Well I mentioned previously that this trip hasn’t just been about the destination, and yesterday’s journey to Siem Reap just brought home that fact!
We had arranged for a 7.30am bus from Phnom Phen to pick us up from our hotel. A mini-van arrived promptly at 8.15am and then drove us around for what seemed like a good 15 minutes before picking up other travellers from various other city hotels! Now, in the 15minutes, Amy and I let my imagination get the better of us… the conversation went a little like this:
A: This isn’t the tourist coach with on-board toilet like they said…
S: I know, I really wish I’d peed again before we left the hotel…
A: Suz…
S: Ummm…this is taking us to Siem Reap right?
A: It’s probably taking us to the main bus.
S: What if it’s not? What if they’re going to ransom us?
A: Suz…
S: I’m going to message Sophie just so someone knows where we are!
A: That will totally freak Sophie out, please don’t.
S: Someone should know what’s happened to us if we disappear…
A: Please don’t.
S: Ok… I’ve texted her
Then we stopped and picked up more passengers…
A: Ok, so I’m a little relieved that there are more people on this bus!
S: ***sat there thinking… I know, right?
So once we’d finally picked up a mini-vans worth of passengers, we made it to the main bus depot to get on our “luxury tourist bus” to Siem Reap… Having packed on we began bumping our way along (what seemed like a) dirt track towards Siem Reap. We stopped at random intervals along the way, I’m not quite sure what we accomplished, however, on two of these occasions we picked up people the bus driver seemed to know! About 3 hours into the journey we stopped and the driver just turned off the bus… turns out it was lunch time – not that anybody confirmed this!
Amy and I wandered around this random little city for a good half hour and managed to find (and use) the loo… it was entertaining!
S: Hey Amz… do you have any paper?
A: Nope!
Enough said really…
Anyway, we got back on and were bumping along when we hear this god-almighty BANG, this British lady screams and jumps across the aisle into her friends lap, all while the bus is filling with an acrid rubber smelling smoke! So we pull over (about 1km up the road) at this conveniently located pseudo-repair station and pile off the bus – all while it’s being jacked up to change (what we soon find out is) a busted tyre!
The tyre really did need replacing, however, we’d stopped where they were using traditional methods to make rice crisps style treats (which many of us bought!)… I will admit that I was hugely cynical by this time because we had found out about 2 hours into the bus trip we’d been TOTALLY ripped off for our tickets! What cost us $11 each, should have only cost us $6… This was after spending $2 to send a postcard and having to buy a new internet card every time I wanted to log on regardless of the fact that my initial 24 hours weren’t up yet!
So, during all this I kept my cool (Amy and I slept most of the way!) and finally we got to Siem Reap bus station…where we were mobbed by tuk-tuk drivers wanting to take us to out hotels! It was honestly the only time I’ve felt threatened in Cambodia, and it lasted all of 5 minutes… and then we arrived at Ree Hotel – Siem Reap (referred to lovingly by us as travellers heaven)!
…our patience was definitely rewarded! Our hotel is beautiful, the staff is SUPER attentive and they aren’t trying to con you! The worst thing about it is that we’re only here two nights! After the lovely concierge had shown us how to use the lights, air-conditioning, safe and tv...Amy and I did a little happy dance, hugged and thanked the travel gods for our lovely travel agent Brooke, who’d organised our trip!!!
We then set off to explore a city we quickly fell in love with. It’s a lot more relaxed than Phnom Phen, the people smile a lot more and aren’t as likely to run you over! In short – It’s amazing, we love it and are already trying to work out when we can come back!
Today we visited the Angkor Wat and surrounding temples… breath-taking! Amy will tell you about it in the next post!
We’re headed to Siagon tomorrow morning, so hopefully you’ll hear from us there!
Remember, always try something new if presented with the opportunity!
SQ
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