tea barely stayed in the cup! I thought the teapot was going to slide away! It was impossible!

We both just wanted to get back to dry land ASAP, and definitely benefit it got dark!

We left about ten minutes after arriving. The girl asked if everything was ok, she said my face did not look good!

I was kind to her, as it clearly wasn't her fault that the company mislead in the way that they have done. She contacted her boss, talking for ages. We got $5 each back. This was a very expensive boat ride!

We got dropped off in town and went looking for cake!

We found chocolate pancakes with gin & tonic.... That'll do nicely thank you! So we'll put it behind us, and laugh about it later!

I felt very nice tonight in my new Vietnamese dress. I mentioned to Helen that I felt like it was choking me! She checked, just to make sure that I didn't have it on back to front..... As if! No she said, it's the right way round, it must be the shape of the dress!

Later, when getting undressed ..... Hmmm.... Back to front!

Thanks Helen.... Lol I don't know who is worse, me for putting it on that way, or Helen for not seeing it when she purposely looked! That says a lot about the Yeo of us, as a pair!

Tonight Terry, and the Easy rider lads skyped us. Aw, it was great to catch up with them! They were pleased to see I am recovering well! It was a nice way to finish our time here.

Tomorrow is all about breakfast, packing and leaving Siem Reap.

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