Siem Reap

Siem Reap, in my eyes is worlds better that Phnom Penh. It seems a lot more developed and busy. We stayed at Tropical Breeze Guesthouse, which is a 5 minute walk to Pub Street. Pub Street is the backpacker's strip and also the location of the night market and some of Lonely Planet's recommended restaurants and bars. 

We arrived late afternoon and went to explore before deciding our plans for the next few days. After a shower, we headed out for dinner and bumped into two girls we met on the Halong Bay tour. We ended up going to dinner with them at Le Tigre de Papier, where we had some traditional Cambodian food. We then headed to Angkor What?, a bar next door which is well known on the backpacker circuit for the t-shirts which you get when you buy a certain amount of drinks. 

This was our first late night in a while and we only got back to the guesthouse past 2am. 

The next morning we had an earlyish start, as we went back to Le Tigre de Papier for a Cambodian cooking class. 

The class started with us picking a starter and a main course from the menu, the teacher then took us to the food market. We saw so many different fruits and meats. The meats and fishes were not the nicest things to see all bloods and guts. She explained to us the ingredients that we would be using in some of our meals. 

On the return from the market, we all had plates with the ingredients that were in our starters and our teacher explained what they were and showed us how to cut and peel everything.

After this was complete, we headed to the kitchen to heat us sauces and complete our starters. In between this we also prepared all the ingredients for the main. The majority of the dishes had the same ingredients such as; pepper, chicken stock, brown sugar, garlic and oyster sauce. 

As we left things to simmer our teacher showed us how to make some of the veg into flowers, birds and other fun shapes. We also all used banana leaves as the first layer of our food and made then into a flower shape.

 

Our teacher absolutely loved Nath and couldn't stop giggling around him which also meant that he did a lot of cooking.

So anyway, here are the pictures of the end result.

My starter - Spicy Papaya Salad 

Nath's starter - Fresh chicken spring rolls with a sweet chilli and peanut sauce

Unfortunately I didn't take a picture of my main, but here is Nath's and his was beef Loc Lak.

And finally our dessert was a mixture of lychee type fruits, sticky rice (which was not to my taste) and mango. 

And at the end we received a certificate.

Day 3 in Siem Reap deserves a post of its own so hope you enjoy it. 

The Temples of Angkor (Siem Reap)

On day 3 in Siem Reap we woke up at 4.30am in order to see Angkor Wat (the main temple) at sunrise. The night before, we went to Blue Pumpkin (a bakery recommended in Lonely Planet) and got some pastries for breakfast so we didn't go hungry. 

A tuk tuk picked us up and we drove in the dark to the temples. It was still pitch black when we arrived and using my phone light we followed people to the front of Angkor Wat. Luckily not too many people had arrived just yet, we got ourselves a good spot in front of the lake with no our tourists blocking our view of a good picture. It soon became packed with a ridiculous amount of people all here to see the sunrise behind the temple . Here are my pictures as it got lighter, unfortunately there was too much cloud coverage so we didn't actually see any sun, but it didn't really matter as we were still glad we did it.

It looked pretty amazing, I'm not sure of you can really tell in my iPhone pictures but on my camera the mirror of the temple in the water is so clear. 

We then headed in to explore. Angkor Wat according to Lonely Planet is the ultimate expression of Khmer genius and it is only matched by a few select spots on earth such as, Macchu Picchu, not only that but it is also the world's largest religious building. It is a symbolic representation of Mt Meru, which is basically the Mt Olympus of the Hindu faith and home to the ancient gods. Angkor Wat is surrounded by a giant rectangular moat which is 190m wide, measuring 1.5km by 1.3km.

The details on the stone are so precise and there many different little patterns and images of Buddhas. 

We then visited Angkor Thom, which is recognised as the last capital of the Khmer empire which conceals many temples. The gates that took us inside the temple were the first vision of interest,  they are flanked by a monumental representation of the Churning of the Ocean of Milk, 54 demons and 54 gods took part in a huge tug of war on the causeway. Each gate is huge with the faces of Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara etched into the stones. 

The first temple we visited in Angkor Thom was Bapuon, which is often recognised as the world's largest jigsaw puzzle, as before the civil war archaeologists took it apart piece by piece but their precise records were destroyed during the rein of the Khmer Rouge. However it has now been restored. 

I can't remember which pictures of mine represent this temple, however in the majority of temples there is a Buddha to which Nath and I were basically forced by a little old lady to pray with incense to the Buddha, and then they put a bracelet on us for good luck. Basically it's all a bit of a con, as they then make us pay. This happened twice. 

The third temple we visited was Bayon. Bayon is located right in the centre of Angkor Thom and is the state temple of Cambodia's legendary king, Jayavarman VII. 54 of the gothic towers are famously decorated with 216 enormous smiling faces of Avalokiteshvara which bare a similar resemblance to the king. 

And finally just outside of Angkor Thom we visited Ta Phrom which is also famous as the location where Tomb Raider was filmed. Ta Phrom is a 12th century Mahayana Buddhist temple. This one was the most different, as the stone had turned slightly green and the roots of the trees were huge. 

This was probably our favourite as it was the most different. We found that many of the temples that we were taken to were similar and even though we enjoyed seeing the ones I described above, it did get a little repetitive and we only did the 1 day cycle. Some people do the 3 day cycle!!! 

We got back to the guesthouse around midday and had some well-deserved chilling out and watched a film. We then headed to the night market in the late afternoon and got some little gifts. For dinner, Nath had sweet and sour chicken with pineapple and it looked like this.

And I had the traditional Cambodian dish of Chicken Amok.

For the following day, we had booked a day bus to Bangkok. 

Phnom Penh

On arrival to Phnom Penh we saw our first heavy downpour of rain since the first week, so naturally we dreaded getting off the bus in just flip flops and t-shirts. Lucky for us, the rain stopped just before we stopped. A Tuk Tuk picked us up and took us to Sunday Guesthouse, which seemed a little remote. However it was clean and that's all you need. 

For dinner we went to a Cambodian restaurant, where again we were the only Westerners. We ordered stir fried vegetables with oyster sauce and garlic, egg fried rice with beef and Angkor beer. 

Our first full day in Phnom Penh was Nathan's 22nd birthday and we had planned in plenty of sight-seeing. We woke up early and headed straight to the Killing Fields, where we learnt all about the Khmer Rouge and their leader Pol Pot. To say it was horrific was an understatement, nevertheless interesting.

Our Tuk Tuk then took us to the Tuol Sleng Prison which was used during the Khmer Rouge rein. The prison showed pictures of all the victims that died during this period and it was very eery.

 

We had planned on visiting the Royal Palace but because we didn't have the right clothing we weren't allowed in. So instead we walked in the park.

For dinner that evening, as it was Nath's birthday we went to a Lonely Planet recommendation, Cantina. It was Mexican and on the riverside. 

Day 2 in Phnom Penh, we woke up late and had breakfast at the hostel before heading to the Russian Market (Psar Tuol Tom Pong). It is the best market to visit in this area of Cambodia as many designer brands are made here so the factories give the products that have small faults to the market for a very cheap price. So I bought myself some converse for £6 and in England I would pay £35 for these. Quite the bargain!! 

After a quick lunch, we went to the Royal Palace for attempt 2! Luckily we got in, but we had to wear long tops and bottoms, which wasn't the nicest given the heat. 

Pre-dinner we planned to go on a river cruise to see the sunset and then have dinner however, there was a ridiculous amount of rain and many tuk tuks wouldn't take us. So we had a beer and the hostel and waited for it to stop.

When finally it stopped, we headed to the riverside and it was worth it because we managed to see a pretty nice sunset and also another dance class. 

And soon the sky ended up like this.

We both had Khmer dishes and agreed that these were one of our top meals so far. 

Next stop, Siem Reap...