Otres Beach: Old Friends and New Friends

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First of all we are SOOO behind. We were in Otres Beach December 14th - 16th. We are working really hard to get you up to date at this busy time so please bear with us!! Everything will still be posted, just a little behind that's all.

After spending three days at Serendipity Beach in Sihanoukville (basically being drunk), we had to get out of that town. We didn't want to go to far since the area is beautiful so we moved to Otres Beach with Paul, Dan and Avi. It took us a while to find accommodations because it is now high season but we were happy to settle in $12 bungalows right on the beach. The place we stayed at (Moorea Beach) resembled a resort with black, white and red accents all over the place. There was always some sort of minimal electronic music playing in the background and the staff were great at keeping hawkers away from people who didn't want to be bothered. There were a number of small huts that you could either sit or hang (in a hammock) under; they also had a bunch of satellite chairs/couches to chill in. With all of this so close by, we never had to leave the white powder sand of the beach.

Most of our time for the three days we were there was spent laying around not doing too much. We each got at least one massage on the beach and ate plenty of fresh pineapple and watermelon from our favourite fruit ladies. We held strong though and didn't buy a single bracelet from the adorable kids. By our last day they seemed to be catching on - one girl walked up to us as we were eating breakfast and said “I know! You no buy! I not ask anymore!” in an angry 8-year-old voice and kept walking. Way too cute haha.

Our meals were pretty pricey since there were less options and no street food but paying a couple extra dollars on food isn't that bad when you aren't spending it on booze or sightseeing. We had Indian food at an all-you-can-eat Indian place a couple times and also had some awesome seafood BBQ'd meals. The BBQ meal was a salad, a beer, three choices of meat (beef, chicken, baracuda, prawns, squid etc.) and fries or garlic bread for $5. We had that a couple of times because it was so good!

For a moment we have to take you back in time to Tyler's other adventures in SE-Asia. While he was in Phnom Penh two years ago with his friends Jaf and Pat they met this awesome bar owner who they partied with every night. His bar was in the lake district that has now been basically demolished. When Jaf and Ty were in Phnom Penh a few weeks ago they couldn't find the bar again. Well guess who we found re-located in Otres Beach... Joe! This awesome bar
owner who now had a place on Otres Beach and another restaurant at Serendipity Beach that his wife Sandy runs. Once Tyler (aka Tiger) jogged his memory they were immediately BFF's. Joe is a hilarious guy. He is so nice, so friendly, so generous, so easy-going; just a great guy to spend time with. Joe's place was right next door to our
resort so we spent a lot of time chillin' at his beach and eating there. One night Joe was having a little bit too much fun. We were all hanging around the bar having a beer, listening to music and talking with fellow travellers when Joe asked Tyler to be bartender for a bit. Joe needed a 20 minute break so he changed spots with Ty; Ty took over the bar while Joe sat on the “customer side” of the bar with us. 20 minutes turned into a few hours and Tyler continued
to serve up beers and drinks to anyone who came by. His first few draft pours were pretty bad, but he caught on quickly. At one point in the night Joe actually left the bar for the rest of the night, completely leaving everything to Tyler and his 15 year old niece Samon. Samon is amazing. She basically runs the whole place with Joe (and an older lady they both refer to as Momma who doesn't speak any English) and loves to be a part of the party (minus the
alcohol of course). Joe said she does most of the cooking and usually covers for Joe if he needs a few extra hours of sleep in the morning. Every time we came to hang out or have a meal she would sit with us and chat just like she was one of our good friends. She had a bit of a crush on Avi which was very amusing. She was always wondering where
Avi was – he was usually sleeping if he wasn't with us. Anyway, we had an awesome awesome time chillin' at Joe's bar a few nights in a row.

One night that Joe got quite drunk was when the power was out all night. Otres Beach quite often is out of power so the majority of places have generators; however, on this particular night his was broken so we had a “candle party”. Joe's favourite lines that night were “Paul!! Fuck the power!!” and “Blame Canada!!” or “Blame who?” because everyone knew his answer, except for the few times it was “Blame Tiger”. He also loves to say “Say what?!”. Hopefully you get the picture, he's hilarious. So many Cambodian's we have met either don't have a sense of humour or just don't understand our humour but it was great spending so much time with Joe because he always kept us laughing.
One morning Rebecca woke up with sore abs and Ty suggested it could be from laughing so much... most likely true!

Other then hanging out with Joe, eating seafood BBQ or Indian food, laying on beach chairs and swiming in the clear blue ocean, we really didn't do much.

Our last day was sort of hectic because we left booking our overnight bus to the last minute. As soon as we woke up we went to buy everyone tickets but they were all sold out. We had to come up with a back up plan. We tossed around the idea of taking the day bus to Siem Reap (which is a 10-12 hour bus ride) but didn't want to spend a whole day on the bus. Taking an overnight bus the following day would kind of suck too since Jaf was expecting us and we were ready to leave the beach. Finally we decided to take a bus to Phnom Penh, stay one night and take an early morning bus to Siem Reap from there. That way we could cut the bus time into two parts and still get to Siem Reap in reasonable time so Jaf wasn't too lonely.

This blog seems really short so we apologize for it's briefness but there wasn't really too much to share. Kind of like Koh Tonsay – the ocean was our shower, but this time Joe was usually our entertainment.

Speaking of Koh Tonsay, photos have been uploaded to that blog. We didn't take many pictures in Phnom Penh (because Ty had already been there and most of the sights were depressing) or Sihanoukville (because it's a bad idea to bring a camera out when you're drinking) but will have plenty to share now that the insanity has evened out a little bit.

xoxo Ty+Becs

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Photos

Our Beach Hut
A bed, a bug net, a wall, a roof; what more do you need when you step out onto the sand?

Moorea Beach Guesthouse
We felt like fancy pants at this place.

Otres Beach
The beautiful stressfree Otres Beach

Joe
The man himself! Never saw him wear a shirt...

Samon
Miss her smile already!

Comments

[Tric]

Expensive meals?!?!
I love how you think $5 meals are expensive now. Wait til you return home - good luck finding a $5 meal like that! :)