We couldn’t leave Kratie quick enough. The town had nothing much to offer except for sightings of the fresh water Irrawaddy dolphins that swim in the Mekong River. We walked around the town and found it to be dirty and offering little for tourists. It therefore wasn’t difficult to get up early, pack our rucksacks and be ready to jump in the taxi that was organised by Chhonn (from ActionAid) for 11am. It turns out that it was much better than some of the taxi journeys that he had taken before. Chhonn explained that he usually travels “Cambodian style” in taxis. This means that 2 sit next to each other on the driver’s seat, 2 on the front passenger seat, up to 6 in the back and 3 sitting in the open boot........13 in total. We have no idea how the car could move but apparently it does!!! We were clearly relieved, as we think Chhonn was, that we only had four including the driver.

As soon as we set off, we stopped again as Chhonn wanted to buy a local Kratie delicacy called Krolan. This snack comprises of sticky rice wrapped in bamboo with coconut plugged in the bottom and top of the bamboo tube. The tubes, which also seemed to have some other raisin type things in them, are then steamed. Both Mark and Chhonn proceeded to munch away during the journey which took 4 hours.

On the way, we stopped off in a small town called Skuon. The town is infamous for the local residents penchant for eating Tarantula spiders, which are fried with oil and garlic (with their fur still on!!). As we pulled up in the taxi there were numerous street vendors waving cockroaches, fruit, bracelets and, of course, the infamous fried tarantulas at us through the window. Chhonn jumped out the car and bought Mark two of the furry spiders. These sat in the back of the taxi with Lisa keeping her beady eye on them; we’re not sure what she expected them to do as they were well and truly dead.

We hadn’t booked accommodation at Phnom Penh so Chhonn telephoned his friend who owns a guest house (Fancy Guest House). When we arrived Lisa jumped out and took a look at the room; on the top floor with a balcony – US$25 well spent. We booked for 1 night, as the following day we had decided to move on to Cambodia’s main beach resort “Sihanoukville”. It was sad to say goodbye to Chhonn as he was such a nice guy but we know we will keep in touch and are sure that we will meet again.

As we sat in the reception while the paper work was being sorted out, we noticed a sign on the wall suggesting a visit to a local orphanage. Without further ado, we were in a tuk-tuk with the guest house owner and his wife on our way to the local wholesale market to purchase some gifts for the children of the Lighthouse orphanage (definitely worth a visit). We had to be quick as the local wholesale market was due to close. At the market (and as suggested by the guest house owner), we purchased 120 toothbrushes, many tubes of toothpaste, 24 combs, an industrial sized box of washing detergent, litres of shampoo, gallons of cooking oil, boxes of colouring pencils, 150 pens and loads of notepads amongst other things all of which were put into a few large boxes. To be honest, it was all a bit of a blur as we watched the wife of the guest house owner negotiating hard with the vendors and then tearing around the huge undercover market at breakneck speed. She was so quick that we lost her and the husband had to track her down with the mobile phone as the place is so large. It was like a maze. We returned to the guest house, stored the gifts and went out for dinner at a restaurant called Frizz, in street 240 again (we stayed in the street last time)!! It is said to have the best fish amok (for which Cambodia is famous....so we learnt) in town. After dinner, we returned to the Fancy guest house for sleep before our visit to the orphanage early the next morning.

We had a taxi booked for us at 8am to take us to the orphanage with the gifts. During the journey there, Lisa got out the taxi to barter with a local for some French sticks to take with us for the children to eat. 24 French sticks were added to the provisions and we were off again. The car was as laden down as Chhonn’s Cambodian style taxis!!!

We pulled into the grounds of the orphanage to find a number of young children playing. They were excited to see us and helped us lift the gifts out of the car boot. A group of boys grabbed Mark’s hands with the girls doing the same with Lisa. Their friends tagged along with us whilst walking around the grounds all wanting to talk with us and hold our hands. All the children were very friendly, clean and spoke really good English. They have a small school on site where they are taught the local language of Khmer, English and also Japanese. It puts us to shame. After looking at the small classroom they took us to their sleeping area. Each bedroom is shared by 20 or so children with six on each bunk bed (three top/ three bottom). All their clothes were carefully hung up or folded; the children really take pride in their orphanage. While we were there, Mark played football with the kids and Lisa sat inside the girls’ bedroom colouring and reading English. One of the girls told Lisa she does her own washing and that they don’t get many visitors at the orphanage. She was only 8 years old. Lisa found this very upsetting and tried to hold back her tears. The staff appeared to be doing a great job with the main coordinator, a local Cambodian woman of 65, saying that she devotes her life to the orphanage and will probably die with the children. Her selfless pursuit of helping others couldn’t help but draw our admiration.

Before we left, we made a couple of purchases - a necklace for Mark and a wrist bracelet for Lisa both of which were handmade by the children - and made a further donation. After spending the morning there we had to move on. We were very sad in the taxi on the way back and sat there in silence with tears in our eyes. We would like to have stayed at the orphanage longer but hadn’t had anything to eat and needed to grab something before the bus journey to Sihanoukville (the beach resort that was our next stop). A stop at a nice bakery on street 240 and the chocolate shop on the same road for some handmade treats worked a treat.

We returned to the guest house ready for the bus transfer. Despite already having some food, Mark decided it was time to eat the Tarantulas that had been sitting on the TV since the prior day. After some crunching he was finished and was instructed by Mrs H to brush his teeth and rinse his mouth out......clearly not impressed by Mark’s choice of snack. Apparently, the tarantulas were quite tasty, if a little crunchy. Back down to the reception and we were soon off in a tuk-tuk to the bus terminal.