Good Morning All!

We have received a number of messages asking why our blog has not been updated. The easy answer is that we have been so busy travelling around and visiting places that we have not had sufficient time to sit down together and tell you all about it!

We began our trip with a night in Bangkok where we met up with our fellow Intrepid group members and sat on the floor of a restaurant for our first $1 meal.

We then woke up early and embarked on a mammoth 12 hour journey to our first destination, Siem Reap. After four hours in an amazing Thai mini van we arrived at the Thai-Cambodian border where we waited for 2 hours just to get our visa's stamped. Our next bus was not quite so luxurious. The seats were extremely small and hard with very little padding and to top it off we drove on potentially the worst road in the world. We were informed of this before we left, however, we did not anticipate it being so bad! (You can check out a short clip in the video section to experience the thrill for yourself).

After passing hundreds of rice paddies and wooden huts, the bus eventually arrived in the bright lights and busy city of Siem Reap - a huge contrast to the poverty that we saw for the 5 hours previous to it.

We woke early on the third day and set off for the temples of Angkor Wat. In total we visited 5 temples (Angkor Wat, Bayon, Ta Prohm, Banteay Srei and Ta Keo), each of them stunning yet all different. The architecture was just amazing and the setting even better as it felt like we were in a scene from The Jungle Book. We finished by watching the sunset over the jungle on top of one of the tallest temples, Ta Keo. The day was complete with a night out in Siem Reap, drinking jugs of beer and whiskey buckets at $3 each!!

The following morning was free, so we visited the Artistic Centre where we learnt about how they created the etchings found in the temples and made the Buddha statues. In the afternoon we took a boat and explored the mangrove forests in the North of Tonle Sap. We visited a floating village where we saw Siamese Crocodiles and river Snakes, however, the highlight would probably be seeing little children floating around in buckets trying to sell you food!!! On the way back we chilled out in a Hammock bar and watched the sunset over the paddy fields whilst eating barbequed snake and boiled snake eggs. We finished the evening in a local restaurant where we tried various beef dishes served with a foul smelling fish paste. We left early and went to another restaurant where we ate something a little more appetising, which was then followed by an hours bargaining in the night market.

A six hour local bus journey took us to the sleepy town of Kompong Cham where we enjoyed a six course meal with locals in their house. We again extended our food range by eating fried Crickets!! Another amazing day finished with a beautiful 4 hour bike ride across a bamboo bridge to an island where we visited and taught English in a school run by monks. The bike trip took us through dense jungle where we were greeted every 5 seconds by children running out of their houses to just say hello.

More driving the next day took us into Phnom Penh and out again and to Chombok where we visited an amazing waterfall hidden in the jungle. After an hours hiking, we all had a well earned swim in a small rock pool. In the evening we were blessed by a monk and were each given a small red bracelet to protect us for the rest of our trip. This was followed by some food again with locals where the chicken was killed especially for us! We spent the evening dancing around a fire, looking at stars, and learning traditional dances. Alex had a dance-off with a local where some smooth breakdancing moves (The Worm) earned him a deserved second place! The night was spent sleeping in a homestay with a local family. We chatted to the owner via our tour guide and learnt about daily tasks etc. The house itself was a wooden hut on stilts but was surprisingly comfortable.

After approximately four hours sleep thanks to endless cries from dogs, cows and roosters, we set off for the beach town of Sihanoukville, where we are currently writing this. The night was spent drinking Mekong Whiskey buckets (half a bottle of whiskey and a little bit of coke for $2.50) and chilling on the beach. Our day yesterday was spent island hopping and snorkelling in the extremely warm sea surrounding them. We also had barbequed Baracuda whilst relaxing on the beautiful white sandy beaches which we pretty much had to ourselves. We ended another brilliant day in style drinking on the beach.

That brings us up to today where we are now going to spend the afternoon riding the banana boat, sipping our ice cold beers and cocktails whilst looking out across the ocean.......