Day 22 31 August

As the only activity I had planned today was a trip to the airport, I had a latish breakfast which was the only breakfast the tour provided. It consisted of an omelet, orange juice, fresh fruit, toast and Jam and coffee.

After breakfast I went for a walk as I needed to get some Thai money to cover the cost of the trip to the airport and food for the day.

I had just about given up on getting to taste Durian fruit. I had seen plenty of the fruits but they were whole and I did not want to buy a whole fruit, they are over 2 kilograms. However, I found a plastic tray with 2 segments and purchased them.

I than found a street planter box to sit on while I tried the fruit. It did not smell half as bad as I was led to believe. The taste was quite acceptable. I wandered around looking for a money exchange. I had a few American dollars I was hoping to exchange, no such luck, plenty of ATM's , but only banks that did not exchange money.

I decided to go back to the hotel to see where the closest exchange was located. When I asked the hotel staff they, because the small amount, said they would change it for me. I received a very bad exchange rate but got enough money to cover the taxi to airport.

I checked out  of the hotel where they were happy to store my luggage until the taxi arrived.

I went for a walk and took a few photos, mainly of their electrical wiring.

Back to hotel where I read for awhile. The taxi arrived early and the 4 of us were transported to the airport.

After a reasonably short wait we boarded the Thai airline. I had a window seat with the centre seat being vacant. The food was better than I remember Quantas being.

For the first time I used my CPAP machine on the plane. After dinner I slept well until just before the breakfast wake up call.

Landed at Sydney and except that my bag was the last off the conveyor I flew through customs and immigration.

I was able to catch the earlier Murray's bus. Arrived at Jolimont Centre and made my way home, by bus, with a reasonable wait at Woden. To save an additional wait I caught the 62 bus and walked home from the Kambah village.

Day 21 30 August

Today is a traveling day from Siem Reap to Bangkok. We left at 7.30 and arrived just on 5pm. The countryside was similar to Cambodia except the roadside had a lot less litter, no worse than Australia.

There was also a greater variety of crops than in Cambodia. Along with the many fields of rice I recognized sugar cane, tapioca, corn, lotus plants and a number of orchids whose fruits I did not recognize.

No photos today, about to partake of our farewell dinner.

I have organized transport to the airport for tomorrow.

We went out for our final dinner.
I had fresh prawns in a spicy lemon sauce . It was very tasty and quite spicy.

After dinner the the group split into two. One group went into downtown Bangkok. The rest of us went to another restaurant for a few drinks. I left after one beer as I thought that I would do some work on my blog and re-organize my bag ready for tomorrows plane trip. As I only had limited clean cloths left I decided, for packing purposes, to treat all dirty cloths as if they were clean keep the two clean sets separate in case I needed two sets tomorrow.

Day 20 29 August

Today was a rest day. My legs were still feeling a little tight from yesterdays rock walking.

There were some optional activities, but none appealed to me.
Instead I had a walk around the town and visited the local market. As a market it was not as crowded as others had been. I hadn't tried to bargain so I thought I should try.

I thought that I should buy something for Astrid and Soren. I selected tee shirts. The first price was $5 a shirt. After sometime I ended up getting 4 tee-shirts for $6. Bargaining if you don't care whether you purchase the goods or not can be quite fun. As I had found out in Mexico the greatest tool for bargaining was to walk away, you soon find out what they are willing to accept.

I had a walk through the old French area, not an overly exciting activity.

After lunch of spring rolls and a watermelon shake I did some more walking before returning to the hotel to consider what to do for dinner

                      The restaurant I had lunch at and the place I worked my way through their range of shakes.

                                                        Below some street scenes

                                                       Parts of the old French quarter

                                                     

For dinner I went to a different restaurant, definitely upmarket, and had sweet and sour pork washed down with a Margarita.

A very pleasant meal.

Not looking forward to a 9hr bus trip to Bangkok in the morning.

Day 19 28 August

Today we are off to Angkor Wat.  It is a 4.30am start as we hope to see the sun rise over the temple. Alas this did not occur as the the cloud cover deprived us of the opportunity. We were not the only ones who missed out.

Angkor Wat contributes 20% of Cambodia's economy. The prices being charged were certainly tourist prices, at least 100% markup for food and drink. The memorabilia was by bargaining. A $11 article could be purchased for $3 - $6.

The Temple complex was surrounded by a moat which was dug by hand. The site is over 162 hectares. The most is about 100m wide.

The temple was built in the 12th century by the Hindu king, but now is a Buddhist temple

The walls of the temple were covered with carvings depicting various mythologies and stories from both the Hindu and the Buddhist religion. The king decided that the temple would be multicultural and included Buddhist myths. Some of then about the life and times of their kings. Of course the various wars formed a major part of the display. Our guide explained a number of stories, however, after the first half dozen I couldn't remember the details.

Some parts of the temples are basically ruins, natural depreciation, and walking around the uneven stone surfaces and well worn steps took toll on the legs. It was a nearly windless day, and the ambient temperature was high.

Some photos at around dawn. Cloud cover hid the sun.

The temple complex

                                             

On the way to Angkor Thom we came across some elephants walking along the road. 

Some photos from Angkor Thom

We then went to Ta Prohm. Notice the trees growing in part of the temple.

The lunch we all thought would be provided was an optional extra and although time was included we had to pay for the meal. I did not feel hungry, probably due to heat and the walking, so I just had a papaya shake.

On my return I decided that I would just have a reasonably early dinner and then relax my legs, which were complaining. Had a tropical storm whilst I was having dinner. The eating place had a tin roof so was a very pleasant dinner, atmosphere and food.

I had beef stir-fry and a banana shake.