To our final destination
We woke up fairly early today. This was because we had a bus to Siem Reap to catch at around 8:30am. Mat and I gathered all of our things together in preparation, then had breakfast at the hostel. Once we had finished, we picked our stuff up from our room, and checked out of the hostel. Thankfully, the bus station is only a short walk away from the hostel, so there was no worry about getting there. The bus station was hot, dusty, and pretty crowded. We had our tickets, so we just had to go to the booth to be told which bus it was, and also get a free bottle of water. I really like that, cos I’m definitely gonna need it!
Even though they pointed out the bus, they were all identical, so we still had to ask the bus drivers. After a bit of deliberating, we got the correct bus that would take us to Siem Reap. The bus was fairly small and cramped, especially with Mat sitting next to me. I’m thankful that for the first couple of hours, I was able to sleep through the heat and fatigue that accompanies most bus journeys in Asia. The most annoying thing on buses, is when I have to sit next to Mat. We both like to sit with our legs quite far open. This means that our legs are always touching, and when it’s hot, our legs are always sweating. The same thing happens with elbows too.
The home of Angkor Wat
During the bus ride, I made sure to take advantage of every break. This was because it gave me time to cool down (somewhat) and dry off (from the sweat). I also jumped at the opportunity to have more pineapple! The bus to Siem Reap from Phnom Penh took around 6 hours or so in total. It’s not the longest, but it sure was one of the hottest, especially when the aircon is a dud. After dropping some folks off, we were the last stop. Once we’d disembarked the bus, we were greeted by many taxi drivers in a dusty bus station. We were constantly tailed by taxi drivers, but were adamant we were going to use Grab. Eventually we just went with one of the taxi drivers here. With our bus to Siem Reap in the rear-view mirror, we drove towards our final hostel in Cambodia.
The hostel we stayed in was actually recommended to us by Mischa, who had previously stayed here. It was actually a very nice hostel, with good facilities, and very good staff. They were excellent at discussing the different options for Angkor Wat tours. The hostel is called Bokre Angkor Hostel, check it out here. We went to our dorm room, which was pretty cosy, and chilled out for a bit. The bus to Siem Reap really took it out of us. Once we’d recuperated our energy, we headed out for some food.
Pub street
I looked at the map, and we headed towards where I thought the centre would be. As we were heading that way, I saw an Indian restaurant. We’d not eaten Indian food for some time, so I thought we could change things up. It was slightly pricey, but you usually get some good food from authentic places, like we did in Ho Chi Minh City. As predicted, the curry and naan bread were extremely delicious, well worth the price and the establishment. We were the only ones eating at the place, but the furnishings were nice. Here’s our experience in Ho Chi Minh with the night life.
After we had finished our meal, we were absolutely stuffed, but had to make a move. As we encroached upon the centre of the area, we noticed an abundance of Indian restaurants, ours wasn’t the only one! The most noticeable feature of this area was ‘Pub Street’; a long road with only pubs and bars along the sides. It was quite cool as most of the bars were open to the street, they didn’t have an outside wall. Plus, no traffic was allowed through this area.
On the way back to the hostel, we upheld our tradition of visiting a shopping centre and supermarket. It’s always so exciting! I decided to invest in a large pack of jam & cream cakes for the road. Mat will always get something too, then we swap and share our own treats. Afterwards, we had a short walk back to our hostel where we proceeded to chill for the night. We are visiting Angkor Wat tomorrow, so it’s an early start!
