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So we decide to take a bicycle tour to Siem Reap from the capital Phnom Phen. It is advertised as an easy to moderate ride so we think this will be good. The tour is for 3 days and 2 nights and we are meant to cycle 212 kms. This turns out to be incorrect, it ends up we are meant to cycle nearly 270km.
We arrive the first morning early (Shenton is hung over as last night was the first night he had really drank here and he drank a little too much!). The tour starts 7.30am ( imagine the state of Shenton :-). ) with a short ride through the city which in itself is very scary as people ride and drive anywhere without seemingly being aware of anyone else on the road. Sokhoum our guide gets us through all this as he does with the whole ride, being a native Cambodian we are reall lucky to have him and he is a pleasure to be with.
We are meant to be taking a local taxi out of the city to get to the road where we start our trip. Our guide pulls up and suddenly there
are men all around him trying to pull the bikes and get us onto a minibus that is already full of people, but it seems the three of us plus bikes will fit in too! The bus is a 9 seater and we end up starting off with 21 adults and 2 kids inside and 2 adults on the roof..... this journey takes about an hour and then we reach a dirt road where we start our ride. It is already around 11am and getting hot. Soon the dirt road turns into a bumpy track and it must be over 40 degrees. Maybe we should have taken another bus .......
Seriously though, this is tough but every few hundred meters it is made worth it as literally hundreds of children run out to see the white person and scream "hello" with big smiles on their faces. We pass many temples and pagodas, we are seeing the real Cambodia. We arrive at our first place to sleep after cycling over 70 kms and I am to say at the very least ready to get off the bike. The hotel is very nice and we enjoy the airconditioned room and a
bath of cold water to sooth our bottoms which are very very sore. Neither of us has cycling shorts and Shenton didnt even bring his trainers so is doing the ride in his flip flops. His feet are ingrained with dirt as the roads are incredibly dusty, we have surgical masks to wear if needed, they can prevent unwanted illness from the dust and of course help us to breath.
The next day we start out early and I am wearing 5 layers on my bottom half to try and cushion myself, it doesnt really work and we both feel like we have not even got off the bike, as soon as we start to ride the burn hits, and I dont mean the sun. Today we ride over 80 kms but it is a bit easier than yesterday as it is not so hot and the road gets a lot better. We stop locally for lunch at someones house and the entire neighbourhood comes over to speak with us, they all admire our "white skin" and want us to take their daughters with us to work for us. Shenton tells them that all the black people want to
get white and all the white people want to get black, this of course is lost in translation.The people are all so friendly to us and we really enjoy eating with them, the food is delicious.
When we finish the ride today we have to get a bus to our next stop for the night which takes about another 2 hours, so again we arrive in the dark. As we arrive at the more moderate guess house / home stay there are 2 french couples, who are also cycling. They are doing a much longer tour and have been riding since the beginning of February, all around south east asia. They are two families, each of them with two small children aged 2 and 3. The kids are seated in litttle buggies behind the bike and they love it. Which of course I can totally understand, being pulled along, in a comfortable seat, yes please!! My butt can,t take it anymore, please ma take this bike off of me! They have already cycled over 3,000 kms and have another 6 months left of their tour.
That night we eat at a local "restaurant" the food is just about
edible!!! But it is all part of the fun of the trip. The next day we only have a short ride to Siem Reap and I am sooooooo glad about this as now we both are really sore and the thought of being on the bike is just not fun. We go back to the same restuarant for breakfast and we have a choice of chicken and rice or noodle soup, so we both go for noodle soup. While we are waiting we have a look around the market and Shenton spots a lady carrying a tray of fried crickets on her head. As we are taking pictures the guide asks us if we want to try one, I say no but Shenton is up for it and so he eats it whole......he says it doesnt taste too bad but a few mnutes later it gives him a bad aftertaste in his mouth.
Back at the restaurant for breakfast the noodle soup is not too nice but we found a boy who looked really hungry and bought him a bowl too , plus he ate most of mine and Shenton's.
The ride today is not so bad and
we pass by lots of places which specialise in selling a certain things, i.e. the place that takes rocks form the mountains and grinds them down, and the place that just sells this kind of sweet treat which is sticky rice, coconut and beans all cooked inside bamboo. Shenton really likes this but I am not too keen.
We only stop a couple of times on the way and we arrive at Siem Reap early, so we go straight to the hotel and we are both so tired that we have lunch then just relax in the room and have a swim in the pool. All in all this was a great way to travel but it certainly was not an easy to moderate ride and it was made much harder by the heat, a constant 40+ degrees of heat on the road. Through all this the memory we will always have will be the 'Hellos' that we heard and replied to along the way, from and to all the children, they ran from wherever they were to see us and laugh and shout that one word they knew. Hundreds of them, just beautiful.
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Heather
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I loved your photos and post from Cambodia! Reminds me of my time in that part of the world. My blog is looking for travel reviews, tips, photos, etc, to share (like of interesting foods, or even how to cushion your bum for the long bike rides!?). If you have the time, check it out at dirty-hippies.blogspot.com, or email us at dirtyhippiesblog@gmail.com. Continued fun on your travels! Heather :)