Final Days in Siem Reap

Saturday 13th of Feb saw us leave Seam Reap after a stay of six nights. 

We had a terrific time in Seam Reap and spread our 3 day Angkor ticket over 5 days so we didn’t get ‘temple fatigue’. In the middle we had time to find someone to weld the other front rack (which had began to crack), explore the town and its MANY bars, and meet some other travellers.

We enjoyed teaming up with Sarah and Julian from Germany and coming 2nd place in the hostel pub quiz one night! We also bumped into Karin and Dierk (for the third time!!) and had dinner with them and their two friends (both experienced cycle tourers who had arrived that day) on our last night. 

Gunnar, the cyclist from Norway, has been touring his whole life reckons he’s probably covered 130,000km on his bike! This is like cycling the circumstance of the Earth at the equator 3 and a bit times! He had some amazing stories and we really enjoyed meeting them. 

Dierk had also bought along his Swiss army pen knife as a parting gift for us after reading on our blog that our other knife got stolen. We were both very touched by this.

Angkor has been a spectacular end to our 25 days in Cambodia and we are both ready to see some new scenery. Even some hills might be welcome! 

Originally we had planned to head towards Batambang on the other (west) side of the Tonle Sap lake. We thought we could spend some time there before crossing the border at Pailin. You can apparently make this journey by boat but after looking into it and discovering the cost ($22 each + $10 for the bike) we agreed it wasn’t worth it and so we decided to head north towards Sisophon instead and then onwards to the crossing at Poipet, leaving Cambodia slightly earlier than expected.

Siem Reap once again blew our budget so we plan to get back to basics for a week or so in Thailand as we head East towards Bangkok. We plan to take the scenic route and will probably make a detour down through Khao Ang Rue Nai Wildlife Sanctury in Chachoengsao province and then head up to the popular Kao Yai nature reserve in Prachin Buri province. We have heard that both offer great camping spots.