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Published: June 21st 2009
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Arriving back in Siem Reap on the 10th June we checked back into Popular Guesthouse (getting a free t shirt seeing as it was our third time!) and went out for a final meal and drink before taking Diane to the airport for an arduous sounding journey back to the UK the next morning. We had previously organised our Vietnam visa to start on the 19th June, 2 days before the start of a 4 week program we had previously booked onto, so still had 8 days to spend in Cambodia. We had debated going to Kep or Kampot on the south coast but had heard negative reports about both from almost everybody we spoke to. There were also dozens of significant temples dotted around Cambodia that were reputed to be worth a visit but after Angkor and Thailand we were fairly templed-out so after staying in Siem Reap another night eating fantastic food we decided to be utterly lazy and go back to Sihanoukville! It wasn't the greatest beach in the world but after a busy couple of weeks we thought that chilling out around a pool and eating freshly caught seafood on the beach was a good way to
kill a few days.
After Sihanoukville we decided to head back up to Phnom Penh to visit the shooting range that we hadn't had time for previously. The range was about 15km out of town and getting there took us through some rather dodgy areas, which is saying something for Phnom Penh. Finally we arrived at a little dirt lane that worryingly had a sign for the Cambodian Special Forces Air Unit at the entrance. Our tuk tuk driver took us down the lane until we arrived at a surprisingly nice looking set up with a cafe and rack of guns out front. I chatted to the owner about the options avaliable (sadly no RPGs as I'd been led to believe) and finally decided on an M16, although I declined his casual offer to fire it at live farmyard targets. The guy gave me 30 rounds for 50 US dollars and led me to a dark and dingy range. After being surprised by my skill with a gun in Poland (another story!) I was a little disappointed to find that the range was so poorly lit that I could barely see the paper target at the end so just
fired off a couple shots in the general direction. I think the owner realised I was a little disappointed so allowed me to put the enormous machine gun on rapid fire - much more fun!
The next morning we left Phnom Penh, this time for Bangkok. Rather ridiculously, it had actually turned out to be easier and cheaper to get from Phnom Penh to Bangkok by bus, and then fly from Bangkok to Hanoi for the start of our course on the 21st June than enter Vietnam in the south from Phnom Penh and then travel up Vietnam to Hanoi. Plus, although we had already been to Bangkok twice it's the kind of city that you can visit over and over so it really wasn't any hardship to go back for a couple of days.
Our bus journey from Phnom Penh to Bangkok had been long and hot and Amy arrived back in Khoa San Road feeling a bit under the weather so unfortunately spent the first day in bed while I went out shopping for some clothes at the ridiculously cheap stalls. Amy managed to venture out the hotel the next day to do the same and
we both sent large packages of summery clothes to the UK for when we get home. In February. On the 19th we got a taxi out to the very nice and efficient Bangkok airport an boarded an ultra cheap Air France flight that we'd booked while in Siem Reap. It was so nice to be travelling on a plane again with no durians under our feet and no loud Asian pop over the speakers. Only an hour and a half later we landed in our final SE Asian country, Vietnam. But that's another blog...
One of the more amusing observations we have made in SE Asia is that people love putting ridiculous objects onto and into their vehicles, particularly motorbike. The best we have seen to date are three freshly killed pigs, whole families and a bedroom wardrobe. We're not always quick enough to get them on film but I've attached a couple of amusing ones that we have caught to this blog.
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