Kwai me a river

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Our last day in Cambodia was spent exploring the Angkor temples in Siem Reap. We left for the temples at 5am to watch the sunrise over Angkor Watt temple. For me it is a novelty to see the sunrise let alone over the vast ancient structure that is Angkor Watt. When our tuk-tuk arrived the place was full of western tourists. Probably the most westerners Ive seen since leaving heathrow airport two and a half months ago. Everyone was crowded in different areas to try and catch a good picture of the temple in the sunrise, however clouds made this quite difficult. During the day we visited Angkor Thom, Bayon, Preah Khan and Ta Prohm. Ta Prohm was probably the pick of the temples. Ta Prohm has been left almost as it was found. The result is huge trees and roots growing in and out of the aged temple walls. We spent seven hours in total looking round Angkor and by the end we had definitely had enough. A lot of people visit the temples over a few days but I definitely think one is enough to see the best bits.

The nest day we took a bus from Siem Reap to the Cambodian-Thai border where we would enter Thailand. The bus was pretty shocking and was packed full with passengers and their bags. Two travellers had to sit on plastic garden chairs in the aisle as there were not enough seats. The roads were in shocking condition considering how much it is used. On the way to the border we saw a crash on the side of the road where a women had swerved into water just off the road. When we drove past she was clutching her bleeding son and screaming. We have seen a few accidents on the roads here but that was the worst. The entry into Thailand was fairly straight forward as you can now get a visa exemption for 30 days on a UK passport. After getting into Thailand we thankfully switched buses. This coach had air con lots of leg room and the bags could go underneath the coach. Still, one unlucky traveller had to have the plastic garden chair.

We arrived in Bangkok in the evening. The skyline at night is an amazing view and a bit daunting. It was a lot bigger than I had imagined. We stayed in the main backpacker area down the Khao San road. This road is packed full of bars and guesthouses. After finding a guesthouse we went out and explored the bars. The next day we went to the weekend market. This was the biggest market I had ever seen and sold everything from throwing stars to puppies. As we are returning to Bangkok later in our journey we left the next day for Kanchanaburi.

Kanchanaburi is home of the Death railway and the bridge over the river Kwai. To see the bridge we hired bicycles and first went to the Death railway museum which overlooks the war cemetary. The museum was quite good as I didn't really have a clue about the bridge over the river Kwai and have never watched the film. Basically the Japanese needed to build a railway from Thailand into Burma. To do this they used prisoners of war, mainly British, to construct the railway and the bridge. The conditions for the prisoners were appalling and many thousands died in the construction of the bridge alone. We had a walk around the cemetary and then headed 3km down the road to the famous bridge. You can walk across the bridge for free. I was only halfway across the bridge and in the middle of two balconies, that I realised a train still runs over the bridge. Luckily it slows down for tourists and I made it out the way. Kanchanburi is a nice little town with very little hassle. We are staying in a beautiful riverside bungalow for less than what we paid for a box room in Bangkok.

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