Potentially taking our final ‘nice bus’ for a while we jump on board at Ho Chi Minh. Border crossings by bus have he potential for suspect extra payments and friends that had travelled through in previous years suggested this might be the case. But as soon as we boarded the bus, we gave in our passports and visa details and didn’t see them again until Cambodia. Our bus ticket came with visa processing too! Happy days. The road into Pheom Peng was relatively smooth. We realised pretty soon that the capital was developing fast, spotting lots of 4x4’s and sports cars. However we opted for a tuk tuk to get us to our hostel, got to keep in budget !

Rs 2 was our hostel and we were really chuffed with our city view room and little balcony! And it was above a knock off Starbucks! Win. After opting for a recommended Ethiopian dinner, we spent the evening exploring on foot, watching some local dancing in 3 forms. A rap show being run by some Americans in a run down mansion, a traditional song and dance show at the cultural centre within he palace walls and then a mass dance off in the city centre where teenagers took to then park dancing in unison to a reel of songs. It was very impressive! The centre of the capital is marked by some long parks and walkways and then a big fancy roundabout, you’re surrounded by brightly lit sky scrapers and you could forget for awhile that you’re in Cambodia to be honest ! We wondered the streets for while but couldn’t find the main tourist hot spot but we were happy just to wonder the ex pat area.

The next day we decided to explore the city further and enthusiastically headed out in the morning to the city pagoda and then onto the market. Soon in we realised that Cambodia was a step up in temperature and within five minutes we were both sweating profusely! Our day exploring was relatively short lived, having to dive into little air conditioned shops. The evening however was a bit more special. On advice from a fellow traveller i signed up to an app that advertises free events and immediately found a free food tour. Olly was pretty skeptical, but we got a message back from the organiser Who was American, and wanted to grow his food tour business into the Cambodian market, and this was a trial run with the picked out restaurants.

We met at a nice brewery and got to know the group. A diverse bunch. A Indian, German, Armenian and A French Guyanan! We headed off after a few beers to a road side stop. We were handed a bowl of lettuce, a plate of rolled and cooked banana leaves, rice noodles and fish sauce and peanut dip. Inside there was a small pouch of pressed fish which was to be removed and rolled up in the lettuce and and dipped in the sauce. Delicious, and also not something we would have tried oursleves. In total we made four stops, including a family bbq, a sandwich not too dissimilar to banh mi and a noodle and live music bar. And all for free ! What a great evening!

The next day the rains had arrived and we grabbed a tuk tuk for the day to see the killing fields and s 21. A very sobering but important place to visit.

From Phneom Peng we headed south to the coast to our first stop Kep. A very low key town on the coast famous for its crab market. We stayed in the forest in little wooden hotel, complete with mosquito net and cold showers. It was perfect for our needs of hiding in the shade in the afternoon. We met a couple and had drinks on the bay with the sun setting which was beautiful. The next day we got our hiking boots back on for a walk up and around a national park. The heat was really on that day! The route took us dense jungle like foliage, and the odd monkey swinging around. We also stopped at a butterfly farm and spent some time relaxing in the shade. After a hard morning hike we ventured down to the water side to watch the locals playing on the beach.

From kep we moved onto Kampot 30 minutes down the road. The town had a very different feel and was more built up. There were some French colonial style buildings surrounding the centre square with the odd Italian restaurant and bar. It seemed a bit odd. The place had a weird feel to it, with a lot of old white men hanging around and not much else going on. We decided on that day that we needed to take a short break from moving on, or we might be at risk of Burning out and not enjoying things around us as much as we had.

That evening we found a cheap and cheerful boat road up the main river to catch a glimpse of the fireflies. The journey itself was beautiful with the sun setting. We headed up the river passing the odd hotel or house but the majority of the river was lined with thick palm trees and hills all around. Really beautiful. The fireflies were cool to see but we did practically reverse into the riverside to see them and one of the guys on the boat caught them in his hand. We headed back to the mainland and found an Italian restauarant to satisfying our western cravings. We sat with a lovely French man and chatted to him most of the evening.

The following morning we jumped on our bus to head further south down the coast to Sihanoukville to a little place Olly had found that was a bit more up market ! The bus journey there was a good example of Asian driving. Overtaking whenever possible and only putting his seat belt on when he reached the main town and there was a possibility of cops! The town has an interesting feel right now. There is a mass of construction going on, with the Chinese building south east asias biggest golf course, the locals who own little hotels and bars are worried that they’ll loose their places soon. Compiled with the fact they have a huge litter problem in the town, there isn’t lots going for this place right now! The main attraction for tourists here is the port for connections to a small set of islands.

Having said that we enjoyed our time in the hotel, and on the beach. One evening we took bikes down to the bars for a little pub crawl, which made cycling back in the dark pretty difficult. Apparently we had pizza and then went onto another bar where we got free beer.. I remember very little of that part of the night!