Cambodia

Greetings everyone from Kuala Lumpar, Malaysia.  It is time for us to reflect back on the month we spent in Cambodia.  (We also visited Cambodia back in October (rainy season) 2006)  So we left Vancouver on January 2nd bound for Shanghai (some 18 hrs distant) where we held over for 5 hrs. before completing the final 5hr. flight to good old Thailand.  This was one brutally uncomfortable flight aboard a Airbus 700...and the strange thing is that the China East Airlines staff did not allow anyone to open any side window shades the entire trip...a cave would have been more friendly!

So 'Blingkok' was the same old same old...good food and cheap beer which makes it a great place to base from.  (We also lost the 3rd somewhere over the top of the world and landed on the 4th)  A few days later we hit the road NW for Cambodia arriving in Siem Reap the same day... a bit different from 06 when it took over 10 hrs from the Cambodia border to reach Siem Reap via a horrific pot-holed dusty one lane road!  This place is tourist central and I doubt it there is any single feature in the world that receives a many visitors as Angkor Wat in Siem Reap!  We cannot recognize anything from 06 and tourism figures indicate that visitors doubled from 06 to 08 to 2 million annually and the amazing growth in tourism continues!  Of course no one goes to Siem Reap without visiting Angkor Wat and we paid up for three days two of which we spent riding bicycles through the ruins, which are as amazing as ever. 

 One big disappointment was that the neatest temple system called Ta Phrom was being rebuilt.  In 06 we had to explore our way through the ruins which were left in their original shape since being discovered by a french explorer in the 1800's...the huge trees growing throughout and through the ruins were amazing (the movie Tomb Raiders with Angelia Jolie was filmed here), but today there are hundreds of tourists travelling through these same ruins on board walks and all of the neatest areas are being rebuilt with all kinds of metal and wood scaffolding...its badly needed but sure ruins the experience!  We also checked out some remote ruins and stream carvings that we didn't see last trip.
After 5 days we bounced down some pretty rough dirt/blacktop roads to Phnom Phen, Cambodias capital of 1.5 million.  This place was pretty dodgy in 06...today is is close to Bangkok...what an amazing change!  Just don't eat at the KFC (we think they substituted crow for chicken) nor the Dairy Queen (offered about 5 icecream options and tasted like it was made with goat milk!...otherwise great food...oh yeah and the beer is CHEAP. (also great Margarittas for 1.50 and some amazing food options!
Next stop is Sen Monoram which is a mountain village about 10 hrs northeast of Phnom Phen...I should add 10 hrs of hell ride via a bus that resembled good old India!  None the less we made it and spent a few days exploring some waterfalls, farms and small patches of jungle that remain intact around this high elevation (we were actually kind of cold!) using 5 dollar a day scooters...a great way to go but hell on the ass! (One of the long drops was so bad (flooded) that by the time I got into it my urge to crap was replaced by the urge to puke.  Back to Phnom Phen and civilization!
Here we come Kampot...a sleepy colonial town resting on the shore of the Bay of Thailand.  Checked into the Kampot River Bungaloos for a big 6 (dollars that is)...had to share our stick and thatch hut on stilts with a couple of cool 8 inch gecko's and various flying creatures (Lori wasn't impressed!)  Renting motos to check out some cool local mountains and ruins was a ton of fun and a few days later we moved about 30 km down the road to the small community of Kep where we did some jungle hiking (in other words crawling up and down slippery hills in thick bush and trees without seeing anything! (anything that moves has been eaten by the locals unless it is poisonous!)  Still a very laid back place to visit and actually got some beach time. 
Back to Phnom Phen for a couple of days of relaxing (checked out the torture prison, Mekong River boat ride and our old digs around PP where we spent time in 06) 
From Phnom Phen we travelled the roads to the city of Battambang and spent another day riding motos and visiting some pretty amazing caves (killing caves where the Khymer Rouge bludgeoned thousands of people then threw them down into caves where their bones remain)  There was also a few good ruins to check out and just by riding around one could get a pretty good sense of what folks in the farming communities lived like...life is pretty rough for these good natured, hard working folks.
At this point in time we decided that we would fly to Malaysia vs. busing it back to Thailand then down to Kuala Lumpar where we are flying out to the Phillipines on the 5th.  So to get back to the closest airport (Siem Reap) we took a boat across Tonle Sap Lake and this truly was an amazing day.  This is dry season in Cambodia and the rice farmers (number one export is rice) are located on the lowlands around Tonle Sap preparing the fields.  Most live on boats but also have temporary tents etc. set up as once rainy season comes only a few places are above flood waters.
So we had a fantastic time in Cambodia but the old saying that the first time is the best time is true...it is the new places that we visited that we enjoyed the most in terms of finding new and exciting things to do and see.  The Cambodian people are pretty amazing so it is good to see that their country is definately doing alot better financially than back in 06.  However compared to countries like Malaysia, Cambodia has serious problems that will be very difficult to overcome.  Their population is rising at over 2% per year and despite having 25% of their land-base in Parks the environmental degradation is horrific...illegal logging is rampant and in terms of litter and water pollution Cambodia matches India with stinking raw sewage pouring into the Mekong right in front of the best tourist areas in Cambodia.  Poverty appears as bad as India yet in Phnom Phen there are Rolls Royce dealerships (500,000 $US), Range Rovers (150,000) Porches, Toyota PUs and we even saw some Ford 450's with 50 inch tires on at least 20 inch lift kits (can hardly fit on the roads!) along with hundreds of crippled beggars, mothers with a pile of young kids etc.  Looks like the ultimate capitalist state and government corruption is daily news. 

Food for thought

Was wandering around today and found some snacks in the market....

Savory deep fried cockroaches

Toasty frogs

Dried fish

I think I will give it a pass.

A big gecko ....10 inches long has taken up residence in our bungalow.  This is probably why we haven't seen any critters living in all the cobwebs. He is a shy creature and doesn't like getting his picture taken.  Beautiful blue spots..reminds me of Terisa and Matt's gecko in Had Yuan.

Waterfall Adventures in Eastern Cambodia

Scootering out of Sen Monorom.  Waterfalls, steep trails and red dirt jungle roads.

Angkor Wat Cambodia

Jungle taking back the ruins.

So, Angkor Wat and Siem Reap have changed (of course) since we were last here in 2006. Lots more of a tourist infrastructure in Siem Reap...feeling almost like a more civilized Kho San in Bangkok...we are relaxing along the banks of the Kampot river in sw Cambodia, a truly beautiful spot and at 6 bucks per night cheap.  We share our room with a bunch of Cambodian wildlife inc spiders and bats and something large crapped on Lori's sleeping bag yesterday.  Big changes at Angkor Wat since our last visit...Cambodge looks absolutely rich compared to 8 years ago which is fantastic as these folks are truly wonderful people that have lived through hell.  Its too bad that Angkor has  really been cleaned up...lots of the best old ruins that we visited previously are out of bounds.  None the less biking around was a great experience.  Phnom Phen was a revelation...it is full of tourists, many with kids and or ancient like us.  It is almost like another Bangkok and beer is 25 cents a glass.  We then took a bus from Hell to the mountain town of Sen Monorom where we rented scooters 7 bucks per day, and had a great time exploring some remnant jungle patches and waterfalls.  So it has been good so far.

Kathmandu & Everest!!!

A few days in Pokhara and its time to bus to Kathmandu...the capital of Nepal. Many people hate this place but Lori and I love it...Thamal is a "run down" ramshackle, ancient part of town full of funky stores selling everything one can think of and some great eateries....Nepalese food is fantastic...definately one of the things that have really improved in this country since 2003. We should also mention "power shedding"...another way of saying that there isn't enough electrical output in Nepal to keep the country in power...so every day the power shuts off for up to 10 hours! Imagine trying to run a business etc. without power...but the Nepalese seem to have adapted and have more solar power, independent water generators etc. than any country we have ever been in!

I might as well throw in our overnight visit to Bhaktapur: this city of 80,000 is a World Heritage Site (the entire city) and lies only 15 km from the outskirts of Kathmandu. An absolutely amazing place which consists of the most beautiful old temples and huge rock carvings that date back well over 500 years. What really amazed us is that the entire city is constructed of ancient brick and rock and honestly a good fart would bring down most of the buildings! Given the fact that Nepal has numerous earth quakes it seems inevitable that this city will be destroyed and at a huge cost to the people living in it. In the meantime it is a living legacy to what life must have been like 500 plus years ago...amazing!



EVEREST HIKE

So one of the major reasons we are in Nepal is to torture ourselves with a hike (or trek if your yuppie foreigner!) in the Everest region. The first step is probably the toughest...we decided to fly into Lukla....and this in itself proved to be a tough undertaking. Needless to say after two days of cancelled flights in a very overcrowded KTM (Kathmandu) airport we knew the airport better than we ever wanted to (but it was interesting watching the pigeons fly and shit inside the airport buildings!) The third day proved lucky and we were rewarded with a very bumpy ride in an ancient Canadian twin turbo Otter aircraft into the Lukla air strip. NOW this is an airstrip worthy of note...less than 300 m long, located on the very lip of a 1000 foot cliff and with the strip at a plus 20 percent grade she is interesting to say the least. The pilots put the otter down HARD and uphill you shoot THEN a 90 degree turn (while you are still speeding along!)-slam on the brakes!




Lukla airport





that's Everest in the background with the spindrift


So we are hiking by 11....again there are lots of changes since our Annapurna/Langtang hikes...and in this case we have to say the changes are positive! First of all the lodging is way better quality and same goes for the food! Without going into details we can say that the Everest and Gokyo hikes offer much better mountain scenery that any of the Annapurna hikes (circuit and base camp)....this hike takes in most of the worlds top ten mountains in height. Secondly the hiking is relatively easy with very short days (because of acclimatization) compared to Annapurna. The flip side is that you end up spending much more time at elevations over 4000 meters...not a problem if you can handle elevation but the fact is that any elevations over 4500m are a real bitch (even if you don't get sick, have headaches etc.)...it is really hard to imagine how hard it is to climb even one step at 5000m...literally a 4 inch step every 2 seconds is doing great! Both Lori and I seem to adapt easy to elevation but not so our travelling companions (two very fit young German fellows who had to bail out at 4300m).

Namche Bazaar



lodging on the way


So outside of the elevation issues the other major consideration when hiking is the timing of your hike. We did our hike in late Feb early March...which is out of season. The rewards: virtually no hikers...the downside...insanely cold (minus 25 at 5000m) which truly makes life a bitch after the sun goes down! (Not to mention long drop toilets that are a sheet of ice...enough to make you hold your bladder until your ready to blow! Another down side is that the few, but gorgeous alpine lakes are all frozen over...and not the beautiful picturesque blue shown in all the summer photos. The real downside of hiking during the tourist season is people...literally thousands of people and the resultant dust, traffic, full lodging etc. Bottom line is that you DO NOT want to hike the trails during tourist season (up to 2000 people on the trail at one time.


at the top of Kala Patar



memorial area to Everest climbers

made it!  Everest base camp!

Pokhara...Nepal

Its time to head to Pokhara...tourist bus this time and she is a JOY.  The changes to Pokhara are amazing...all of the small villages we drove through back in 03 are now one large city and new construction is occurring everywhere!  No doubt about it this is the "tourist capital" of Nepal and there are Chinese folks everywhere!  Pokhara is located on Lake Phew the second largest lake in Nepal (and it is small!!) There is lots of do around town and we did a couple of really enjoyable local hikes to the top of some viewpoints.  From here we get a good glimpse into the latest recreational pastime in Pokhara....para-gliding...the skies are full of para-gliders (up to 35 at a time!).  We also rented bikes and pedalled out to some bat caves about 15 km out of town...pretty neat as their are thousands of Horseshoe bats in these caves which also feature a narrow/claustrophobic climb through which I could fit my skinny ass through!

on to Nepal and Chitwan

Hello everyone...we have decided its time to head to Nepal so we book a seat on the Darjeeling Toy Train...running on two foot wide tracks and in operation since 1918 the coal fired train follows the existing road and literally runs down main-streets inches away from buildings etc. Today only two small carriages are attached to the smoking locomotive but the intricate wood work on the roof and velvet lined interior spells back to a time when British Royalty "owned" India. Unfortunately our ride only lasts for 35 km (but 3 plus hours...its a slow carbon filled ride!) as landslides have torn out pieces of the track. From the train we transfer to a jeep for a ride down the "hill of doom"...these drivers are amazing and know this 10 km hill like the back of their hand as there are only a few places that vehicles can pass each other...each hairpin is negotiated by constant blaring of horns and in a few hours we roll onto the flats and the BUDIC (big ugly dirty Indian City) of Silaguri. Come morning we are fortunate to grab a jeep ride to the border...only 30 kms but well over an hour as our 4X4 jeep dodges a seemingly endless morass of potholes.


Checking out of India was a pleasantly easy exercise and across a bridge in a pedal rickshaw (we always feel guilty when riding these rickshaws as they are inevitably powered by a 50lb Indian about 50 years old that has to jump out and push at the first hill!)

Kakarbhitta, Nepal is a typical border town (read: craphole!) and after the Nepalese visa's drained us of all our Indian Rupees and US dollars AND not one of the 3 ATM's in town were working we were more than a little worried as we piled onto a local bus for the ride to Janakpur. Take our word for it...you do NOT want to ride on a local Nepalese bus...as hard as it is to believe this thing is worse than any bus in India. First off the bus stops every 10 to 30 m in the cities (people do not congregate in any single spot and sometimes the bus literally stops every 10 m to pick up someone!) Thus the 8 hr bus ride ended up being well over 10 hrs and there is no way one can leave their seat or it is immediately taken...in which case you stand with well over 40 other people absolutely packed like rats in isles, seating spaces etc. As Dylan would say: "She's a shit show!"

Janakpur is well known for its gorgeous temples and they are indeed impressive...but none of their 4 ATM's worked...so we are down to our last coppers! The bus drivers have taken us under their wing and its a good thing that Mr. Kamikaze gets behind the wheel as the ride to Chitwan National Park is FAST!!

Chitwan is our first taste of the Nepal we came to visit...its changed a lot since our last visit with Terisa in 2003 and the winds of change are creating a "tourist trap" (for instance the lovely beaches along the Rapti River (sunset beer!) are being cut up by a dirty road!!!)...but it is still fantastic and the number of animals we saw is significantly more than in 2003...good job Nepal!!

We took a shortened Jungle walk (shortened because we got hit with an unusual 24 hour monsoon like rain shower that proved that our Indian "gortex" jacket is not only "not breathable" but also "not water resistant"!) None the less we saw Rhino's (the Indian one-horned rhino is my favorite Indian animal and is the fourth largest land mammal in the world) sambar deer, Chital (including 3 huge bucks) deer, Hog deer, Jackal, Mugger crocodiles and lots of new bird species...really nice! Next we spent a day riding pedal bikes into the 20,000 lakes area and again tons of wildlife as well as gorgeous old-growth Sal forest. Our elephant ride revealed 6 rhino's including one mother with a youngster and at least 20 mugger crocodiles, some of which are huge! (not to mention lots of deer and wild boar) The elephant breeding center is still a great place to visit and learn all about the Indian elephant of which only about 150 exist in thewild in Nepal. Again there have been some pretty significant changes since our 2003 visit...the biggest now being that one cannot play with the young elephants like we did "back in the day"! Lori checked out the elephant dung paper making "factory"...how about bear shit paper?...