Siem Reap

Where we stayed - Encore Angkor

You certainly know you've entered a country which has seen tough times when you cross the border into Cambodia from Thailand. You can visibly see the differences, straight away. Smoothly tarmaced roads give way to dusty roads with potholes and brick houses suddenly disappear and wooded houses built upon stilts pop up amongst the trees which line the roads. The scenery though is breathtaking, it almost looks surreal and more like a movie set built in Hollywood. We decided on this trip to Cambodia that we'd only go to Siem Reap, we are going to save the rest of the country for when we return to visit Vietnam, seeing as we cancelled that part of our trip due to the typhoons.

Siem Reap is a great little town, full of fabulous restaurants, wonderful markets (which all pretty much sell the same thing) and the main road is a dusty bumpy pot-holed mess. Everyday you see at least 5 or so people who have had limbs blown off due to landmines and UXO's and there are quite a lot of beggars on the streets too. Nonetheless, we found Siem Reap to be a charming wee town, full of genuinely kind people. I'd go as far to say, it is one of my favourite places we've visited on our trip so far...

The temples of Angkor are stunning and everyone should try and see them. We spent a day doing the 'small circuit' and visited the main sights, which included the immense and beautiful Angkor Wat, Bayon with it's 216 faces and eerie Ta Prohm which is getting swallowed up and overtaken by massive tree roots (It was also the place where Tomb Raider was filmed).

While we were in Cambodia we really wanted to visit one of the numerous orphanages and take some supplies which we had bought in large quantities (toothbrushes, toothpaste, shoes, washing powder and rice). One morning we were trying to figure where to take them and we met a fellow guest from our guesthouse (Anthony, whom was also from Hamilton) who had been in Cambodia for a few months trying to set up and sort out an orphanage. He invited us to join him on a visit to his orphanage, so we jumped at the opportunity and what an amazing experience it was.

32 children aged from less than 1 to 17 years of age lived at the orphange. They were so pleased to see us and happily practiced their english on us and eagerly posed for photos. At first Mia was a little intimidated by them, but it didn't take long until Dallas started acting the clown and had all the kids laughing... These kids were just amazing and I really wished we could have done more for them.

Alain's Khmer BBQ, no it didn't consist of dog, cat, rat or worm, but it did have snake, crocodile and two other mystery meats.

Bangkok - Part 2

Where we stayed - Lamphu Tree House

On our second stay in Bangkok, we decided to stay in a different part of town. We stay in a lovely hotel which was within walking distance to the backpacker ghetto on Khao San Road (which is just a dodgy, sleazy boozy street full of pissed foreigners being knobheads, it's pretty pathetic really).

The only redeeming thing was that the hotel was also close to the beautiful Wat Prad Kaew and the Grand Palace. The whole complex is just amazing and the temples, monuments and shrines are intricately decorated. Just a word of warning if you do go there though, is make sure your dressed for the occasion. If you turn up with a singlet (sleeveless t-shirts seemed ok, but not singlets), or shorts/skirt you'll need to hire some hideous clothing, which you will sweat like a pig in...

We also visited the HUGE Chatuchak Weekend Market. This is one of the largest markets in the world, and it really is overwhelming and disorientating. You can literally buy anything and everything here, from a kitten, to dinner plates, to scary monster face masks. I think we were quite possibly the only people who went to the market that day who didn't buy anything...

Chiang Mai

Where we stayed - Chiang Mai Thai House

There is just so much to see and do, in and around Chiang Mai, that it didn't take long for our week long stay to pass by.

We spent our first day visiting a few of the numerous temples within the Old City. These temples are simply amazing, the craftmanship and detail of the temples is astounding, as are the shrines housed inside.

One day we hired ourselves a driver to take us to the Tiger Farm, where we had the emense pleasure of playing and patting three adorable 3 month old tiger cubs. Alain was even brave enough (and stupid enough) to go into the 'big' tiger enclosure to get up close and personal with them. The tigers in there weighed up to 200kgs each!!

Afterwards, we headed to the Monkey Centre where the kids enjoyed the monkey show, as well as getting the opportuntiy to shake hands with the cutes little hypo monkey ever...

Following that, we were taken to one of the local Karon Long-neck villages, where we had the opportunity to wander around their village and rice paddy fields (which amazingly smell like rice) and witness their way of life. We even met a little girl the same age as Mia, who had already been wearing her neck rings for a few year... These two girls couldn't come from more different worlds, but they still managed to make each other giggle and laugh.

On another day out, we headed up the hill to Wat Phra That Doi Suthep, which is one of northern Thailands most sacred temples. The view from the temple is amazing, you can see right across Chiang Mai and into the surrounding area. After the temple we headed back down the hill to the Zoo, to see the Panda bears. They have two playful adults and one baby, who unfortunately was a little shy the day we visited and he didn't make an appearance.

We also visited Maesa Elephant Camp, where we watched elephants bathing in the nearby river before they headed to the showgrounds. The kids loved watching the elephant show, which consisted of elephants playing football, playing harmonicas and painting. Alain and Dallas also went for a ride on one of the elephants, Mia and I wouldn't have a bar of it though... I mean, elephants are nice and all, but damn, they are bloody freaky too and riding upon one just wasn't something I was gonna do... EVER!

Alain took advantage of the cheap dental treatments offered here in Thailand, and got his teeth whitened using the Beyond method. The difference in his teeth is just amazing, after years of drinking coffee, red wine and smoking, he still managed to change his teeth colour by 7 shades. Even the dentist was hugely surprised by the difference and regretted not taking before and after photos...

Bangkok

Where we stayed - Legacy Suites Bangkok

Arriving in Bangkok after nearly a month in India was pure bliss. Everything seems sparkling clean and orderly. Even the traffic jam's are orderly, people don't try to cut the queue and noone honks their horns... It was such a shock!

We stayed at the beautiful Legacy Suites, just off Sukhumvit. This place is fantastic! The rooms are huge and are more like apartments, rather than hotel rooms. The rooms have luxury bathrooms and even a proper working kitchen!! We delighted in being able to cook proper meals for ourselves for the first time in nearly 5 months... It was bliss!

One day we took the kids to the Children's Discovery Museum, it's a place where kids rule and touching and interacting with the displays is what it's all about. It was a whole heap of fun watching the kids discovering new things, and hearing their squeals of delight when Alain put them in the bubble machine and made a huge bubble around them. Or my fits of laughter when Alain tried to cram himself into the womb of the 'reproductive' Mummy's body...

We truely didn't do a hell of a lot on our first trip to Bangkok. The most exciting thing we did (and by far the most important) was that we discovered the wonderful food hall in the Siam Paragon shopping centre. There is one whole floor of the shopping centre dedicated entirely to food, it was AMAZING! There was the most wonderful gourmet supermarket, which had a huge selection of free food sampling stations (much to our delight) and there are numerous food stalls selling everything imaginable from the most delicate french inspired pastries, to the most pungent fermented fish eggs (and everything else in between). Alain and I were both completely blown away by the variety and quality of foods on offer here, it truely is a foodies paradise!

After a few days in Bangkok we took the very rocky/swaying overnight train up to Chiang Mai. It was a long trip, but the kids though it was fantastic that we were going to be sleeping on the train and we were grateful that they sold alcohol onboard.