"When you come back, you buy from me….OK ?!"

Siem Reap (which has to be said in the drawl accent of the man we met on the bus in Laos) was a place we were really looking forward to for the obvious highlight of Angkor Wat. The bus we had taken from Laos took its time with the usual drawn out stops and changeovers (especially at the border with Cambodia where dollars were added on for everything including having your temperature taken) so by the time we were making out way towards Siem Reap it was late and dark.It was at this point I remembered reading that you should travel during the day in Cambodia due to the serious lack of street lights and condition of the roads - oops!However after flying over bumps (and trying not to look out of the window) we arrived to be met by a keen representative from Prince Mekong Villa where we would be staying, who took us back to the hotel for a welcome beer.

Cambodia, it seems, operates mainly in US dollars which makes it much harder to barter and get a cheap deal (they don't use cents and only occasionally when something is worth less than a dollar do you get change in thousands of riel) so many of the hotels we had looked at were more expensive than the £5 we'd been paying in Laos and Thailand.We had chosen the Prince Mekong (for about £8) because it was closer to the temples with free bikes, breakfast and best of all free laundry!

After a good night's sleep and a very garlicky omelette for breakfast we set about organising our upcoming sightseeing days.We took the advice to not cycle on our first day since we hadn't got up early and take a tuk tuk around the 'grand route' of temples instead.The ruins were interesting and all slightly from different however the highlights of this day was the children we met.We had been told that Cambodians were exceptionally friendly and we found this to be true as we cruised around the quiet tree lined lanes with hundreds of children waving as they cycled to school (mainly on bikes far to big for them).One group of girls happily sang as the wandered along hand-in-hand.We discovered that school is only half day here and for the other half a day they are mainly found selling at the entrance to the temples.It becomes difficult to say no when the children are so exceptionally cute - however as soon as you've bought one thing you are met with "You buy from her, you buy from me…" and"Lady you borrow from your Mr - you buy for your mother, your sister".So 2 drinks, 2 scarves (actually very necessary in the heat), 4 woven animals and 2 wooden flutes (I'm sure Mandy will be chuffed when we give these to Jacob and William) later we made it around more of the ruins and were getting hungry for lunch.This again becomes a begging game to drag you into their restaurant but again we settled on the one with the sweetest girls who were lovely and threw it fruit and cheap drinks (Lychee Fanta has become my favourite which I wish we got at home!).They spoke good English and chatted to us about school.Sam asked them to teach him basic words in Cambodian (I'm finding it hard to keep up since we keep changing countries) and they made him practise over and over until he'd go it.After a few more stops we returned for an early night so that we could be up early for sunrise and a day of cycling.

Liz