A Weekend in Siem Reap - Culture, Relaxation, Indulgence and Debauchery!

As I sat in Siem Reap International Airport watching the various travellers preparing to depart on the next stage of their adventure, I couldn’t help feeling as if I was living life in a bit of a strange order. I don’t think I’ve regressed exactly, despite my new found interest in travel my 35-year-old body does demand a certain level of comfort that a hostel can’t provide. But I do seem to be retracing the steps that my friends took in their early 20s.

Weekend Break

So last weekend we visited Siem Reap - the novelty of being able to hop on a flight on a Friday night to visit somewhere that previously seemed remote and exotic has certainly not worn off!

I’d pre-booked a 2-day tour -I use the word ‘tour’ is used in the loosest sense as it was essentially a driver and a car who drove between the various attractions and gave us water. That being said it did take away all the thinking about where to go, where to get tickets etc., and as it was insanely hot getting into an air-conditioned car was very welcome.

Day 1, Boat 1, Many Drivers

On Day 1 we headed to Tonle Sap Lake to take a boat trip and see a fishing village and floating market. I’ll admit that I hadn’t exactly researched what we were doing all that extensively, so every step of the day felt like a nice little surprise!

We were ushered onto a boat of questionable seaworthiness, piloted by a woman and toddler and a bloke with an oar; for the first leg anyway. We headed towards a cluster of boats and for a moment I thought we would be switching boats but no, we were just depositing ‘man with oar’ to a new location. We set off again and headed towards another cluster of boats. This time the woman and toddler got off and some completely new guy got on. And then we were on our way. At this stage I don’t actually think we were even on a real lake, technically it was just a flooded field.

The scenery was pretty consistent for a while and then we started to approach the village comprising houses on stilts with no land anywhere near them - this must be the floating fishing village.

It all sounds quite romantic visiting an authentic fishing village, witnessing a different way of life but I actually found it a bit weird! I’m not sure I’ve ever visited anywhere before where the sole objective was just to look at how other people live, so I felt a bit uncomfortable just gawping at people in their own homes.

We left the village and our next stop was a large raft house where we disembarked without really knowing why. We were quickly ushered towards a desk to buy another ticket for another boat plus some over-priced exercise books for us to give to the children. Everything seemed to cost 5 dollars!

Day 1, Boat 2

Boat number 2 was more basic than boat number 1 and our lady driver paddled us through the 'river forest' whilst we sat cross-legged and enjoyed the tranquility. It was actually all quite nice until we got to the ‘floating market’ which essentially was 3 boats loosely lashed together, selling drinks and snacks way above the recommended retail price. One boat owner grabbed onto our boat and it was clear from her vice-like grip we were not going anywhere until we bought something. After establishing that we didn’t want any refreshments nor did our mother, father, brother or 2nd cousin once removed, we finally gave in and bought a drink and some biscuits for the driver, although I doubt she wanted them. Anyway, we obviously did enough to secure our release and on we paddled through the trees, picking up the odd discarded plastic bottle to support our driver with her sideline recycling business. Chris commented that it wasn’t too dissimilar to the ‘Swan Ride’ at Alton Towers.

Day 1, Boat 1, Maybe Same Driver?

We were returned to the raft house and again slightly unsure of what we were supposed to do. The rapid switching of drivers on boat number 1 meant we couldn’t recall what our driver looked like and in fact, we weren’t entirely sure he’d even hung around. Other boats were arriving so we considered just getting on one of those but before took that leap of faith our guy appeared and we got back on the original boat.

We ventured onto the actual lake, albeit only briefly, as it’s massive and there really isn’t anything to see other than a vast expanse of water. So we made our way back to the start point, retracing our steps through the village. At various points in the journey, our driver did keep leaving the steering wheel unattended to attend to something at the back of the boat but I'm sure that was nothing to worry about!

Once we had disembarked we had a brief moment of minor panic when our guide/driver seemed to have abandoned us but we soon tracked him down and started heading back to town. The weather had been absolutely stunning all morning but a storm quickly moved in and by the time we got back it was hammering it down.

A Light Afternoon

This seemed as good a time as any to take our lunch break. Since living in Thailand I'm not sure I can actually just eat one dish for lunch so we ordered a selection of different things to share. To be honest the food was pretty similar to Thai food; it just seemed to have a lot more garlic.  We washed it all down with the local Angkor beer and before we knew the rain had stopped and the sun was shining. A coach load of Chinese tourists pulled up so we took that as our cue to exit.

Obviously, the boat trip was the main event of the day so our afternoon itinerary was a bit lighter. We went to a Buddhist Monastery and then the Killing Fields Memorial. I believe the main points of interest regarding the Khmer Rouge atrocities are actually in Phnom Penh, but there are memorials in other locations with information boards that tell the stories of some of the people that were affected. Cambodia sees this moment in history as something that should not be forgotten and must be learned from; a point that seems to have been missed by those Cambridge University students who want to ban Remembrance Sunday in the UK.

We had an early night as we'd planned to leave at 5 am the next day to see the sunrise at Angkor Wat. To be honest, we barely need an excuse for an early night but this seemed like a good one.

Angkor Wat

So Day 2 was our temples day and the spectacular Angkor Wat was our first stop. I think the main advantage of starting early is that you avoid the heat as later in the day it was pretty unbearable. On the way in I bought a guide book from a woman who allowed me to pay for it in Thai Baht but gave me change in US Dollars so I'm not exactly sure what the final price was. The publication date was 1999 but as Angkor Wat dates back to the 12th Century I figured it would be ok!

Hordes of people had gathered in front of the reflection ponds hoping to capture the perfect Instagram shot of the sunrise over Angkor Wat - the tour guides seemed very keen on their groups capturing this shot. I could hear one Australian guy protesting that it was 'too cloudy' and as we were only armed with iPhones for cameras we decided to head straight through Angkor Wat to the other side. Actually, this was unwittingly quite a good move as there were relatively few people around so Chris was able to take quite a few photos without other tourists obscuring the nice view.

I can't really describe Angkor Wat in any way that will do it justice - you just need to see it, or maybe follow the hashtag on Instagram!

Angkor Thom

After a quick pancake, we headed to Angkor Thom, the ancient 12th Century Khmer city, within its walls containing some pretty stunning temples. The Bayon is probably the weirdest one, with face towers and maze of tunnels. Baphuon boasts literally the steepest staircase I have ever climbed up, and actually much more frighteningly climbed down. The Ta Promh is the infamous 'Tomb Raider' temple with trees growing through the walls and is actually barely standing. All very impressive in their own right.

Unofficial Tourism

A consistent theme of all the temples was the people trying to get money out of you. I haven't experienced quite the same thing in Thailand, but in Siem Reap, there are countless men, women, and children trying to get you to part with small amounts of cash. They will either be trying to sell you some souvenirs or clothing, which seems fine on the face of it - I'm very partial to 'tourist tat' and always buy something. It just becomes relentless though as they try to strike a multi-buy deal with you - what do they think I'm going to do with five identical fridge magnets, especially as I already bought two earlier in the day. And saying you've already bought a fridge magnet does not deter them, it just shows them that you will eventually give in!

The second tactic is to offer you some advice and information about the temple you're looking at, apparently just wanting to be friendly and share their knowledge. But you know it's only a matter of time before they mention that they are a teacher in a school that needs donations.

I'm actually quite relaxed about this and tend to go along with it all, buying a few things, handing over a few dollars here and there which seems to work. I know it really bothers some people - that feeling that you're being preyed on. In Thailand, I've found that people will try to sell you things, but normally the quality is better and if you don't buy anything they back off. In Siem Reap there was a definite sense of desperation - they know they're selling you poor quality goods but they hope you will take pity on them and buy anyway. I hope things in Cambodia do develop enough to legitimise these efforts; as a tourist, I'm quite happy to pay for goods and services and actually some of the ad-hoc advice we were given was pretty useful!

By mid-afternoon, we were all 'templed out' so we relaxed by the rooftop pool of our hotel which was awesome. There only appeared to be about 3 other people staying in our hotel so we had the place to ourselves.

Backpackers

That night we hopped in a tuk-tuk and headed to 'Pub Street' so Chris could relive his backpacker days. A few months after we first got together in 2007, Chris went on a trip to Southeast Asia and had some crazy night in a bar in Siem Reap called the 'The Angkor What?'. This bar encouraged its patrons to write messages on the walls and ceiling, to leave behind an indelible mark of their time in Cambodia. Chris had written our names on the ceiling so was hoping to rediscover this moment of history. Clearly many people take advantage of this freedom and the walls had been painted over many times since to allow the latest crop of backpackers to make their mark.

As always going back to somewhere where you have memories of crazy, hedonistic times is never quite the same but we tucked into our bucket of gin fizz nonetheless. I'm not sure if it was a bit early in the season or those stories about young people not drinking nowadays are accurate, but 'Pub Street' wasn't all that lively. We did a bit of a crawl, which included some sort of weird semi-karaoke night for the elderly, but then ultimately ended up back at 'The Angkor What?' for a margarita bucket nightcap.

A fine weekend indeed!