John in Cambodia.

From Phnom Penh we headed to Sihanoukville. Luckily we paid the extra $3 for the $9 express bus, and it only took 5 1/2hours to travel the 250km to Sihanoukville.

We got here, and with nowhere to stay, had a look at the trusty Lonely Planet, no help there... So we enlisted the services of a tuktuk driver. His name was Doctor Raymond. Doc took us to his favourite guesthouse (the one he gets a commission from), the Markara Guesthouse, right on the beach at Occhueatal. We grabbed a double room with cold water only, and two fans for $9 a night.. although we're not really pinching pennies, everyone loves a bargain.

Shannon wanted to hit the sand, so we walked down to the 999 Bar and Bungalow, pulled up a seat and had a few beers. A few touts came past, including one selling lobster. We bought 10 lobsters for $4, absolutely delicious and fresh, and drank some more beers. A lady named Mom came past, selling sarongs. After telling Mom we had no sarongs, she offered to give Shannon the "threading of a lifetime". Basically its a form of hair removal for the legs using only string. As you can imagine while Shannon was having her minute leg hairs pulled out by string, and chatting with Mom (who is the nicest woman EVER, better than my own mother) I drank more beers.

I turned around as there were some local Cambodians at the table behind us making a ruccus. I waved and said "Sues day" which is hello. Because of my elite Cambodian language skills, the ringleader, a man named Vun asked if I would like to drink some wine with them.

So I ditched Shannon and Mom, and took two steps to their table, and sat down. Vun introduced me to his family... his wife, his uncle and aunt, his sister in law, and her husband. He told me that his uncle was visiting from France and they were down from Phnom Penh to celebrate. As I love a tipple, and a yarn, I decided to settle in for the evening.

Turns out the wine he was drinking, was actually Hennessey VSOP. Partial to a good cognac, my christmas's had all come at once. We sat there talking the usual shit making sure that we never experienced "Chui Ah" (empty glass), when Shannon joined us. We all sat around a table, eating barbequed fish, mango with some kind of salty paste, and drinking cognac and beer, for a while, all talking about everyday life, Vun's recent wedding, Claude's (Vuns uncle from France) recent trip back to Cambodia, only the 4th in 30 years and they helped us with learning more Khmer. Many more "Chui Moi" (cheers) were done, the Cambodians we have found love to Cheers. They will even Cheers a cheersing. And so on.

We drunk, got drunk, and when I put my head through the wooden part of the chair, and broke it, I knew it was time to head home. Not just that, but we had been drinking non-stop for 6 hours, in the sun, and had to get up at 7am to catch the boat to BAMBOO ISLAND to see pandas*.

At about 1am, Shannon and I both woke up to very pasty mouths, and a hot, hot bedroom. No worries, we'll just grab water.

WRONG DUMBASS TRY AGAIN.

No water. Thats ok, we'll go get some from reception. Shut. Can't drink from the tap, the water is not potable. Ask the security guard... can't speak english. So John grabs a shirt, jumps on the back of a seedy guys motorbike and says "STORE". Off we go, from Occheutal Beach, towards the Sihanoukville CBD. Seedy guy says "Chicken farm, chicken farm" whilst taking one hand off his handlebars to point at a casino. Tired, drunk, and thirsty I tell him to shush and we pull up beside a stall.

I get 6 Litres of drinking water for $2, and we head back. Halfway back a massive dog runs out of a vacant lot and towards the moto. The dog is gaining on us, so I tell the seedy guy to step on it. We finally get back to the hotel where Shannon meets me and sculls 2 L of water.

Woke up this morning, seedy and pasty and ready to go out into the Gulf of Thailand. We get to the boat.. which can only be described as .. a people smuggling vessel. As Cambodia is a standout for human trafficking, I wonder where we will end up. But all is ok and we end up chugging out to a small island, where they throw us some snorkels, a coral reef, say "watch out for urchins" and everyone jumps in. The sea was a bit rough, and being seedy, tired and lazy I jumped in and then pretty much back onto the boat. From there we headed to Bamboo Island. At Bamboo Island we lazed, drank some beer, swam and relaxed while our crew made us a delicious barbeque fish lunch. We ate that and then headed back towards the mainland, stopping once to snorkel and fish.

As we were in the open sea, most people will assume a small boat (15 passengers) will experience some kind of motion. There were these whingy English girls who were like:

"Oh me, oh my, I do say this water is awful rough. Jeeves, can you make the water calm? Pip pip hoorah"

We got back to the beach, disembarked, and went down to Bar RU for a beer, where Shannon met Mom. We had some more lobster (the same woman as yesterday sold us 16 for $4 today) and chatted to Mom. Some kids came up and had a chat, we gave them some lobster (everybody had matching towels), as well as a black cat that jumped in my lap, meowed and laid down. I fed the cat some lobster and we chilled out, talking to Mom and the kids. Haha.

Eventually we made tracks back here to our hotel, where we are writing this blog right now. This one here. That's the one.

Tomorrow morning back to Phnom Penh at 8am.. and then Friday we have another appointment at the Phnom Penh rubbish dump.

That's the haps.

Johncrest out.

* there were no pandas at bamboo island. there was also no bamboo. weird.