Angkor and beyond

aha...it works

So now that I know it works, I will post some more shots. The last shot was obviously me being a suck about my elbow injury...which is healing slowly but nicely.

The shots I will upload are all Cambodia. Angkor Wat, the crazy British guy Lee that we have been travelling with for the last 3 weeks, some Phnom Pehn shots and the killing fields and the Sihanoukville in the south. Enjoy

An attempt to upload images in Cambodia

A boat trip to some islands off Cambodia

Well the day started off all right. Nice and sunny. French toast and pineapple for breakfast. Got picked up at 8:30am for our boat trip out to some islands to do some snorkelling. But oh how quickly things can change when you are in a country like Cambodia.

Got to the beach where the boat was supposed to be...you will notice I use the word "supposed"..that is because there was no boat. We waited 30 minutes in the hot sun only to be told that the engine on our boat was not working so they were getting another boat. There were about 20 of us waiting...so we were expecting a boat of substantial size. Again we were wrong. When the boat finally did arrive it was an oversized canoe with a hand blender for a motor.

We all climb aboard and begin the journey...there is no cover on the boat so we can feel our skin begin to sizzle. About 45 minutes off shore, the hand mixer coughs, sputters and then dies. Oh goody...how long do you think it would take us to drift to the shores of Southern Thailand...will our water last the trip?

Fifteen or so minutes later another hand mixer canoe comes up and we throw him a rope and he tows us to the first island where we throw anchor and snorkel. The mask and snorkels are Wal_Mart specials I am sure. My niece and nephew probably have better equipment. You can barely see anything at all. A couple of fish swim around the coral reef which is quite minimal seeing as they still do dynamite fishing here.

We bob around for a bit while we wait for another boat to come and tow us to the next location. The next island is marginally better and another man has jumped ashore and is taking the engine apart....perhaps we will have our own power soon. Nope...he was just for show. We ended up having 3 different boats tow us to 3 different islands where the swimming was ok, the snorkelling was pathetic and the sun was roasting.

We have learnt our lesson...we are not made for group travel.

A little bit of an accident

Well the past few days have been uncomfortable for both Deb and I...even though we are in a beautiful beachside bungalow in Sihanoukville, Cambodia. Deb ate or drank something that is haunting her for the past 24 hours and I am recovering from a small spill on a motorcycle. Nothing serious.

There are motorcycle taxi's here...and we were taking one with our backpacks to the bungalows where we are staying now. There is a steep road up a hill...and the road is pretty much mud, rocks and tree roots. My driver was approaching too quickly and started driving up the hill in too high a gear and stalled. Well little did I know that he didn't have brakes. So we started sliding backwards down the hill until we tumbled over. I flew off the back landing on my elbow, smacking my head on who knows what and scraping my back and inside of my knee. It could have been worse. Nothing was broken...I have some nasty scrapes and some bruises and my elbow swoll up nice and big. But it is moving ok...but the salt water sure stings it. I will post a picture so you can all feel sorry for me the next time we come to do internet.

So we have been lying pretty low. Just lounging on the chairs by the beach, eating, reading our books, etc. Cambodia is different than I expected. Not as rough or hard to travel as were were imagining. Lots of good restaurants, nice places to stay, etc.
But it is more expensive than we thought it would be...seems strange when Deb and I can't eat lunch for under $5 with a beer. It sounds funny to complain about a beer being $1.50. Ha...we will go into shock when we get back to Canada.