Cambodia

All the reports we'd heard from friends who'd been to Cambodia pretty much amounted to - "You HAVE to go to Angkor Wat" and "Cambodia is poor as fcuk"...from our 5 day jaunt I think they were spot on. The journey from Saigon to Phnom Penh was a bit of a struggle because once we crossed the border the roads almost instantly turned from fairly decent roads to dirty, bumpy roads...welcome to Cambodge!

We found ourselves a cool little hostel near the lake which was choc-full of backpacker comforts - DVD player, Bar (50 cent a beer), Restaurant, Internet Cafe etc. We organised for a tuk-tuk driver to bring us on a day-long tour of the city including trips to the Killing Fields, S-21 Prison and the Rushian Market but he got really stroppy when we declined his invitation to go to a shooting range where you can fire rocket launchers and grenades (at $200 a pop) at cows ($50 a pop which you need to purchase from a local farmer) - after firing an AK-47 in Vietnam I think our bloodlust was satisfied enough.

The Killing Fields are a bit grim to be honest. What would astound as much as the piles of skulls & bones is the reasoning Pol Pol provided for killing an estimated 2 million of his own people. You were killed if the Khmer Rouge didn't like you, if you didn't work yourself to the bone, if you were educated, if you spoke Vietnamese, if you had a Vietnamese friend...it looks like you had to try pretty hard just to stay alive!

The notorious Tuol Sleng prison (known as S-21), an old high school converted into a prison to house, interrogate and torture prisoners (prior to them being sent to the killing fields), is a pretty bare, run-down site which shows little signs of the horrific acts which went on there. The most interesting sight there is probably the room full of hundreds of photos of men, women and children who passed through the prison on their way to the killing fields.

Because we needed to make it back to Bangkok by the 10th August to collect our stolen credit cards (kindly brought over to us by Walshy's buddy Mark) we could only spend 5 days in Cambodia so we belted on to Siem Reap pretty quickly. The only sight worth getting off your lazy ass for in Siem Reap are the temples at Angkor, built in the 12th century by the Khmer empire, Angkor Wat is the the worlds largest religious building and some of the minor temples have been used in the tomb raider movies. I did spend 8 hours trying to track down a seat that Angelina Jolie may have sat down on after a particularly sweaty scene but no luck..

What may even surpass Angkor Wat is the Angkor What? bar, it's a great spot for a ridiculous session & practically every available space is covered in graffiti, a touch of class.

The journey from Siem Reap to the Cambodian-Thai border was hell on earth. Crappy little bus, no air-con, non-stop bumps and a monster hangover..horrible stuff. We'll never learn though, the urge to get hammered ahead of a 12 hour bus trip in the sun is always too much for us...it's time to hit the beaches of Thailand & get re-acquainted with an old friend, buckets of super-strength whiskey & coke.

Good Morning Vietnam!

After the madness of Beijing, Hong Kong & Shanghai we didn't think we could find a more crazy city but Hanoi definitely tops the lot. It's the only city we've been in where you are genuinely taking your life in your own hands every time you cross the road, it's lunacy. There are 3 million people in Hanoi yet there are 5 million motorbikes so you can imagine how crazy the streets are. That said the old quarter, where were stayed, is really lively with loads of bars, restaurants, copied DVD shops (where I had a bit of a splurge on box-sets..) and little makeshift road-side bars selling the local brew, Bia Hoi for 2,000 VND a glass (about $0.12) - at that price you can't go far wrong.

We visited the Hoa Loa prison (also known as the "Hanoi Hilton") which was interesting as much for the blatant propaganda as much as anything else. The prison, built by the French at the turn of the century, previously held many Vietnamese political prisoners and they really went into minute detail on the abuse they suffered at the hands of the French. Fair enough, can't begrudge them that but they go overboard on how well they supposedly treated the American POWs with hugely exaggerated pictures of them cooking, playing guitar, reading letters from their loved ones and attending lessons in the prison. It has since emerged the prison was a site of numerous acts of torture, beatings, broken bones and teeth, dislocated limbs and medical neglect of infections. Although you do occassionally meet some really nice locals here I wouldn't trust most of them as far as I could throw them...on average they try to rip you off 5-6 times a day. I can understand that even a few $ here or there can go a long way for them but it gets on your nerves after a while..my tolerance of their sneaky ways varies depending on how drunk I am..

Walshy & myself are "shackled"...

We managed to grab tickets (..by paying over the odds as usual) to the Asian Cup quarter final between Australia & Japan. Even though the ref had a dodgy game the biggest mistake of the evening was made by the tournament organisers who criminally underrated the drinking capacity of the Aussies, the place was literally drunk dry before the game had even kicked off! The game eventually went to penalties with the Japs running out as deserved victors. We had 2 near crashes on our motorbike ride back from the stadium, Vietnamese motorbike drivers are like Valentino Rossi rushing to get to the toilet!


While in Hanoi we went on a 2-day cruise of the beautiful Halong Bay which is inhabited by nearly 2,000 limestone islands (several of which are hollow with enormous caves inside). We spend the two days kayaking, diving into the sea off the beat and getting lashed with a load of Aussies who were in Vietnam for the game. Money well spent I reckon. Halong Bay is now in the running to be one of the new 7 Natural Wonders of the World (up against the likes of the Great Wall of China, Mount Kilimanjaro & the Great Barrier Reef) - as nice as it is I reckon it'll struggle to make the cut - www.natural7wonders.com.

After Hanoi we hopped on a 12hr night bus to Hue (mainly because we didn't have the stomach for the 18hr bus directly to Hoi An!). The best thing we did in Hue was to hire a local fella, Tu, drive us around the countryside on his motorbike taking in as many sight as possible the best of which was probably an old US Army bunker at the top of the highest hill in Hue which has a great panoramic view of the city...he also took us on the lash with his buddies and we ended up screaming the night away at a local karaoke bar.

Boozing it up with Tu (far left) and his cronies

View from US Army Bunker, Hue

After Hue we headed on to Hoi An (only a 5hr bus..nice wan) where we spent 3-4 days chilling on the beach, getting suits made and getting lashed. Hoi An was a bit more chilled out than the rest of the places we visited in Vietnam and was probably my personal favourite.

Once we got kitted out with our suits (I ended up getting a load of stuff made but at those prices you'd be a fool not to) and got them shipped home we hopped on the bus to Nha Trang. Yet again it was a 12hr night bus but this one was a little different. We had the worst seats on the bus (they didn't even recline) and were hitting bumps that would lift you out of your seat every 10 minutes...horrible stuff. I guess if you only pay $22 to travel over 1,000km you'll get what you pay for. Nha Trang was a bit of a disappointment to be honest, mainy because we were looking forward to a few days on the beach but it was overcast or raining the entire time

After Nha Trang we continued down the coast to Ho Chi Minh City (although still largely known as Saigon to the locals). After trawling the narrow backstreets of Pam Ngu Lao (the main backpacker area) we eventually found a guest house that had two beds the only downside was that we had to lug our gear up 7th flights of stairs & there was a smell of stale cheese in the entire building..luckily we didn't have to pay extra for this feature. After a messy night in a club called Go2 (where they had no problem with us drinking a bottle of vodka bought from a 7-Eleven as long as we bought mixers there) we rose bleary-eyed and headed out to the Cu Chi tunnels which, during the Vietnam War, was the makeshift residence for hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese eager not to have their bits blown up by over-zealous US bombers. As ever the Vietnamese are mad to cash in on increasing tourism and have actually widened the tunnels to allow for more "robust" western frames. You really get a feel for how tough it must have been for them to live down there for months on end. With even a couple of people down there the temperature is really high mainly due to body heat & they are really claustrophobic. After checking out the tunnels we went to the shooting range where we both shot an AK-47 although at $1 a bullet our budgets couldn't stretch to trying out the rest of the guns on offer.