Anyway, Siem Reap was starting to feel like home. We spent eight nights here in a row - something we rarely do. We were in a great hotel with amazing restaurants on our doorstep. The people were so friendly too.
In one of those amazing coincidences that happen sometimes, Beth and Carlos, the American couple from our cycling trip, told us that they were going to see a place where rats were used to detect land mines. John mentioned that he had heard of this once before. We were sitting in a bar in Tanzania, about 10 years ago and John got talking to a local guy there. This guy trained rats for detecting landmines. Guess what? Those rats were now being bred in Tanzania and sent to Cambodia. It was the same program. Amazing!
Of course, we had to learn more about this so the five of us, Beth, Carlos, Ellen and us, hired a couple of tuk tuks to take us to Apopo, the base for the rat de-mining activities. It's a popular destination and we had to book in advance. Once there, we learnt that the rats are a special breed that has a super-sensitive sense of smell. Landmines are triggered off by people or animals standing on them but the rats are too light to trigger them.
Rats can clear an area far faster than a metal detector can as metal detectors find every bit of metal, whether they're landmines or not. Rats are trained to smell the explosive in the objects, so they can detect all sorts of Unexploded Ordinance. When they smell it, they are taught to scratch the ground. They get rewarded with food.
A rope is strung between two handlers and the rat moves between them on a harness. When the rat reached the edge of the area, the handlers move half a metre further on and the rat goes back to the other side, smelling as it goes.
Out of all the charity work being done in Cambodia - and there is soooo much of it! - this was the one that seemed to have no downside to me. It was a feel-good place. The difference these rats have made to people's lives is amazing. Villagers that have been unable to work in their fields can now work them again.
The next day was John's birthday and we spent it just organising things. We went for a walk in the morning. This tuk tuk driver was fast asleep in his vehicle!
One of the main bridges over the river is decorated with these cool lampshades.
Ellen had left the day before so only Beth and Carlos joined us for a celebratory birthday dinner. John was originally going to choose a flash restaurant but we had fallen in love with the food and the great people at Elia's, a Greek resaurant just a few doors from our hotel. It was a very multicultural affair - the owner was Turkish (!), his partner was Finnish and they employed English and Cambodian staff. We felt like they were our friends and we had a ball here.
Celebrating with ouzo.
They always gave us free chocolate desserts here but this time we requested a different pudding (which was amazing!) to hold the candles.
From left to right - the main Cambodian waitress, Anu the owner's Finnish partner and the English waitress whose name we can't remember! Having said that, we'll never forget this place!
It was time to move on - this time to Battambang, an old colonial town about 3 or 4 hours from Siem Reap (depending on road conditions). We had booked our bus and rolled up at the allotted time to catch it. Most of the passengers were tourists. Before we got on the bus, a worker went on ahead of us and sprayed what looked like insect spray along each row of seats. We thought that was a bit odd but, a few minutes later, we all boarded the bus. To our horror, the bus was FULL of mosquitoes! There were hundreds and hundreds of them! This is a country that has both malaria and Dengue fever, both spread by mosquitoes. Everyone immediately pulled out insect repellent or put on more clothes and the entire trip was punctuated by the unmistakeable slap of mosquito-squishing!
We spent two days at Battambang and rode both mornings with a local guide that we met at the bike hire place. Sa was fantastic! She spoke great English, was very knowledgable and was a lovely person to boot. Over the two rides, we saw many really interesting things.
We tasted bamboo sticky rice - sweet rice cooked in a stick of bamboo. It's the Cambodian version of take-away and it was great!
Again, the strange mix of the beautiful and the horrific that we've come to expect in Cambodia reared it's head. This was a beautiful new temple.
The old temple it replaced sat nearby. I thought it was really beautiful until I learned its story. During the Khmer Rouge times, women and children were rounded up and held in this temple. Some were tortured and most were killed in the field behind the temple. People no longer wanted to use the temple after this as it held such sad memories, so the new temple was built nearby.
Remnants of what I assume was an even older temple were very atmospheric.
A shrine dedicated to the victims stood nearby. Sickening carvings depicting some of the horrific treatments of the prisoners lined the outside.
Inside the shrine are bones found in the killing field. Nobody knows who the victims were. There were many killing fields all over Cambodia.
Moving onto a lighter topic, we checked out a place where they make fish paste and fish sauce. What a putrid smell that was!
We were taken to a house where a woman makes "banana dry". She slices bananas very thinly and dries them on bamboo trays. They are often then lightly cooked and these can last for a month. We often see them for sale on the sides of roads.
We tried home-made rice wine. The large bottles of it often hold dead cobras!
A huge Buddha.
Underneath the huge Buddha were heaps of smaller ones, all decked out in the yellow/orange of monks.
We were going to ride by ourselves the next day but we were so pleased with Sa, that we took another tour. This time a Scottish guy joined us. This was more of a rural ride. There were several swinging bridges to cross. Cool!
We were shown all around a farm. The plants were all watered by hand using two large watering cans slung from a wooden yoke, Chinese-style. It was all very labour intensive.
This toothless old lady could still squat and work far better than I ever could! She has probably spent a large part of her life on her haunches doing manual work.
She and another lady were pulling tiny weeds from this herb bed. The younger lady wisely had a stool, although it was still tiny.
Floating fish farms were strung along the river. These were run by Chams, a muslim ethnic minority group. Apparently they mix well with the Khmers.
We visited a "green orange" farm. The local oranges look green when they're ripe but they're a bit sour. These ants were everywhere. The Khmers eat them!
The only way to where we wanted to go next was back via Siem Reap so we caught another bus back - without mosquitoes this time - and returned to our favourite hotel and ate Greek food again!
The next part of our journey was through an area with little public transport. USB helped us work out what to do and we finally arranged for Ert, one of the drivers from the bike tour, to take us. It was an expensive lashout to have a van and a driver just for us but we could see no other way of getting to these places. Early the next morning Ert turned up and we were on our way.
After a couple of hours driving, we arrived at Koh Ker, an unusual Khmer temple. It looked more Mayan than Khmer. There were hardly any people here so we were free to soak up the atmosphere.
The main staircase had fallen down but we were able to climb a somewhat rickety wooden one to the top.
We had a fabulous local lunch at a place that had about 20 big pots full of food. You just picked what you wanted by lifting up the lids and looking inside. I chose chicken curry and it got served up with two tiny pieces of bony chicken, a sensational sweet potato, a kidney and a blood pudding type of thing! It's a good thing the curry sauce was sensational!
We had a long drive and eventually made it right to the Thai border where there is an amazing temple, called Prasat Preah Vihear, on a cliff. The road is too steep for most vehicles so we had to pay to have someone take us up on either a motorbike or a 4WD. We opted for the 4WD and I'm glad we did. The road was so steep!
We rode in the back (the front was too hot) and got bounced around like sacks of potatoes.
This temple and the area around it has been in dispute by the Thais and Cambodians. The Cambodians have it at the moment but there have been sporadic fights over it. The most recent skirmish was only a few years ago and we passed many bunkers on the way up. You can see the Thai border buildings in the distance.
The temple consists of a series of buildings connected by long, paved walkways and many stairs. The buildings were striking.
They were in various stages of decay and some walls were clearly falling down. Work was being done though to open up the old drains that kept water away from the foundations.
There were quite a few monks here.
These young ones were just hanging with friends - and phones!
The last temple was located right on top of the highest part of the mountain. The views were spectacular, but smoky.
No matter how old a temple is, it still obviously holds religious significance for many people.
About 10 hours after we left, we pulled into our destination, a small town called Preah Vihear City. We said goodbye to Ert and he drove another few hours back to Siem Reap!
Our hotel room here was incredibly cheap - about $25AUD for a modern, clean room, however this is the view from the 'mountain view room' that we booked!
Our hotel room here was incredibly cheap - about $25AUD for a modern, clean room, however this is the view from the 'mountain view room' that we booked!
The hotel owner turned up and he spoke English so we asked him where to get a shared taxi to Stung Treng, our final destination in Cambodia, the next morning. Shared taxis are minivans that operate much like buses. He made a phone call and told us the van would pick us up between 8.30am and 9am the following morning. We knew it would take about two hours to get to Stung Treng so we calculated we would be arrive between 10.30 and 11am.
We waited outside the hotel a bit before 8.30 the next morning. We waited a bit more, then a bit more. The owner turned up at 9.10 and we were still there. He made another call and the van turned up at 9.20. There was nobody else in the van so we were prepared for a few pickup stops. Sure enough, we drove up a narrow dirt track and picked up a lovely lady from her house. The whole time, the driver was making phone calls. I could see over his shoulder and he kept calling A. THOM. We then drove back past our hotel and up another back road. The driver asked some locals where to find his passenger. We pulled up outside another house and tooted but nobody came out. The driver went into the yard and called out but nobody was there.
He then drove to the central shared taxi station, which is clearly where we should have gone to start with. We waited there a while, but nobody got on. More calls were made to A. THOM plus others. We drove around a bit the returned to the central station. There were discussions but nobody got on. We drove around the town a bit more and finally someone joined us. Maybe this was A. THOM? In the meantime I heard cheeping and realised there was a bag with baby chickens in it in the back.
We then returned to the central station - again.
We picked up some boxes of goods and hung around a bit more. We drove around again and this time picked up a man and woman. One of the seats in the back was broken and the man had to sit on the upright part that wouldn't sit upright. We then returned to the central station for the fourth time! We had just about had enough. Finally, at the very last minute, the driver got out of the vehicle and a different driver and his wife got in! At last, we were going!
Almost......
First we had to get fuel. We pulled into the petrol station and John and I took the opportunity to use their toilet, as we had been in the van for ages. We drove off. At last we were going!
Almost.....
One minute down the road we pulled into another petrol station. It became clear that they couldn't open the little door on the petrol tank. With three people trying to sort it out, they finally got it open. At last, we were going!
Almost.....
Five minutes down the road we pulled up at a roadside shop. The driver yelled something to the lady in the shop. After a short while, she brought out the order. It was passed to me and I passed it to a lady in the back. She passed me some money and I passed it to the driver. He gave it to the shop owner who wandered back to the shop to get change. The change was passed to the driver, then me then to the lady in the back.
At last, at 11.15am, nearly two hours after we got onto the bus, we really were going!
We arrived at Stung Treng, having picked up and dropped off a few people along the way, and were dropped at the office of the busline we wanted to catch in a few days. To our delight, the guy spoke great English and we had no trouble organising our next journey. They would even pick us up form our hotel - after all, it was owned by his uncle!
The accommodation here was out of town so we grabbed a tuk tuk. We were on our final leg.
Almost......
First, we had to fill up with fuel!
Our bags had a very dusty ride.
We had taken a bit of a punt on this accommodation. It had only been open for a month or two and had lots still to be done on it but it was incredibly cheap and got a few good reviews. We were shown to our room and couldn't believe the view from our balcony. We were right on the Mekong River!
This place turned out to be amazing. The cabins were comfy and the onsite restaurant was fantastic! We ate every meal here for three days. We could chill in hammocks if we wanted to (we didn't have time!) or hang out in the restaurant over the water. They had super friendly dogs and a cat. We met two lovely couples who were staying there on our first night, but after that we had the entire resort - and all its staff - to ourselves!
We were here to ride though so we got a lift back into town and picked up some great hire bikes. We raced the 9kms back to the resort, trying to make it before dark. The sun was getting low as we cycled the last part.
We made it to our restaurant over the water just in time to watch an amazing sunset over the Mekong.
We spent the next few days cycling each morning then catching up on things in the afternoons - and writing this mammoth blog post!
The cycling was wonderful - we rode through villages and past farms. Kids waved madly and called out "Helloo". We received some beautiful smiles.
We rode to the confluence of the Sekong and Mekong Rivers, just near Stung Treng.
All over Cambodia we have seen these signs. The Cambodia People's Party is very much the governing party.
Many minor roads have huge archways like this to mark them.
It was fun riding over rickety bridges!
On one of our rides, people were laying drainage pipes under the roads. Most of the village was watching the action!
We saw more amazing sunsets.
This was such a wonderful way to finish our Cambodian travels. This is such a unique and interesting country. Next stop - Laos!
Til next time.
Heather and John
No comments:
Post a Comment