Well, I woke up this morning to find myself one year older. Yup, this will be the last one in my 50's, next January second I change decades. Sixty used to sound so old. My grandparents were 60. I don't feel or look like my grandparents did back then.............. or do I? Whatever, there's not much I can do about it now but deal with it. Chronologically I'm getting up there, but my mind believes otherwise. Enh! I'll just grin and bear it.

The day started out with my beautiful wife giving me not one, but two great cards. The first she carried here from Canada and the other she bought in Chiang Mai. Then we had a very nice banana pancake breakfast in the hotel restaurant before we headed out the door to explore more temples in the Angkor comlex. Well, actually only one temple, but it was a bit out of the way.

We rented bikes and set out for Banteay Srei at about 8:00 AM. This temple is around 39 kilometers north of Siem Reap, fortunately most of them perfectly flat. Our bikes were in decent shape, but both had seen better days. Nonetheless, the brakes worked well and the gears shifted smoothly, so what more could we ask for? Around 7 kilometers into the ride, I rode through a small patch of broken glass on the road with no apparent ill effects. But 3 kms later, I felt the rear tire getting spongy. I'd noticed a small motorcycle repair shop about 500 meters back down the road, so we turned around and had a very nice young man put a patch on the tire, pump it up and send us on our way. Cost of repairs: $1.00. After another 3 kms or so we passed through a small but bustling village and, 1 km later, the rear tire went completely flat. Turn around again, jog the bike back to the village and go to another motorcycle shop. This time an older mechanic pulled out the inner tube and showed me the patch had blown off the tire and torn a larger hole in the tube. Of course, his English was about as good as my Khmer, so we communicated with our hands. He managed to patch the hole and double checked the patch to ensure it would hold. Brenda was a little wary about continuing since we still had another 60 or so kms to cover before we returned to Siem Reap. I was undaunted, placing all my faith in the master mechanic's expertise. And besides that, it's my birthday and things will just work out.

And work out they did. We finally got to the temple just before 11:00 and did a tour of the grounds. Banteay Srei was built in around 860 and is very small compared to Angkor Wat and the other temples closer to Siem Reap.What it lacks in size however, is more than made up for in its ornate carvings. Surprisingly, despite the age of the structure that is constructed entirely of sandstone, the detail and sharpness of the carvings are unparalled. I inspected the carvings closely but again found no evidence of extra terrestrial involvement in the construction of the temples. I did, however notice some sections of the carvings had been chiseled out. Could this be some sort of cover up? I'm sure we'll never know.

As we headed back towards Siem Reap, we stopped at the Cambodian Land Mine Museum for a tour. It was created by a man whose parents were killed by the Khmer Rouge in the 70's when he was 5 years old. The Khmer Rouge enlisted him and turned him into a child soldier by the time he was 10. He was personally responsible for planting thousands of mines before he defected to the Vietnamese army many years later. After the war, he became aware of the dangers all these mines and unexploded ordinance posed to his fellow countrymen and he began a crusade to remove and disable as many and as much as he could. He estimates having disarmed at least 50,000 mines and UXO's since he began. The museum also provides schooling and shelter for child victims of mines. Talk about turning your life around. http://www.cambodialandminemuseum.org/

After the museum, we rode the remaining 27 kms back to our hotel, passing through Cambodian villages, seeing water buffalo grazing and wallowing in mud and passing dozens of villagers producing and selling palm sugar from roadside stands.

We arrived at our hotel at about 2:30 and showered and then Brenda dragged me out the door to an unknown destination. After a 10 minute walk, we arrived at the Blossom Cafe where we had 2 marvelous little cupcakes each and bought 4 more to eat later. What!?! They were small!

Next we went for an hour long foot massage at Pura Vida spa that literally had me falling asleep, until the masseuse started working the pressure points, that is.

Dinner was at Dakshin's Indian restaurant. We started with vegetable samosas, Brenda had a masala dosa and I had potato masala and dahl, we had rice and two naans and a couple of beers to wash it all down, The favours were exquisite and we pretty much rolled out the door. Sure it was a lot of food, but we biked almost 80 kms today! Oh yeah, we still have 2 more cupcakes to eat. And we did as soon as we got back to the hotel.

This was one of the best birthdays ever, filled with so many of my favorite things, but most of all, the love I felt from my fabulous wife.

Thanks a million, Babe, for a great day.