Good morning everyone!!
I did the stupidest thing when arriving in
Sihanoukville but it turned out okay!! For those of
you who don't know, N.H. Sihanouk is the King of
Cambodia and it was his birthday on the 31st of
October. (I'd read this in Lonely Planet but not
actually registered that I'd be arriving on his
birthday in a resort town named after him!!) Anyhow,
Cambodians are given a three day holiday to celebrate
the King's birthday and EVERYONE from Phonm Penh seems
to come to the beach in Sihanoukville!!
I arrived in Phonm Penh and went to another bus
station to take me to Sihanoukville where I discovered
that I'd missed the last bus (I watched it pull away)
and that it was full. I ended up in a minivan
(designed for 9 passengers) with two Dutch guys and a
local who was travelling with them (we four took up a
seat designed for 9 Cambodian people). The remaining
minivan contained 25 people at it's peak - 5 in the
front seat!! It was a cramp 5 hour ride and when we
arrived it was dark (around 7pm). If it'd just been
Cambodians, then they would have fit in up to 30
people in a 9 person minivan!! Absolutely nuts!!
The local lady works for the port here in
Sihanoukville and didn't want me to travel across the
city alone so I got an air conditioned ride to a local
guest house. Turns out that most were full - a
motorbike driver trolled around looking at four
different places before we finally found a spot with a
room!!
Since my arrival in Sihanoukville, I've completed my
PADI diving certificate which is exciting!! It was a
lot of fun to dive underwater and see the fishes,
sometimes in the thousands though the visibility was
not always great (5-7m only sometimes). We saw
something comparable to mini sharks (they swim and
look like sharks anyhow) which was kind of neat but
disconcerting all at the same time!! I'm going to
have to dive again in some different locations. I
also spent a brief period at the beach - brief because
an hour and my skin is pink and I hate salt water :)
I'm heading off to Thailand today by boat (the roads
in the rainy season are near impassable). From there,
up to Bangkok for a bit of a mozy around before
heading home. I'll proably send on last e-mail before
heading off home!!
Take care everyone,
Sarah
P.S. Sam - it turns out that the PADI course was only
3 days so I could have spent one more day at the
village - instead it'll be one more day in Bangkok!!
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