18. Kep

I caught the bus to Kep, about an hour away, and for once it actually left on time instead of Cambodian time! I went with a French lady I met in Kampot who was just going for the day, whereas I was moving on. I found a place to stay very quickly.... Mine was the door on the left, and the hut on the right was the shared bathroom. US$5 a night, cheapest yet! 

This was the view for breakfast looking out to the sea 

So by 9.30 we were exploring Kep. It is even sleepier than Kampot, a seaside town strung out along the coast, and is busy importing lorry loads of sand to make a nice beach. Kep was the coastal version of the colonial hill station, where the rich and famous came to cool off. The relics of the old villas are dotted around the coast. This was King Sihanouk's mothers house on the seafront. Note the bullet holes from flighting against the Khmer Rouge. 

 It has some quirky statues on the front

Kep is famous for crab cooked in green peppers, and Kampot pepper is grown all around the area and is world famous. The main type of crab caught locally is the blue crab and blue it is...

We had lunch at the crab market where crab is cooked in many many different ways, but the famous one is green pepper crab....wow, wonderful! 

This was what we watched while we tucked into the crabs... Guys fishing standing waist deep in water holding the net while the boat circled around 

Ladies selling some of their crabs that they keep alive in the baskets in the sea.

The crabs are cooked for the many restaurants along the market area.

A lot of the locals living here are Cham Muslims

A local fishing family by the sea. He is mending his nets while she holds the baby.

And their little lad sucks his ice lolly.

And children doing as children do the world over...

The lady was washing up...

Other statues along Kep sea front. This is the naked statue of a fisherman's wife waiting for her husband to come home from the sea. I'm not sure why she's naked....

There are lots of monkeys in Kep

Finally, another sunset view from the top,of Sunset Hill overlooking the town. We were accompanied by two very friendly monks.

17. Kampot

So having decided I needed to pull myself away from the lure of the beach, I caught a mini bus to Kampot about 3 hours away, travelling further east towards the Vietnamese border. On the bus I met 2 Dutch ladies and we shared a tuk tuk from the bus station to find a place to stay, we found a guest house just back from the river front for $12 a night with own bathroom and hot water (which was a luxury as no hot water on the beach). My cheapest place so far..... I'm going cheaper all the time! The guest house had a beautiful garden to sit in and a lovely balcony. 

Kampot is a sleepy riverside town with a quirky bridge which has obviously been mended in many different styles! 

And some quirky roundabout features...

The fruit statue below is the durian, and Kampot is a big area for growing durian.... And note I almost got a bike and trailer piled high with cane furniture in the picture! 

The Cambodian Vietnam Friendship Statue. Vietnam invaded Cambodia in 1979 to free them from Pol Pot, although the friendship has waned recently.

 

This was the old colonial prison in Kampot next to the new one

and this the view over the road from the prison.... Daisy was sitting watching the world go by....

I did a night boat trip down the river to look at the fireflies. I've seen them before but they were beautiful, all flashing in unison until the guide put his torch on them, then they were in total disarray for a while til they found themselves again. I don't know why, must google it! 

The next day I did a tour to the Bokor Hill Station, an old French resort built about 100 years ago in the hills to escape the heat and humidity of the lowlands. There were some beautiful buildings....

The Catholic Church where you can imagine the expat French coming in their Sunday best

The pagoda built nearby for the Cambodian king who also came here to escape the heat. It was built on the clifftop with jungle below

And the old colonial hill station which was also built in the same red brick, but is now being "restored" and covered in concrete. They have covered over the bullet holes where battles were fought with the Pol Pot regime. 

 It is going to be turned into one of a series of hotels to serve the HUGE Chinese funded casino and hotel complex very nearby which has totally changed the whole atmosphere of the hill top. But who are we to judge, we destroyed our heritage up until 1970s when we started to realise its value. So too the Cambodians are destroying some and preserving others. 

We were then taken to waterfalls nearby, which, being the dry season were non existent. The rock is limestone, and it very much reminded me of the Dales this summer where rivers had dried up.

And again...the people

Kampot is famous for its pepper, black, white, red and green, and we visited a pepper plantation. This plant was about 8 years old, and there we're lots of green pepper seeds on it. Later in the year they are picked and dried to make black pepper. When the outer husks are removed it becomes Red pepper, while White involves another soaking and drying process. 

The day ended with a sunset boat trip down the river, although it was a bit hazy, but we did see the fishing fleet going down river on its way out to sea for the night.

16. Sihanoukville.... The beach!

After so many days travelling I decided a few days by the beach would be a good idea. So I got the overnight bus from Battambang to Sihanoukville. An interesting experience! I couldn't boom the sleeping bed bus so got the reclining seat bus..... For 7 hours. We should have left at 11.45 but it was actually 00.45 before it arrived.,the seats were interesting....

 

Yes they were reclined, but look.... no foot room on the floor, just the approx 4 foot long recline! I was next to a large Cambodian man (the perils of travelling on my own...!) and my seat was immediately above the door where the luggage was stored. This door had to be tied shut by rope as it didn't close, leaving a gap of about 6 inches around the door where the wind blew all night as the bus sped along. Actually, once I had blocked the howling gale around my seat with a strategically placed blanket it did give some valuable air, as it would have been very hot and stuffy otherwise! And I did managed to sleep..... My most important travel companion of ear plugs helped enormously! Luckily we changed buses in Phnom Penh to normal seat ones for the final 5 hour journey. 

Then Sihanoukville.... As they say, it is all in the beach where you stay. Otros Beach was recommended, a tropical paradise....

This was my hut on the beach... 4 days of bliss! 

A perfect end to a perfect day...

Unfortunately the local big wigs in their wisdom have decided that they will no longer allow sleeping huts on the beach, they will have to be on the other side of the road. At the moment this is not being enforced but when it is the beachfront will no doubt become wall to wall bars and restaurants just like the main beach in town... Serendipity.... Which is Awful with a capital A..... And then paradise will disappear forever.... 

I met some people and we all visited the local island for a boat trip... bamboo Island.  There I got chatting to a guy from Poole who had built his own boat from the flotsam and jetsam he had found on the beach. Bamboo, bits of wood and rope, 20 sacks stuffed full of polystyrene (which you fine everywhere) provided the buoyancy. He bought the anchor and line and had some tarpaulin which he sewed into shape for the sail. He was living on the island for the winter.... Look at You Tube Andy's Boat Cambodia! Unfortunately I didn't get a sail.....

A far cry from this beautiful Getman yacht anchored in the bay. They had taken 2 years to get this far.... What an adventure.... But then so is the land based version! 

15. Battambang

I met a lovely couple on the boat to Battambang so we decided to explore the town together. 

Battambang is the second largest city in Cambodia after Phnom Penh, but it doesn't feel it. It straddles the river that we travelled down, and has some old colonial buildings and a village feel to it. This was the disused Art Deco style railway station which they are trying to get back into use again, with Australian monetary help. 

These were the old engine sheds, now with people squatting in them.

And the former Governors Mansion... What a contrast

We went on the Bamboo Train, an exhilarating ride along old buckled tracks on a bamboo cart, which when one comes the other way they just dismantle and lift off the tracks! 

Some of the tracks had seen better days... This was a bridge 

And were somewhat buckled...

The end of the line

And the kids....

They made this wonderful reed grasshopper!

The local headgear...

Then our tuk tuk driver took us for lunch. Sticky rice from the roadside caf, where all the locals buy. Rice, coconut water and black beans, cooked in the bamboo container on charcoal for several hours, then the burned outer shell of the bamboo is sliced off leaving the container which can be peeled open. 

Delicious, eaten straight from the bamboo...., 

He then took us to the local Killing Fields in Battambang. They are all over Cambodia..... He told us his personal story. He is now 58 but when he was 19 the Khmer Rouge came to power and spread panic, terror, torture, famine and destruction throughout the country, for 4 bloody years. They killed between 1-2 million people through starvation, disease, torture and execution. He knows from talking to neighbours much later that both his parents were killed as they told him they saw them die, but he never found out what happened to his brother and sister. At one point he was interrogated and told to write in Khmer.... He said he wrote with his left hand and only did three sentences. He told them that was all he could write as he had only had 2 years of education, and after some very tense moments they told him to go. He actually could write and speak both English and French, but if they had found that out he would have been killed. He also changed his name as he feared that they would look for him as he knew his family had been caught and they always traced all members of a family to kill them, including children. He then escaped into the jungle and joined the army to fight against the regime, and somehow managed to survive.

This was the memorial of the killing fields in Battambang...

When we arrived the local children were playing tag around it.... A happier generation than those that went before.....

He then took us to see how they make the rice paper for spring rolls...... A family run business. They mix the rice flour by hand in a large bowl over a flame, then spread the mixture over a skin to create the circle, which is then put on a rack to dry in the sun. 

Then the spring rolls are made. We ate several, which were delicious! 

The Memorial shown earlier read.... 

And the wonderful Cambodians are indeed restoring their beautiful land. I love Cambodia!