Riding the Norri train

From Battambang

From Battambang

Battambang - Norri trains

After leaving the beach I headed back to Phnom penh for one day before getting an early bus over to Battambang.

The bus journey was very beautiful with a much better road than before and Cambodia still seems really flat compared to Laos .  We found a great cheap hotel only paying 3$ a night for 2 of us, although it was right on the top and had to climb lots of stairs to get there which was a bit of a pain if you forgot something!  The town has a really nice feel to it and I spent the first afternoon wandering around and looking at the strange statues they have around it, no idea why!  While we were looking at a temple some monks came over and asked us to join us so we spent a few hours chatting with the monks so they could practice their English which was pretty good! It was really interesting talking to them about Cambodia and school, and they gave us a tour of the temple too.

The next day we hired a tuk tuk for the day and headed out to see some of the temples around Battambang and ride on the bamboo trains. We decided to head out to Phnom Sampeau first not realising that the temple was on top hill with a 2km climb in the mid day heat!  The drive out was along a big dusty track road we got covered in red dust! and all along the side of the road everything was covered in a red coating all the trees and houses, it gave a crazy view from the top of the temple this red strip along the green.  We stopped half way up the climb to look at the Killing Caves that Kymer Rouge used, over 10,000 people were killed in the caves, its a really eerie place.

After another dusty ride back we went to see the Norri trains, the trains are a light bamboo frame  on 2 wheel shafts powered by a tiny engine.  The trains run along a single track so if you meet another train coming the other way you have to jump off your train and dismantle it on the side so the train can pass!  I was surprised at how fast the trains ran along the tracks, however it was full of tourists apparently they only run for tourist groups now as the locals prefer to use the bus which is a shame as the cost of going on the train is very high.  I guess its due to all the big buses of tour groups that come down from Siem Reip and can pay a lot of money to ride the trains. 


That evening we went too see a circus performance.  There is a school - Phare Ponleu Selpak which is a multi arts centre for children and they put on performances in the week.  It was a pretty good show lots of acrobatics and some fire juggling, I think the best bit was the guy doing back flips in a skipping roap on fire! pretty impressive for teenagers.


osdfsd

Scrambled egs and cheese

literally! was joking that it might be a slice of cheese on top and it was!

Independance beach

From Sihanoukville

Lots of Monks came down to the beach for a swim at sunset.

Sihanoukville

Sihanoukville wasn't what I expected, I had heard stories about it being full of drunken backpackers and lots of partying and that the beaches were damaged in the recent typhoon, so I was quite suprised to get there and find it pretty quiet with some amazing beaches. 

Sihanoukville is a small town made up of lots of beaches around the headland with a massive port at one end and lots of small fishing boats speeding around. The town has a few different parts that has lots of backpacker bars and resturants but I guess its not peak season yet as it was quite quiet in the evenings.  I hired a moped for the 2 days as I thought this was the best way to get around the beaches and its far too hot to cycle.  Mopeds are defo the way to go, almost considering trading my speedy bike in for one when I get home! 

The water was really warm and very calm so I spent a lot of time just floating around in the sea which was very blue and white sand my favourite beach was Sukhoa, although a massive hotel had claimed most of the beach as part of the hotel, so you couldn't go in all of it, there was a public bit which was lovely and quiet to sit on, just some men fishing and a few tourists and amazing sunsets!  Perfect to spend a few days just relaxing by the sea.  On our last evening we attempted a pub crawl along the beach but we didn't get very far as the sea came in and we ended up climbing across the rocks to get from bar to bar so just gave up, but lovely to sit in a bar and watch the sea come in. 

Photos of Kampot

Kampot

Photos of Rabbit Island

Rabbit Island

Tequila!

Sun set on the Island

boat to Ko Tonsay

Kampet & Ko Tonsay (Rabbit Island)

After the hecticness of Phnom Penh it was nice to escape to to the quite beaches of Southern Cambodia.  The bus ride was really beautiful lots of flat rice fields with farmers ploughing with cows instead of the water buffalo used in Laos.  I got to Kampot late in the day and it was dark as I had missed the early bus.  I met some people that were headed off to Ko Tonsay the next day and decided to tag along. 

Ko Tonsay is a small island just off Kep on the Southern coast, you can walk around the island in about 2 hours which we did but there wasn't that much to see just lots of seaweed!  There was a small local village and they seemed to be collecting all of the seaweed but we couldn't work out what they used it for.  We stayed on a big beach that had a few beach huts and restaurants on it but only had electricity from 6-10pm at night so no all night parties!  The sea at night had the most amazing glowing plantain which move when you swim in the water, they were so bright i think it was due to the fact there were no lights on the Island.  The second night we had a big party as we there was an American girl in her group and it was Thanksgiving.  We had a big meal consisting of 2 whole chickens bbq (with their heads still on) potatoes and vegs (for me) and then a big fire and far too much tequila from these amazing little bamboo glasses.

Once I got back to the mainland I spent an extra day just exploring Kampet, the town had a strange feel about it, sort of run down but everyone seemed quite happy going about their business and you didn't see many westerners which was nice for a change!  Kampet is near the Bokor national park which has an amazing old ruin of a french hotel & casino on the hill, unfortunately a private company have purchased the land and are building a new massive hotel complex next to it so you have to do a day trek up to see it which was too expensive for me to do, so I just hung out in Kampet for the afternoon.

Photos of Phnom Penh

Phnom Penh

Phnom Penh

I really enjoyed Phnom Penh after hearing mixed reviews of it I wasn't sure what to expect, but it had a good feeling about it (well apart from the pretty grotty area on lakeside) and the traffic wasn't as manic as I thought.  The first day i spent exploring the markets and the riverside which was very beautiful, lots of old French buildings amongst the crazy chaos and I braved a very scarey motorbike taxi ride down to the Russian market to part with lots of money for more tourist tat - I almost need another bag to carry it all in!  Thankfully I survived the journey there and back, but the driver did scare me by driving the wrong way down one of the main streets, seeing the cities traffic coming at you whilst your on a teeny bike isn't fun!  The lakeside area is a bit grotty but has some really nice cafes, the government are gradually filling in the lake so they can build on it and they have already paid off all the hostels to move but that hasn't happened yet so the hostel owners are still making money on all the backpackers but aren't doing any repairs or taking care of the buildings so the rooms are pretty run down and the lanes are full of Nigerian drug dealers and touting tuk tuk drivers!  Walking down it is pretty tireing just consists of lots of 'no thankyou's to get passed everyone!

I spent one day visiting Killing fields and S-21, I thought it was important to go and see these monuments to try and understand the history of Cambodia but I wasn't quite prepared for how hard the prison was to go round.  The fields of Choeung Ek are situated just outside the city and are where prisoners were taken to be murdered after being tortured in S-21 for many months.  S-21 - Tuol Sleng is an old school that was turned into a prision and was used by Khmer Rouge.  I wasn't quite sure what to expect at the museum and was very shocked at what images were there, there were a lot of photographs of what was found when the prison was liberated, and also photographs of all the people that passed through the prison, from the very young to very old.  It was very hard to see but I was glad that I went.

Arriving in Cambodia

At first Cambodia didn't feel any different from Laos but it was much flatter and the roads were a little less bumpy.  I was headed straight for Phnom Penh but we stopped at a really beautiful little place called Krati on the way down.  The driver drove straight into the middle of the town and round this tiny market square almost squashing the stores, we couldn't work out what he was doing but turned out his mate had a restaurant and hostel and he was trying to take us all there, very funny.  After an interesting lunch of packet noodles and vegetables we set off again.  The journey was only supposed to take a few hours but at 9pm we were still driving and still had the people that were headed to Siem Riep on the bus, finally we stopped somewhere (outside another hotel) and they got off to wait for another bus.  I think the idea is to make it as late as possible so that when they change buses people get fed up and just stay in the hostel and go in the morning, clever!   Finally we got to Phnom Penh at around 10pm that evening it was a very long day!  Not sure if it was good or not but when we arrived in the city another of the drivers friends met us off the bus and took us to his hostel which was very close and turned out to be on lakeside which is backpacker central and by that point we didn't care where we stayed!

Bye bye Laos

So its time to leave Laos which I am very sad about, I really loved Laos, both the scenery and the people, especially the fact that if you wanted to eat - best order when you start to feel a bit peckish rather than when yo are starving as it can take up to 1hr for the food to arrive with the owners having to do a trip to the shops or anther restaurant.

I left Laos the same way I entered with a broken down bus at the border, although this time the bus broke down with the border in the distance so the whole bus was able to get off and walk instead of waiting for them to repair it, it must have been a funny sight a whole bus of backpackers walking down this long straight road in the sun!  The border crossing was pretty painless apart from all the bribes that we had to pay - one for it being Saturday, another for taking our temperature (incase we had swine flu) and another one just because they could, some French guys in front of me argued with the guys on the border and were asking for receipts for the money, I think they ended up only having to pay for one of them but I didn't want to argue with the border people so just paid the money and headed for Cambodia!

4000 Islands Photos

4000 Islands

4000 Islands

After a hectic couple of days in Pakse i set off for the 4000 islands to spend a day or 2 chilling in the hammocks.  The islands are supposed to be one of the most laid back places in Laos where nothing much happens.  I headed to the Island of Don Det which was apparently where all the parties etc happen but it was still relatively quiet as high season is in a week or so so it was easy to find somewhere cheap to stay and pretty quiet on the Island. You can cycle round the Island in less than an hour but we had pretty terrible bikes and the roads were mostly sand tracks so it took a while, I also crossed to Dong Kong which was the next island down and the French had built a bridge linking the two islands together.  There was the remains of train tracks and also a rusty old train on the island from when the French thought that they could build links between Cambodia and China for importing goods but it never happened.  Don Det is also a good place to see Dolphins but I didn't have time for day trip so just enjoyed the sunsets instead.

Fruit sellers

big waterfall near pakse

 

huge waterfalls near Pakse, we climbed down a very steep path to try and get a better view which probably wasn't the best idea as it was marked ''dangerous''

Wat Champasak

 

strange buddah sat in a tree

saw this on the side of the road on our drive down, strange seeing such a big statue just by the side of the road in some trees

Ferry across the Mekong

Pakse

I arrived in Pakse at 6am after a very sleepless night on the sleeper bus which was very cramped as its made for small people not big westerners, but I did get to watch the sunrise which was very beautiful!  The landscape is very different here from the north its much flatter.


I met a French girl on the bus and she was heading down to see the Wat on a motorbike so I hired one too and joined her to drive down Wat Champasak and see the old temple, it was a bit of a long drive down there with some crazy traffic to negotiate as well.  At one point we had to cross the Mekong river and needed to put the bikes onto a ferry - well Ii say ferry more of 2 boats strapped together with some planks so you could push the bikes onto it, was a little unstable but went across the river pretty quick.  The landing was very odd the path went straight through a Wat so we had to drive around the temple to get onto the road - so relaxed!  
Champasak was a very small little town, strange to think it used to be a royal capital until very recently but looked pretty deserted and run down. 

The temple was really impressive even though it was mostly ruins and no where near as big as Anchor but interesting to see, just a shame that the part that used to house old statues had been replaced with a big golden Buddah.  There was also an interesting rock with an crocodile carved into it which they think was used for sacrifices to the gods.  

Pakse

Piccys of Vientiane

Ventienne

Strange buddah park

Very odd place just on the outskirts of Vientiane.

Photos from Vang Vieng

Uploaded some piccys here

Vientiane

After Vang Vieng it was quite nice to spend a few days exploring Vientiane.  It didn't really feel like a capital city more like a big town as it didn't have any high rise buildings but its actually quite big.  I wandered around the main monuments and markets which were crazily hot! The city has some strange old French monuments and one which is a Laos version of the Arch de triumph very bizarre!  The second day I hired a moped and headed out to the 'buddah park' which is a very strange park that is full of random statues of Buddahs and hindu gods comissioned by a guy in the 70's, the most random of all is a massive concrete pumpkin like ball that is hollow with 3 levels in the middle full of strange statues that you can climb, very odd!  


That evening I got on a sleeper bus down to Pakse.  The bus was a bit different to the last one I took in China as it had double beds so I had to share with another girl which wasn't too bad but I coudn't lie flat so it was a bit cramped for the 12 hour journey! I was just glad I wasn't downstairs at the back as that was very cramped and very hot!

Vang Vieng

I wasn't sure what to expect from Vang Vieng, all I heard about it was the tubing injurys that people ended up so I was only planning to stop off for a day or so, go climbing and head onto Vientine. 6 days later and I have just managed to leave!  I found a really chilled out hostel to stay in, it had only been open a month and had a sort of tree house for a dorm where all the beds were on different levels in one big open area, it was really cool, although not advisable to get too drunk when staying on one of the upper levels!  it also had a good common area with some very comfy hammocks looking out onto the amazing hills behind.

Vang Vieng is a really beautiful place its just a shame that tubing is all people associate with it and all people head there for.  I did some climbing the first morning I was there which was really good fun but very exhausting, this time the guide showed me how to do all the knots and ropes etc so it was more than just climbing up and down!  Luckily I went in the morning so avoided all the noise from the tubing which takes over the river in the afternoon.  I did 2 days tubing which was probably enough, there are guys there that have been in Vang Vieng for over 1 year, tubing every day - what a waste of a year!  


I spent 2 days tubing which was more than enough, the first day I didnt manage to do much tubing just lots of bar hopping and zip lines, luckily I got back in a tuk tuck just before 6 so got my deposit back, most people 'mislay'their tubes or kids take them back and get the deposit.  The second day I actually managed to tube the entire river which was really beautiful but far too long to tube down, all the bars are in the first section then the rest of the hour and a half is just river and rapids!


One day I managed to get out of the hammock and cycle to see the 'blue lagoon'and caves (well didnt see the caves but got to the lagoon).  The limestone gives the appearance of a blue river which was quite cool, but it was far too hot to cycle! 

Photos from Luang Nam Tha

Some pics of Luang Nam Tha and treking are here

Off to Vang Vieng

Well the journey to Vang Vieng didn't go quite as planned, I was leaving Hanna and Cajsa at the bus station and they were heading east over to Vietnam.  We all got to the bus station and they got on a lovely air con mini bus and I ended up with a very local bus that looked as if it wouldn't get out of the bus station!  Once we were on our way it became apparent that the bus didn't have any air con and the door didn't shut so all the dust from the tracks went straight into the bus, it was like a red sandstorm inside!.  As normal we broke down a couple of times and went a break neck speed down the winding road, I was due to get into Vang Vieng at 1am so when we got into Luang Prabang I decided that I would jump off the bus and spend the night there before continuing my journey the next day, the idea of wandering around Vang Vieng trying to find somewhere to stay wasn't too appealing.

The next morning I was able to catch a mini bus, it was total luxury compared to the bus the day before but was full of backpackers not locals.  The drive to Vang Vieng was amazing, the road wound up for the first half to go across the valley and then down in the second part, thankfully the driver wasn't going that fast as I thought the girl next to me was going to throw up!We arrived in Vang Vieng in the afternoon, the town isn't much to look at as it's full of western tourists who go there for tubing but the surrounding area is very beautiful, hopefully it wont be too hot in the day to do anything!

Jungle Trekking - Kayaks

Jungle Trekking - Kayaking

Kayaking was really good fun, I was in a boat with the French girl and we were about the same size so pretty well matched for paddling.  The guide didn't give us any instruction just said off you go and we got into the Kayaks, they were big inflatable ones rather than the molded ones we went in in Luang Prabang but they were easy enough to paddle around.  We went down quite a lot of rapids which was lots of fun although we did get stuck on lots of rocks and ram each other going down, we only capsized once in the whole day when I was steering and we got stuck on a very big rock.

We stopped off at a couple of villages on the way down, one of the villages was of Chinese descent and the villagers looked totally different to the local Laos tribes, apparently there was some fighting between the two tribes and if you married into another tribe you were disowned.  

The scenery down the river was amazing and it was so quiet, it was a much better idea than walking back!  

Jungle Trekking - too much Lao Lao

Jungle Trekking - drinking Lao Lao with the chief

Scarey Lao bridge

 

Scarey Laos bridge we all decided we would try and cross.  Michelle got the furthest at a little over half way but then it started to make cracking noises

Jungle Trekking - Crazy caterpillars sleeping

 

A mass of fluffy poisonous caterpillars all sleeping on a tree

Jungle Treking - Lunch local style

Jungle Trekking & Kayaking

Today we headed off jungle trekking, there was 8 of us in the group, 4 Americans, 2 Sweedish, 1 French and me so a good mix, but unusual to have so many Americans in one group.  The trek was for a days walking through the jungle to a small village where we would stay the night and then the next day kayak down the river back to Luang Nam Tha.  The trek went through the Nam Tha national park which has lots of different tribes living there and is protected by the government, villages are only supposed to be visited once or twice a week but I think most villages get more as the tour companys can make more money that way. 


Once we had all grabbed our parcle of banana leaves and sticky rice we set off in a tuk tuk up to the village where we picked up our local guide and set off into the jungle.  Apparently there are tigers and lots of other wildlife living in the jungle but we didn't see much, I think it might have been due to all the noise we were making!  We only walked about 10k the first day but we had to cross a large hill, so the morning was all up hill and the afternoon all down hill, and it was incredibly hot so we were glad it wasn't a fast pace!

We stopped for lunch in a bamboo hut where the guide set out a table of banana leaves and some cooked vegis and fish to have with our sticky rice.  The vegis were good and there was a lovely spicy aubergine salsa to go with it.  Once we had all stuffed ourselves we set off down the jungle to visit a small village.  None of the villages were accessible by road so the villagers had to walk for about 2hours to the town if they needed any supplies and then carry it all back.  The village we visited was empty apart from a few kids running around as most of the people were out working in the fields.


We set off again to the village that we were staying in for the night, the village was very small and quite a poor village, but the government and the money from us tourists coming to visit was enabling them to  build a new village down stream a bit with another tribe living near buy to create a larger community.  We stayed in our own big bamboo hut just at the end of the village and the villagers took turns in cooking dinner for the groups which was a way of sharing out the wealth.


The dinner that evening was great, some pumpkin soup, sticky rice, spicy tomato sauce with a very hot red salsa to go with it, and of course some Lao Lao moonshine to wash it all down!  The chief and an elder from the village joined us for dinner along with the guides and we got to chat with them for a while which was really interesting.  After dinner we all sat aroudn the fire for a while before sleeping in our shack.  I dont think any of us realised quite how cold it got in the jungle as it was freezing that night and not many of us slept!


The next morning we got up and de-frosted ourselves around the fire before having a breakfast of omlettes with sticky rice (by this time I was sick of sticky rice and not looking forward to more meals!) and then heading out on our Kayaks.

Proper noodle soup Laos style

Lao style bridge

Cycling Luang Nam Tha

Photos of Mung Noi

Ive uploaded some more pics of the village here

Luang Nam Tha

Luang Nam Tha is a small town near the China and Thai border on the edge of the Nam Tha national park.  The town was full of very big cars, some expensive BMW's and big houses, apparently its all the Chinese that have come across the boarder and are making money from exporting all the teak.  I was still traveling with the Swedish lasses and also met an American couple on the bus, we all decided to do a trek together but we had a couple of days wait before the trek. 


We hired mountain bikes and decided to head off and explore the villages but didn't get very far as the bikes were very uncomfortable on the dirt tracks and it was very hot in the day.  We did come across a few small villages with some teeny bridges that they were riding motorbikes across, we decided to walk as didn't fancy our chances of cycling across them!  Once we stopped for lunch we didnt make it out again, think I've seen enough small villages and rice paddies!

Crazy Knife Man

Leaving Mung Noi

After 2 days of chilling in the hammocks I started to get itchy feet, I wanted to head up river some more but there weren't any local boats and it was really expensive to hire boats so I decided to head over to Udomassi and then up to Luang Nam Tha.  Hanna and Cajsa were also thinking of heading that way too so we all jumped on a boat down river to catch the bus in Mung Khiaw.  This time we were on a little local boat and had a bit of a surprise when we passed a calf swimming in the river and suddenly all the locals started shouting and some jumped on the roof, the boat turned around and i thought they were going to rescue the calf but these massive knives appeared and it turned out they were going to kill the calf.  The next thing the boat had landed and all the men got off and started running after the calf, luckily they didnt catch it as I didn't much fancy sharing the tiny boat with a dead cow!  Finally the boat driver went after the men and got them back into the boat.  Guess thats the fun of local boats!

The bus ride to Luang Nam Tha was pretty uneventful but lots of bad roads so very bunmpy!  We all ended up on a mini bus with lots of other tourists and the driver took us straight to Nam Tha instead of Udomasi but we did end up getting ripped off for the price!





 

Chillin in the hammocks

Trecking across the rice fields

Surrounding Mung Noi there were some smaller villages that are connected by paths through the rice paddies, we went for a bit of an explore one afternoon and came across some locals beating the rice after harvesting it.  They invited us to help and laughed lots at us as we couldn't lift as much as them!  

The views across the rice fields were stunning and very quiet as there was just farmland and small villages with no cars or motorbikes.  We went exploring for a waterfall but gave up then found out that it was another 3 hours walk from the little villages which was a bit much in the heat!

Nong Khiaw

We landed at Nong Khiaw in the afternoon and found some little bamboo bungalows looking over the river.  It was a bit hot to go exploring so we just sat around and looked at the view across the river of the hills.  We spent a couple of days chilling by the river before going up river on a boat to Mung Noi, 1 hour north.  Mung Noi is a small village that is only accessible by road and has electricity between 6-10pm every day, and full of guest houses and resturants but no people which was a bit strange, but I think its just before high season at the moment.  We found a lovely place on the river with a bamboo hut and lots of hammocks to chill in, the owner was really sweet. 

Nong Khiaw & Mung Noi

After hanging out in Luang Prabang for a few days Hanna, Cajsa and I headed up the Nam Ou on a slow boat to Nong Khiaw.  We wanted to get on a local boat and spent a while checking out when boats went from the jetty by speaking to the locals, it looked really promising when we turned up the next morning until the boat loaded up and was full of tourists!  I think that most of the locals now take the bus up to Nong Khiaw as its faster and cheaper, however we did pick up a local guy with some bags of rice half way up so it did sort of turn into a local boat.  The boat ride was really beautiful going through lots of valleys and passed little villages with lots of fisherman around, luckily we had cushions on the wooden seats otherwise 6 hours would have been a bit much!

We landed at Nong Khiaw in the afternoon and found some little bamboo bungalows looking over the river.  It was a bit hot to go exploring so we just sat around and looked at the view across the river of the hills.  We spent a couple of days chilling by the river before going up river on a boat to Mung Noi, 1 hour north

Lao Lao Wiskey

Back packers on the move

Mung Khia

Photos from Luang Prabang

I've uploaded some pics from Luang Prabang and Muang Khia here

Kayaking in Luang Prabang

Laos and Luang Prabang

Laos and Luang Prabang

River traffic

Slow boat up the Nam Ou

Our boat for a 6 hour journey, luckily there were cushions on the wooden seats!

Nam Ou river

Pho Laos style

Hmm noodle soup with no meat - sure thats big bits of liver