In the words of the eternal Nicki Minaj, I kept chanting, 'Let's go to the beach, each, let's go get away!' and as if by magic, we were transported to the beach town of Sihanoukville. Our hotel was right next Ochheauteal Beach, although this was very crowded during the day.
We threw our bags in the rooms, shoved our cosies on, and headed for the beach. Opting for a more exclusive beach, a few of us went to Otres Beach. This was relatively quiet, and peaceful until a pack of Cambodian women suddenly descended upon us, trying to get us to buy their wares. You could get manicures, or legs threaded, massages etc.
It was quite interesting chatting to some of the younger ones. They told me their life story and their dreams for the future. All of them wanted to study tourism at school, and practice their English. Again, it seems to be if you speak English in Cambodia, you are more likely to get the better paid jobs. I liked one of them, called Ocean, who gave me an anklet as a good luck charm. I gave her some money and took a bracelet and wished her well.
You are also joined by more unexpected guests, like this little guy below. He came and sat with me for a while.
We got back to the hotel, changed, and headed out for a couple of drinks at the local beach. It was actually Australia Day, and there were quite a few Aussies around on the beach playing with some Cambodian children. It looked like fun, but in reality, those kids shouldn't be at the beach at all. You get a lot of them wanting you to buy dodgy fireworks and postcards. By giving them money, they will never see any of it, and be forced to beg more by an adult. There are a few projects I would like to get involved with to help stop these situations, and will look into it when I settle down in Sydney.
The next day we headed to an island paradise. We had initially booked with an agent who had met us on the beach the night before, but he failed to turn up on time. We flagged a tuk tuk and raced down to the harbour at Serendipity Beach to get the ferry to Koh Rong Samloem. When we arrived, it turned out we were at the wrong island, and had an hour to wait on Koh Rong. This is what greeted us there:
This island looked like a party island, and was full of very chilled out people. Lots of 'happy' cake places too :)
Getting back on the boat for twenty minutes, we reached our final destination aka paradise. The following images have not been altered.
This island seemed to only have beach huts and two restaurants, with a small shop. It was very secluded and hardly anyone was around. We found a spot and basked in the sun, swam in the clear turquoise waters and ate coconut crackers.
Adam, an architect by trade, even built a mini Angkor Wat, which my budgie took pride of place on.
We went for lunch in one of the restaurants, and being fed up of noodles and rice, I opted for a chicken burger. It was so yummy! This was our view from next to the restaurant.
Leaving the beach behind, we headed back for one more night in Phnom Penh and then onto the Vietnamese border for the second half of our trip.
