On Monday morning we boarded the bus from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh and I was pleasantly surprised that the bus was massive, had aircon, wifi and plug sockets to charge your phone. (Little did I know at the time this was not the norm for all buses in Cambodia and my future journeys would not be as good).
The journey was one of the best bus journeys we have had while travelling, we went through many villages.
It was really interesting to see the Cambodian countryside and a glimpse into rural life.
We stopped a few times along the way.
The best stop was at sunset.
We arrived in Phnom Penh around 7pm and jumped in a tuktuk to our hotel called The Teahouse. It feels like such a treat to stay in hotels so its really nice that the girls are here on holiday and means we are able to book some nice places.
The streets in Phnom Penh are busy and noisy but you walk into the Teahouse and it is the most calming environment. There are plants, trees and ponds everywhere. We were greeting with a cold towel and refreshing ice-tea. Alison and I looked at each other as if to say 'OMG we don't usually book places this nice!'
We dumped our bags, had an awesome shower and headed out for dinner.
The next morning we started walking to S21 the school that Pol Pot had transformed into a prison between 1975-1979. When we arrived at the gate we saw it was shut and realised that we would not be able to visit until after the New Year celebrations were over in 3 days time. However we had planned to leave Phnom Penh and be at the beach by then. So we stood at the gate and discussed our options and decided we would stay in Phnom Penh for the next 5 night until the girls flew home on Sunday morning to allow everyone to relax and to explore the capital city.
We then went for a walk around the city.
Mainly to get a feel for the layout and to see some of the monuments and temples.
It was insane how empty it was, apparently everyone leave Phnom Penh and heads to the villages for 3 days over New Year.
It was actually kind of cool to have the place to ourselves.
We spent the afternoon at the pool.
Then headed out for dinner in the evening to a place called Lemongrass which was great.
We also went for drinks at the Foreign Correspondents' Club (FCC) along the river front.
On Wednesday and Thursday we spent the days by the pool and the evenings out having drinks, dinner and playing cards.
On Wednesday afternoon Alison, Nathan and I went to the movie theatre which was such a unique experience. Inside there were 2 big beds and 4 chairs to sit on so all in all the place could hold about 16 people. We laid on the big bed and ordered beers and watched the movie 'The Killing Fields'. It was a shocking movie but also have us an idea of what happened and what we would see when visiting S21 and the killing fields on Friday.
I will write a separate blog post about our visit on Friday.
Friday evening we headed to the night market. It was busy and full of locals which was great.
We went to a crazy busy stall and eventually got some food, not sure we all got what we ordered but it was good. It was pretty awesome sitting on massive mats in the middle of the market place, sweating hot and eating noodle soup!
Afterwards we got some great ice creams.
We got back to the hotel and went for a swim in the pool and Alison and I stood in the pool and Tasha on the side and we played charades. Sounds random but was a lot of fun trying to act out in the middle of the pool.
Saturday was our last full day all together so we had our usual epic breakfast and then some pool time. Around 2pm we headed to a little cafe and then split off into different groups to do different stuff. Lauren and I headed to central market.
We managed to buy everything we needed to get!
Saturday evening we had an amazing last Khmer meal together.
I felt sad saying goodbye to the girls as honestly I cannot describe how relaxing and chilled out this trip was. Everyone got on well and enjoyed each others company which made everything so easy. It was so lovely seeing them all and I really felt privileged that they chose to spend their precious vacation days with us.