Posts Tagged ‘boat’

Sihanoukville Island Trip

Posted in Cambodia on February 27th, 2010 by Vagablonding – 2 Comments

We had an all day island boat trip on Thursday, February 25th. At 8:30am we boarded a little boat and cruised for 1 hour to Koh Preaus. There we snorkeled a bit, but it wasn’t very good. There wasn’t much to see plus the mask provided was very scratched up, and I kept getting stung by jellyfish so I gave up after about 20 minutes.

Gulf of Thailand - Sihanoukville, Cambodia

Next we boated for 30 minutes to Koh Ta Kiev. This island is blessed with a beautiful deserted white sand beach and a waveless ocean like a bathtub that is still waist deep even 60 feet out.  We spent about 2.5 hours here swimming and sunbathing.

Beach - Koh Ta Kiev, Sihanoukville, Cambodia

Boat - Koh Ta Kiev, Sihanoukville, Cambodia

Beach - Koh Ta Kiev, Sihanoukville, Cambodia

Lunch was included on the island. There was  grilled tofu for me, grilled fish for everyone else, rice, salad, baguettes, and coke in a bottle, yummy!

Coke - Koh Ta Kiev, Sihanoukville, Cambodia

The boat ride home took about 1 hour 20 minutes. From the boat we got a good view of some other islands and of Otres beach. It’s a very long deserted white sand beach. I would definitely check it out if I had more time here.

Cambodia Island

Mom and I had sunset drinks on Ochheuteal Beach (aka Guilt Beach). The cheap $1.50 cocktails and $0.50 beers are sort of the only reason to go to this beach, besides that it’s the closest to most hotels.

Sunset - Ochheuteal Beach, Sihanoukville, Cambodia

Sunset - Ochheuteal Beach, Sihanoukville, Cambodia

Sunset - Ochheuteal Beach, Sihanoukville, Cambodia

Tomorrow we are heading back to Phnom Penh and having our final dinner with our Intrepid group. Mom is going home in a couple days and I’ll be staying in SE Asia until March 15th.

Spider Eating and Kampot Countryside

Posted in Cambodia on February 26th, 2010 by Vagablonding – 2 Comments

We had a looooong travel day on Sunday, February 21st. First we took a 4 hour bus ride to Phnom Penh, the highlight of which was me eating a fried spider and washing it down with a beer mom bought me cause I earned it 🙂 They taste just like weird greasy french fries. Kind of good actually.

Fried spider - Cambodia

We had a 3 hour break in Phnom Penh and mom and I spent it at the FCC (Foreign Correspondents Club), an excellent but expensive place to hang out. We had a nice lunch of beers, rice, vegetable spring rolls, and free wifi. We were back on the bus for another 5 hours to Kampot.

On Monday, February 22nd, we went to nearby Blissful Guesthouse for breakfast. Finally, a big cup of coffee!

The rest of the morning and the afternoon was spent going on a tour of the Kampot countryside with an insufferable tour guide that could not stop repeating himself. First we saw some salt fields but there wasn’t much to see as they were flooded from the rain we had that morning.

Salt fields - Kampot, Cambodia

Next we went to the Phnom Chhnork caves. Inside one of the caves is a well preserved brick temple that was built in the 7th century.

Phnom Chhnork Caves, Kampot, Cambodia

Temple - Phnom Chhnork Caves, Kampot, Cambodia

We had a herd of preteen schoolboys following us around during our hike to and from the caves. It was cute, but they were just following us around trying to be our tour guides so we’d pay them money. One picked me a flower, how sweet.

Kids - Phnom Chhnork Caves, Kampot, Cambodia

Kids on a Tuk-Tuk - Phnom Chhnork Caves, Kampot, Cambodia

The view of the countryside from the cave was nice, but I’m sure it’s much better on a sunny day.

View of the countryside - Phnom Chhnork Caves, Kampot, Cambodia

Next we went to a pepper plantation. Kampot is known for it’s pepper, and back when the French were in control every restaurant in France had to have Kampot pepper if the were to be consider of any quality. By this part of the tour some of us were getting fairly hot, hungry, and irritable. I tried to liven it up by eating a raw pepper seed off the plant. It tasted like pepper, surprise! Mom was so sick of the tour guide by this time she said “If I had a gun I’d shoot myself.”

Finally we went to Kep, a deserted old resort town that was quite the place for Cambodia’s rich back in the 50s. It has since been mostly abandoned and there are crumbling buildings everywhere. The beach isn’t very nice either, but apparently it never was. Back in its heyday white sand was shipped in from Sihanoukville to make its beaches nicer. We had a large included lunch here that was quite tasty. I spent the rest of our time in Kep reading in a hammock.

Beach - Kep, Cambodia

In the evening we went on a boat ride down the Kampot River and watched the lovely sunset.

Kampot River, Cambodia

Kampot River, Cambodia

Kampot River, Cambodia

Kampot River, Cambodia

Sunset - Kampot River, Cambodia

Living on the river doesn’t mean you can’t have DirecTV!

Kampot River, Cambodia

Afterward I got a Seeing Hands massage for $5. Seeing Hands trains blind people to give massages and you can find one or two in almost every city. It was better than the massage I got in Siem Reap for sure.

Battambang to Siem Reap via River Boat

Posted in Cambodia on February 17th, 2010 by Vagablonding – Be the first to comment

Wednesday, February 17th, was mostly spent in transit via boat from Battambang to Siem Reap. At 7am we boarded a little boat with 2 rows of seats, a roof, and a tiny 4 foot tall squat bathroom so precarious I was the only one that dared to use it, which I did twice. I have good balance. We floated down the Battambang River for 5 hours; it was much more fun than I was expecting! We’re probably the last Intrepid group to go to Siem Reap by boat rather than by bus this season because the river is getting very low and we got stuck a few times. From our boat we saw a side of Cambodian life that few tourists get to see. The people that live on the river live in either little huts on stilts, floating huts, or their boats with rickety walls and a roof. They bathe in the river (which is filthy), wash their clothes and dishes in the river, and fish in the river to get their food.

Battambang River, Cambodia

Battambang River, Cambodia

Battambang River, Cambodia

Battambang River, Cambodia

Battambang River, Cambodia

Battambang River, Cambodia

Battambang River, Cambodia

Gas station - Battambang River, Cambodia

Battambang River, Cambodia

Battambang River, Cambodia

There were lots of ridiculously cute kids along the river that would run up to the edge of the water to wave at us and yell “bye bye!!!” I got quite the arm workout from all the waving. I’d post pics of them but I think I would get in trouble with the law since most of the kids were half or fully naked.

After 5 hours on the river we got to the Tonle Sap Lake. Tonle Sap lake is the largest freshwater lake in Southeast Asia, and it is the reason the ancient Khmer civilization was centered at Angkor (and why the temples were built there). But from my vantage point on the boat, Tonle Sap Lake was large, brown, and boring. I took a picture for posterity.

Tonle Sap Lake, Cambodia

We crossed the lake in about an hour and were soon at the docks near Siem Reap.

Siem Reap docks, Cambodia

We got off the boat and onto a bus that took us to Siem Reap proper. I was tired so I spent the rest of the evening sleeping. Tomorrow is temple time!

From Gili Air to Ubud via Perama boat and bus

Posted in Indonesia on July 13th, 2009 by Vagablonding – 2 Comments

Tuesday, June 30th, 2009

Happy birthday to me! I’m 23 today!

We woke up before sunrise, had some mango, pineapple, protein bars and coffee soda for breakfast before getting on our cidomo for a ride down to the jetty on the south end of the island. We boarded a local boat at 7:15am which took us to Bangsal. From the boat we could see where they harvest the pearls!

lombok pearl farm

perama boat sign

In Bangsal we walked on the main road to where the Perama bus picked us up to take us to Senggigi. You can tell which road to walk down because it’s where all the horse carts are waiting to offer you a ride. You can get a ride on a cidomo or a motorbike if you want to, but the walk down the road isn’t bad and going by foot saves you money. The bus stop is on the left side of the street before the tattoo shop. You will know it by the baby blue painted pillars, but otherwise there are no signs indicating that it’s the bus stop. We walked right past it the first time!

bangsal perama bus station

bangsal perama bus station

The bus to Senggigi goes along the coast and the views from the road are lovely. Lombok definitely has some stunning beaches and I am coming back to explore this island for sure someday!

perama bus

view from lombok road

view from lombok road coconut trees

Once in Senggigi, we took a local boat to the larger Perama boat, which left at 9:00am. A breakfast of coffee, banana pancakes, bananas and pineapple was waiting for us onboard. The boat was practically empty compared to the packed Perama boat we came on 12 days ago. The ride was much smoother and I read and napped for most of it. Lunch was served onboard at around 11:30am and consisted of rice, veggies, tempe and peanuts, fish, and watermelon. We arrived in Padang Bai at around 1:00pm. There we waited for the bus to Ubud.

perama boat and public ferry padang bai

The ride to Ubud took about an hour. We were dropped off at the Perama office where I waited with our bags while Ryan walked around trying to find a hotel that still had rooms available. We ended up staying at a place called Puri Gong Cottages on Jl Hanoman. We got a room with a double bed, air conditioning, and a view of the pool for 225,000 a night. The walls are rattan and are very thin with peep holes poked through them! We stuffed some toilet paper in the holes to keep out any prying eyes. Because the walls are so thin there is pretty much no noise barrier which makes sleeping well a bit difficult.

puri gong peep hole

After getting settled in our hotel we went to the market for some sunset-priced shopping. Everything is always cheaper at the end of the day because the shopkeepers get desperate if they haven’t made enough sales for the day. Then we had dinner at Biah-Biah on Jl Gootama.