We jumped on a boat making a day trip around some of the small islands, including Koh Ta Kiev - where we were headed. The good thing was that they made a quick half an hour stop at a snorkelling sight for everyone to have a swim. Chris of course was straight in the water, and I did follow slowly, jumping off the side of the boat and swimming around for about 10 minutes, seeing the coral and many fishies!
As we arrived at Koh Ta Kiev we saw the most unusual thing...a cow sunbathing on the beach with a group of travellers! We walked along the beach, through some jungle, and to a bay at the end, where we would be staying (Coral bay).

We spent our first night in a hammock on the beach, and the next two nights in what is called a Monkey Bungalow, for the reason being we had to literally climb two ladders to get to our platform in the trees, overlooking the sea.
Ko Ta Kiev is a wonderful place for relaxing, clearing your mind, and generally chilling. But there is a hidden attraction, the absinth distillery. We spent a weird evening here, listening to an American guy sing, playing with kittens, and trying the different types of absinth (green, red, black, gold). The challenge is clambering down the ridiculous stairs (ladder!) at the end of the night, without falling - apparently know one has fallen yet, but when you see the picture you might find that hard to believe.

A man made raft, which apparently took staff 10 days to build, was the best sunbathing spot in the bay. You pulled yourself out to sea, using some rope, and floated until you couldn't bear the heat, so then jumped into the clear blue water to cool off. It was also a good opportunity to try some more snorkelling, although the visibility wasn't great so I didn't last long. Chris however went on a mission to find some sea horses, he didn't, but he did have a little yellow and black stripy fish swim just in front of his mask the whole way back to the raft - about 200m. This little yellow fish then decided to pester us on the raft, biting at our feet!

A short walk through the jungle and across to the other side of the island, takes you to Naked beach. The name says it all, it is simply a long stretch of beach, nothing else. It was so quiet and deserted, and made for a lovely afternoon.
We met a girl from Denmark who had just completed a Yoga teaching course in Bali, and I convinced her to do a sunset yoga class, which was a perfect way to end a day.

Another evening we went on a mission to find a kayak, as we had been told it was a must do to paddle out to sea at night time to see the plankton. We managed to find one, but to my horror, as we both sat in it it sank! As you can imagine I was not pleased! I was showered, wearing clean clothes, which were now wet and sandy, and we were about to go out to sea in the pitch black! So, attempt number two, a blow up dingy...which was not so blown up, and again sank! After some air from a local Khmer guy, attempt number three took us paddling out to sea, and wow the results were worth it. Millions of glowing plankton - it was incredible.

The other highlight staying at Coral Bay was the freshly prepared French food every lunch and evening. We ate very well, and it made a nice change from eating rice and noodles!

After three nights on KTK, we got the boat back to Sihanoukville, only to then get another boat out to Ko Rong Samloem.....