Our official entry to Cambodia came on foot. We walked 800m between the Laos and Cambodian border, filled out the paperwork for our visas and walked another 500m to look for the small restaurant where we were supposed to meet our van to move onto Siem Reap. There were only a few hole in the wall type places next to a dusty road so it was pretty easy.

We were jammed into a van with 10 other people and our luggage. The promised air conditioning in the rickety old van could not compete with the 35 degree temperatures and all that body heat. There were some fellow travellers that hadn’t seen a shower in a while which made for some interesting aromas!!

We reached Strung Trung and unloaded into another crowded hole in the wall restaurant and waited to be herded into another van. We had time for some food and smoothies before our van to Siam Reap was ready. There was a bit of a mix up which left 2 seats available for the 4 of us. After trying to point this out to the driver, and having him trying to show us how we could fit (kids sitting on us or the floor), I finally refused to get in. After checking in the van beside us, the driver realized that two guys in there were headed to Phnom Penh not Siem Reap. He got them in the right van and Grace and I hopped into the second van. But, being the last ones in meant we had the worst seats….facing backwards for the 6 hour drive. Grace is a trooper and can sleep anywhere so she was fine. I took 2 Gravol with no water (it was in the other van with Mark and Molly) and tried my best to not throw up.

We pulled into Siem Reap after dark with a full day of travel under our belts.

We had a great hotel on the river with a pool, big adjoining rooms and killer AC. We stayed in Siem Reap for 5 days, with a 3 day pass to visit the Ankor temples. Our plan was to visit the temples early in the morning and get back to the pool and AC for the afternoons. If you haven’t already guessed, Siem Reap was hot….really hot.

At this point we had been in Asia for two months and we were all craving burgers!! Siem Reap has a lot of expats, some of whom have opened restaurants. We found a place that served what may be the best burgers we’ve ever had (we ate there more than once in our 5 days there). Thank you Trip Advisor for helping is find Kiwi Clayton at Jungle Burger.

One thing about Siem Reap is there is no shortage of tuk tuks ready to bring you wherever your heart desires. We would literally be pushing the door to the hotel open and from across the street a chorus of voices would shout “tuk tuk”, “you need ride” or “cheap price”. We met Jim during one of these encounters and he took us on a ride around Siem Reap for the morning. We visited a huge local market outside the city centre. This place sold everything (except souvenir type stuff). We were in dire need of shampoo and toothpaste and it was great to find it at a local price and not an inflated tourist price.

After the market, we stopped at the Royal Palace gardens, which is famous for the large fruit bats that live in the trees there. We arrived to the faint sound of squeaking in the distance, and as we walked closer to the tall trees we could see hoards of bats hanging in the branches. Occasionally one would fly to another branch to get more comfortable which gave us a chance to see how big they were. The size and shape of the bats are exactly what I picture “Dracula” bats to look like.

The much less glamorous side of travel came after Jim dropped us off. We had to fill out the paperwork for our Vietnam visas. You can’t cross into Vietnam by land without having a visa ahead of time. I found a travel office down the street from our hotel that would take our applications and passports to be processed at the consulate for an extra $10 on top of the cost of the visa. Yes please! Avoiding all the hassle for $40 was well worth it.

There was also an ever growing bag of sweaty, stinky two-week-old laundry that needed to be taken care of. Most hotels charge per item so that was way too expensive. After walking around in the mid-day heat, we found a place close to our hotel that charged a decent price per kilo and would have it back to us the next afternoon. We made sure the lady did the laundry herself (machine on-site) after the laundry disaster in Nepal.

We had arranged for Jim to pick us back up to take us to Phare, a circus in Siem Reap (think Cirque du Soleil not animals and clowns). After a short ride Jim dropped us off in a parking lot outside a small, well-kept ticket booth and gift shop with a big tent set up behind it. The smell of fresh popcorn followed us into the tent where we sat in the front row of bleachers set up around three quarters of the inside. The show was amazing and the skill and performance blew our minds. Fire juggling, crazy acrobatics and impossible balancing feats kept us entertained for over an hour. The great thing about the whole organization is it’s completely non-profit and is set up to help disadvantaged youth.

Day one of our temple sightseeing had us arriving at Ta Prohm temple before 7:30am. We were trying our best to beat the heat and the bus tours. It gets crowded here not only because it’s a strange, beautiful place that demonstrates the power of nature, but it was also made famous by the Tomb Raider movie starring Angelina Jolie. As we walked into the gates the roots of these giant trees enveloping the walls immediately catch your eye. Inside, doorways and statues of this ancient temple are no match for nature. Mark took some great photos, but they really don’t do justice to the enormity of the jungle invasion on this place. One other interesting fact about this temple is that there’s what seems to be a tiny carving of a dinosaur on a wall inside. We found it and it definitely doesn’t fit in with the other carvings. Weird. There is a ton of history and interesting information on Ta Prohm. This page gives a good, short summary.

Our second and last temple stop of the day was the Ta Keo temple. It was built a few hundred years before Ankor Wat, but was never finished. There is an inscription that says the temple was struck by lightning, which was seen as a bad omen, so many think this is why it was never completed. It resembles a pyramid and it was a steamy, but short climb to the top.

Our second temple day we chose to go to Ankor Wat for sunrise. We took a tuk tuk to get there and met a guide outside the gate in the dark. We made our way to the iconic view point and waited for the sun while eating peanut butter and jam sandwiches. It was overcast so we really just saw the front revealed slowly without a grand sunbeam shining on it, I thought I would be more disappointed, but it was still pretty amazing to see, and the clouds kept the strong sun from roasting us. There was no need to linger outside for photos so we got inside before the crowd got too thick.

Ankor Wat is huge and we wanted to make sure we didn’t miss anything; a guide was essential. He revealed so many interesting facts and small details that we would never have caught. Photos of Ankor Wat just don’t convey the size of the complex. There were so many people there for sunrise and later inside the temple, but it’s big and there are many different areas to look at so the crowd spread out nicely.

After Ankor Wat we headed for another popular spot, Bayon Wat. We entered and were surrounded by hundreds of giant, smiling faces. 37 of the original 49 towers of faces remain, the biggest is 35m tall with 8 faces on it.

Our last day in Siem Reap we decided to visit a few of the temples further away from the main wats. We went to these by car rather than tuk tuk, it would have taken too long. We saw Ta Som. This was similar to Ta Prohm with the jungle taking over the complex. We were literally the only ones there, we even beat the vendors!

Our last temple was Banteay Srei. It’s famous for the intricate carvings in the red sandstone.

Like Laos, Cambodia is also plagued with the problem of unexploded bombs and landmines littering the landscape. Many of the UXO’s were left during the civil war by the Khmer Rouge. We visited a museum and school set up by a former Khmer Rouge child solider who has made it his life’s mission to clear the land of these dangers, somewhat of a therapy for him I think. The organization clears areas and then helps set up schools in rural areas. Being in a country so recently involved in a civil war and genocide was strange because everywhere we went it was in the back of our minds that these people were directly affected by those events.

Cambodia is a large silk producer and there was a silk farm on our way back to Siem Reap, we stopped in to see how it’s made. We saw it all, from the mulberry bushes and worms, to the extraction and weaving. Let’s just say it’s no wonder silk is so expensive.

Our evenings in Siem Reap were spent walking the streets, eating burgers/watching soccer at Jungle Burger and shopping in the night markets; the Robertson’s can’t miss a night market. Siem Reap surprised us. Other travellers told us it was just a city that was convenient to see the temples from, but it’s not just that. We weren’t expecting much, but found we enjoyed our time there over and above the temples.

A couple of Gravol and a short (by SEA standards) bus ride later we found ourselves in Battambang. Battambang isn’t a well known stop for travellers in Cambodia, there are enough things to see and do to occupy 1.5-2 days. One of the must-see attractions is….a circus. Soon after arriving we bought tickets for the show that night. Battambang is home to the school that trains the performers for the circus in Siem Reap. We thought it would be neat to see a performance at the school. It was less elaborate and not as polished, but the performers were so close to the caliber that we had seen in Siem Reap. They’d soon be ready for the Big Top. It was awesome and so cheap!!

During the day we took a ride on the bamboo train. The cart we rode on was a bamboo platform on a set of barbell type wheels that fit on the rails, powered by a lawnmower type motor. The thing flies down the track at breakneck speeds. It was so fun (safe?). These vehicles used to be used to transport goods from village to village, but now are run mostly for tourists.

After a walk through the local market (and I mean a local, not for tourists to see, market – lots of weird meat and a woman stuffing pig intestines with ???), school work in the hotel with the AC blasting was in order for the afternoon until our tuk tuk driver picked us up to take us to Phnom Sampeau (a mountain just outside Battambang).

At the top of Phnom Sampeau we were greeted by a troop of monkeys as we looked over the landscape below and walked around the temples. Sadly, on part of the mountain was a cave known as the ‘Killing Cave’. The Khmer Rouge would bring dissidents to the opening at the top of the cave and throw people in….alive. Some wouldn’t die right away and would lay suffering in the cave for days with dead bodies around them before succumbing to their injuries. Even babies born to “the enemy” were thrown in. There is a small memorial inside and many of the bones have been collected and stored in a glass shrine.

The main reason people come to the mountain and Battambang is to see an amazing natural phenomena. Every night at dusk, millions of bats leave a cave in mountain to scour the land for fruit and bugs. We found a seat below the mouth of the cave and waited. At first we saw a few bats come out and then fly back in. It’s like they were testing to see if the coast was clear. And then, like a river of squeaking, flapping mice they came. The river did not stop flowing. The girls timed for over 25 minutes before we saw a hint of it slowing down. Unbelievable.

The next morning we headed to the bus station to catch our 8:30 bus to Phenom Phen. At 9:30 we finally loaded in and drove off while a Cambodian man lifted a panal in the floor, took out a wrench and worked on the bus as we bumped along. It was a local bus, which meant lots of stops, strange cargo and loud Cambodian music videos playing on a screen at the front. My patience with buses, no matter how cheap, was starting to wear thin.

Phenom Penh was probably one of our least favorite SEA cities. I can’t really put my finger on why that is, maybe it lacks ambience. It’s just a big city, not pretty. But, some really significant events (Khmer Rouge genocide) in recent Cambodian history took place in and around this capital and that makes it a place that people come to learn more about it.

Genocide is the deliberate and systematic destruction of a group of people because of their ethnicity, nationality, religion, or race – dictionary definition. The Holocaust is what comes to my mind when I think of an example of genocide. Cambodia experienced a massive genocide lead by Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge party from 1975-1979. It’s estimated that 1.7-2.2 million Cambodians were massacred.

Learning about this dark time in Cambodia’s history by visiting the Killing Fields and Tuel Sleng Genocide Museum – S21 Prision (a former high school that was used as a prison by the Khmer Rouge) was powerful. Our tour guide at the museum was a woman who’s father, brother and sister were killed by the regime. She and her mother escaped to Vietnam and lived in a refugee camp. Her story brought us to tears. What is hard to grasp is that the people who were part of the Khmer Rouge went back to being normal Cambodians after 1979. That sometimes meant that people had a neighbour that was a Khmer Rouge solider during that time. We asked our guide about this and she said that many people had no other choice but to join with the Khmer Rouge or they would have been killed. Forgiveness was essential to healing.

Cambodia’s commitment to traditional art forms was better than we’d seen in other countries in SEA. While in the capital we saw a production at the National Museum that highlighted the traditional forms of Cambodian dance. The costumes, stories and skill of the dancers were stunning. There was no photography allowed so we’ve got those pictures filed away in our memories.

We couldn’t leave Cambodia without seeing some kind of martial arts type fight. It turned out that every Friday night one of the TV stations hosts live Bokator (similar to Thai kickboxing) matches. There was a ring built right at the station with full on lighting, screens and announcers. Admission was free and we had ring side seats. Small world side note: there were a total of eight foreigners at the match (we were four of them) and we got talking to a couple who ended up being from near Milton, ON. It turns out both the man and woman had worked with my cousin husband, Rick – on the other side of the world we met people who knew a relative of mine!! My dad would say I pulled a Nonie – my grandmother was well known for finding connections with people wherever she went.

The plan was to cross the Cambodian/Vietnam border in the south, so, we made our way to Kep, a small seaside town just a hop-skip-jump from Vietnam. When we arrived we realized how spread out the town was and knew we would need motorcycles to get around. Kep was sleepy enough that I felt comfortable getting around with Grace on the back of my motorcycle. We toured around for the afternoon, looking for a lunch spot and enjoying the views from the ocean front roads. We found a cafe run by an American from Seattle who was married to a Cambodian woman. The food, coffee and tea were awesome!! The girls scarfed down some mac and cheese as an appetizer, it was really good, but they said it made them miss nana (my mom makes the best mac and cheese). We chatted with the owner about what we should see and do and that lead us to making a decent plan for our last two days in Cambodia.

Early the next day we made our way 60km on motorbikes (not sure this was the best decision, but it prepared us well for the rides to come) to Bokor mountain/hill station. This hill station was built in the 1920’s by the French as a place to go to beat the heat of Phnom Penh. The ride to the mountain was busy for part of the way and a little nerve wracking but going up the mountain was really fun. Switchbacks, beautiful views out to the ocean and cooling temperatures made the experience one we won’t soon forget. The dramatic temperature change, along with moist air from the ocean meant that in some spots we were surrounded by dense fog. I hate to say it after being extremely hot for the two months prior, but I was cold!! It was creepy seeing the abandoned buildings at the top, but what was even weirder was that there was a huge hotel and casino up there that was recently built and more development coming, but there are no people up there. I’m not sure who they think is coming. After a 120km round trip we had a well deserved soak in the pool and a game of Catan.

Our last full day in Cambodia we decided to take a short boat ride to Rabbit Island. There are no resorts or hotels there, just a few guest houses and bungalows. There’s no electricity after 8pm, but during the day you can get some good food and, of course, a massage. We swam and relaxed before heading back to the mainland.

The Kep area is known for two things: crabs and pepper. The most famous pepper is Kampot, which is grown in an area close to Kep town. One dusty, bumpy motorcycle ride later and we were well educated on pepper production.

After learning about pepper we had to have a meal with the famous sauce made from it. Before going out for dinner we stopped at the local crab market so Mark and Grace (our seafood lovers) could pick out some crabs and have a quick appetizer. They literally looked in a basket, picked out their crabs and took them over to a lady with a makeshift kitchen set up. She proceeded to cut them in half with scissors and take out the guts. When they were ready to go she threw them in her skillet, worked her magic and produced the most delicious crabs they have ever eaten.

I’m not a seafood lover so at dinner that night we all had the Kampot pepper sauce but mine was with chicken while the rest had crab and shrimp. We bought some pepper to bring home, but I don’t think I’ll ever be able to duplicate that heavenly sauce. A great way to spend out last evening in Cambodia.

Human resiliency even in the most horrifying conditions, temples, art, bats, dancing, ring-side seats, food and our first big adventure on motorcycles will forever be our memories of Cambodia.