Tuesday
We got our coach from Phnom Penh and arrived in Siem Reap about 2 in the afternoon. Our free tuck-tuk was waiting for us to take us to the hostel. We relaxed in the room that afternoon as we were feeling a bit sickly and ate a very late dinner at a very cheap hotel restaurant a few doors down from our hostel, that would see plenty of business from us over the 2 weeks.
Wednesday
This was very much a get our bearings day. We had our cheap $2 breakfast at our hostel, then headed out to have a look around the town. We enjoyed a beer down Pub Street to get ourselves out the sun for a little while. Afterwards we found a Khmer restaurant down an alleyway where we sat and had some local cuisine for lunch. We had a browse around the central market as we were after a couple of Christmas hats to go with our Christmas dinner that we had managed to book for the 25th. We didn't succeed in our hunt though and headed back to the hostel empty handed. For dinner, we went to a fairly upmarket restaurant, in our shorts and flip flops, called The Grey. I had a Crocodile Burger and Charlotte had Pork Chops. While we were eating, the chef approached us and wanted some feedback on her cooking. To us, everything was fine and we didn't want to criticise when criticism wasn't necessary.
Thursday
Stupidly, we decided to skip our cheap breakfast and headed out to Pub Street and got a fry up instead. It was tasty but we thought we may aswell eat for less at breakfast, in the hostel. We had a better look around town today and Charlotte managed to barter our way to two pretty snazzy Christmas hats to £3. We spent the afternoon relaxing by the pool and keeping cool. Our hostel had its own cinema room which showed 3 films a day. The film at 9 o'clock today was The Killing Fields, which we wanted to watch, having been to them in Phnom Penh, we thought it would provide some more background information on them. We were the only 2 who watched the whole film, a few others seemed to give up and walk out.
Christmas Day
It was very strange waking up on Christmas morning to something completely different to the norm. No pressies, stockings or, more importantly family. On the other hand, we had our Christmas lunch booked at the number one restaurant in town so we were pretty excited (mainly just at the prospect of having a roast potato for the first time in 6 months). We stayed in most of the morning and had breakfast, all the time wearing our newly purchased Christmas hats. At about half 11 we headed out towards Genevieves. We arrived fairly early and were the first ones to start eating. The starter was Tempura Prawns and fried pepper squid. Main was roast turkey, roast potatoes (woooohoooo!!!), pumpkin, carrots, peas, stuffing and gravy. It was delicious! Charlotte and I were pretty much the only two who ate everything on the plate and we probably could have managed seconds. Pudding was of course, Christmas pudding with homemade custard, which also went down pretty well. Add this to a large amount of beer and we were two happy travellers. The rest of the afternoon and evening was spent Skyping family as they opened our presents we had sent them from Japan.
Boxing Day
This was our first visit to Angkor Wat and the larger Angkor archeological site. We opted to do the small circuit which encompassed Angkor Wat at sunrise, Angkor Thom, Ta Phrohm and Banteay Kdei aswell some minor temples. We had to set our alarms for 4am in order to be up, ready and in position for the sunrise. We got a tuk-tuk to the site and purchased ourselves a 3 days ticket, which would allow us to visit 3 times within 1 week. We made our way across the bumpy pathway to the reflecting pool where we could watch the sunrise behind Angkor Wat. This seemed to be the big draw of Angkor Wat but to us, the temple was much more impressive in full daylight. After that we visited the other sites and temples around the archeological park. All in all it took us 8 hours and by the time we got back to the hostel we were pretty worn out and treated ourselves to an afternoon snooze. We woke up and had a late lunch downstairs, both enjoying the cheeseburger, although, for a hostel it was rather expensive. That evening we Skyped the Hosie family once more as it was my Dad's birthday and I had to explain why I had bought him a tin of Hot and Spicy Spam as a present.
Sunday
We had booked ourselves in to an Australian hairdresser for the morning. It was our first haircut in 6 months and we were desperate to lighten the loads now it was getting hotter and hotter. The difference when we walked out was huge, more for me than Charlotte. It still didn't stop the constant sweating though. To celebrate we enjoyed a couple of beers down Pub Street, it helped they were only 50 cents each. The rest of the afternoon was spent relaxing and today's it was the Norris' turn for a Skype as it was Charlotte's Dad's birthday. Paul had already tucked into his present of beer and mini cheddars.
We utilised the second day of our Angkor pass today. Although the tuk-tuk driver struggled to understand that we only wanted to go to Angkor Wat and didn't want to do the small circuit again. We'd had no time to look around the temple during our first visit and so used this opportunity to spend 3 hours exploring the site. Angkor Wat is repeatedly voted the top site worldwide and has people gushing about it on tripadvisor. Charlotte and I really enjoyed it but wouldn't say it was any better than other places we had seen, the Great Wall of China for example and even the Coliseum of Rome. Still, I don't want to take away from how impressive and iconic it is. The Cambodians are so proud of it, it's even on their national flag. It was great, just not the be all and end all. We hopped on our tuk-tuk after our exploration and headed back to the hostel and had a beer. We even ate at the hostel that evening to spare the stress of finding somewhere outside. I had the Monday special, which was breaded squid. Charlotte had wanted the same but they only had one portion left. As it had the potential to be spicy, I won the rights to the squid and Charlotte opted for Chicken Rice with mixed veg.
Tuesday
This was one of those nothing days that you always seem to get between Christmas and New Year. The highlights of which were Charlotte purifying some tap water, me pinning my pin badges to my piece of card and a large bar of Cadbury's Dream chocolate being purchased and consumed. It was purchased with funds provided as a Christmas present from Charlotte's Mum and Dad.
Wednesday
The morning flew by despite us doing nothing of interest. Early afternoon, we walked to a souvenir shop, located quite a distance out of town. From research, it seemed to be the only one that sold locally made products, whereas ones in the centre of town all seemed to be made in China. We were after something very specific, which we intended for use when we move out when we get home (optimistic, I know). It turned out they had plenty of place mats and coasters to choose from. We picked out a set we liked and were then given a basket so we could buy more things from them. We politely declined as we had somewhere we needed to be. Our date was with Khmer International Boxing at the specially erected Angkor Arena. It was a short walk there, we just had to follow the streams of tuk-tuks heading in that direction. Coincidentally, we bumped into the driver from our hostel who had picked us up from the coach station and had a habit of shouting my name whenever he saw me. He had taken a couple there after they had done the small circuit. We sat with them and had a great time doing something completely different and quite unique. The locals loved it and it was funny to see them all placing bets up in th stands. The fights were all Cambodia v Thailand and overall it ended in a fair 2 fights each. Although some of the decisions seemed a bit suspect to us. We turned down the offer of a tuk-tuk home and opted to walk instead as it was early evening. The sun as still up but it had cooled significantly from what was a rather hot afternoon.
Thursday
New Years Eve, not our most favourite day of the year. We relaxed for most of the day and headed out into town for dinner at an Italian restaurant we had been to before and enjoyed. The atmosphere of the crowds was good but Cambodians taste in music is absolutely shocking, with not much variance from a single, constant beat. A few lyrics wouldn't go a miss. We stayed out late and took in the midnight fireworks by the river. They were a slight disappointment but we didn't expect much from a country that doesn't celebrate New Year. We wandered home afterward and sent out a few Skype messages wishing our families back home a happy new year, feeling slightly strange that we were already a year ahead of them.
New Years Day
Our final day of the Angkor Pass, so we needed to use it to avoid losing out. Our hostel offered free bike rental, so after breakfast we headed down and signed out a couple for our final trip to Angkor Wat. The bikes were slightly old and in need of a bit of tlc, for 2 people who are used to road bikes, they were slightly cumbersome and slow too. Still, after strapping our water to the rack on the back, we headed off, trying to get used to cycling on the other side of the road. Somehow along the way, despite being a straight road out of town, we managed to get ourselves lost. We ended up cycling along dirt roads through a small dusty suburb of Siem Reap, past wooden and iron huts. We got to a crossroads and hummed and harred over which way to turn. After a while of seeing us struggle a young girl skipped over to lend us a hand and sent us on our way in the right direction. The pride in me would like to say we got lost deliberately in order to see a different side to the town but unfortunately, that isn't true. We are certainly glad we did get lost though. Eventually, we found our way and made it, despite Charlotte's best efforts to skip ticket inspection, to Angkor Wat. We locked our bikes up and entered. On our previous visit, we were unable to enter to central part of the temple due to what we were wearing. This time though we had come prepared. We queued up and then clambered up the steep steps to the top. The views of the site were great but it didn't really add a great deal to our last visit. It was still a worthwhile visit combined with an enjoyable cycle ride. After a couple of hours we saddled up and followed the precession of heavy traffic back into the city. This is when I started having problems. My chain just wouldn't stay on and it was clear to see why. It was dry as a bone, filthy and rusted and also not my responsibility to try and fix it. After a while of it constantly happening, I gave up and decided to walk the rest of the way, which fortunately, wasn't that far. I did report the problem when we got back to the hostel and it almost seemed as if the receptionist already knew about it. We sat in the bar for a few hours in an attempt to make the most of the all day happy hour. The barman clearly hadn't got the memo and overcharged us for our beers on more than one occasion. We had some Beef Lok Lak each, which is a Cambodian speciality. I got the second round of beers and questioned the price but he still had no idea about the happy hour. He asked the owner who confirmed our suspicions but clearly communication had broken down somewhere along the line. We ate at the cheap hotel again and afterwards we headed back to the hostel with some more Cadbury's chocolate in hand. We had seen Jurassic World was on so decided to spend the evening watching that in the cinema. Compared to the Killing Fields attendance, there was quite a few people in this time, although one clearly got bored as he fell asleep and talking in his sleep.
Saturday
This was yet another day of relaxation. That night we went back to The Grey for a Cambodian BBQ. We opted for the 7 kinds of meat rather than the slightly decadent 13. They were Chicken, Beef, Pork, Squid, Crocodile, Fish (not sure what kind) and Swordfish. They were all cooked on a hot plate infront of us along with some vegetables and noodle soup. It was a different experience and we really enjoyed it, slightly on the expensive side but we thought we would treat ourselves.
Sunday
Our final day of Siem Reap, our final day of relaxation. We did a lot of looking in to jobs in New Zealand as it was something we had put off in the past. We were still slightly early to find anything for our arrival date yet though. We had one final dinner stop at our cheap hotel just along the road. I had grown very fond of their Khmer red chicken curry.
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