Hey Everyone,

Since our last blog we have been busy!! Well, not really!! We travelled to Sihanoukville which is 3 hours West along Cambodia's South coast back towards Thailand. We were taken to a guesthouse called Markara on the recommendation of an Italian man we were sat next to who had stayed there previously and was staying there again. We checked out the room, which had two big double beds and a spacious bathroom but at $11 a night it was a little pricey. Kie managed to get the room down to $10, which is the average for the guesthouses along the beach and we decided to stay. After a few hours of chilling out, we had some food and headed into town to explore. Much like Vang Vieng in Laos, Sihanoukville is aimed at tourists and has lots of bars and restaurants. After arranging for a tuk tuk to pick us up and drop us off at Otres beach in the morning, we called it a night. Otres Beach is described as a seemingly infinite strip of almost empty white sand. It is the quietest beach thanks to its lack of development and should provide a nice place for us to top up our tans.

Bright and early in the morning, our tuk tuk driver Sam was waiting outside the front of the guesthouse for us but instead of being on his tuk tuk he sat upon a moped and told us to get on, as it was easier to get to the beach using this method, Sophie was not comfortable with this so instead we asked to go via the tuk tuk, luckily he agreed, warning us that we were in for a bumpy ride... he definitely wasn't lying the road up to the beach was an undeveloped trail of rocks and sand, not the place a tuk tuk should really be heading. However after being shaken up a little we reached the most amazing beach with the clearest water either of us had ever seen - we were absolutely gobsmacked. Not only was it amazing but the endless stretch of paradise was desolate; we were the only people there! We put this down to the fact it was only 9am. However, the beach at its busiest had no more than 50 people on it all day! It was so nice infact that we decided we would stump up the $8 tuk tuk charge again the next day to go back, instead of our original plan to head to the busier beach over the road from our guesthouse. That evening we enjoyed a BBQ back at the guesthouse and retired for an early night.

The second day we spent on the beach we took some extra money and instead of getting up earlier to eat at the guesthouse decided to have breakfast when we arrived at the beach. Whilst eating breakfast the usual "street" sellers pestered us and made us promise to buy things etc. Instead of parting with his money straight away Kie, hesitantly, decided to play pool against one of the young boys who said he was a pool champion, to coin the boys phrase "play pool for a deal" if Kie won he had to buy a bracelet from the boy for the normal asking price of 3 dollars if Kie won he would get the bracelet for free. Luckily Kie was on form and won 3 games out of 3 instead of getting his free bracelet though he picked up the boys whole collection of products and turned saying "thanks for a good game" the boy instantly panicked and started running after Kie who was by this time in hysterics! Once the boy realised Kie was joking he tried to play it all cool but didn't manage very well!!

After Kies victory we laid on the sun lounger and enjoyed a series of pamperings that had been sold to us over breakfast. Sophie first had an Aloe Vera massage to help the burns she had suffered from the day before, Kie then also had the same treatment while Sophie had her feet massaged and enjoyed a pedicure. 4 o'clock came and it was time to say goodbye to Otres beach. Sam was waiting for us where he had dropped us off and back to the guesthouse we headed; with the intention of booking tickets back to Bangkok and Thailand the next day. When we arrived however, we were told that the bus was full and we would have to wait another day before we could go. We booked our tickets and after some food at the local food market headed back to the room for Kie to watch his beloved Arsenal play and so that Sophie could go on the internet. On our extra day between the beach and travel we decided as our bodies were feeling the effects of the sun we would just relax around the guesthouse giving them a chance to recover.

So Monday came and it was time to wake up and get on the bus for a 10 hour journey back to Bangkok, the original coach from Sihanoukville to the border was quite empty although there was an elderly American gentleman who decided to tell his life story loud enough so that everyone, not only on the bus but, in the whole of Cambodia could hear!! Other than that it was quite a painless trip. Upon arrival at the Cambodian border we were greeted by the usual hoards of locals trying to sell us cheap fags etc. By the time we had got off the bus our bags had been piled up on a cart and were already heading to the Thai side of the border; we thought this was to do with the bus company but, once we had done all of the visa stuff, we went to collect our bags and literally had to buy them back off of the guys who had wheeled them through! Lesson learnt!! We then boarded our minibus and started our final leg of the journey to Bangkok. 5 minutes into the trip the driver received a phone call and we ended up having to turn around to swap some passengers over from another minibus and eventually we were on our way. We finally arrived in Bangkok at 20:30 a full 2 and a half hours after we were supposed to. We checked out the guesthouse from our last stay here and found it had increased by 30% to 650 baht a night for a room which didn't even have ensuite, this is expensive even by Bangkok prices so we ended up moving into the guesthouse nextdoor; half the price for an equivalent room of similar standards.

As it is our last time in Bangkok we are going to be doing all the sightseeing before heading down to the south for some more beach time over Christmas and New Year!!

We hope everyone's ok, we're missing you all and love you all lots

Love Sophie and Kie xx