No Fixed Abode: Where’s a cat when you need one?

Wed 09 Mar 2016 - Royal Palace and travel to Kep

Up early to make the most of our last morning in Phnom Penh we jumped in one of the hotel fixed rate tuk tuks, no room for bartering today, and headed off to the Royal Palace. Cutting and weaving, quite literally, through the morning rush hour traffic we arrived just after the gates had opened at 0830.

The palace is set in some lovely gardens and looks just like one of the Buddhist temples. Although we were not allowed inside we were able to peer through the open doors and windows and see the throne set up on a dais just like one of the buddha statues would be. It seems royalty and religion and closely aligned. To be honest, the place wasn’t that impressive so we made our way to the Silver Pagoda, also in the same grounds and home of a buddha image made from emerald.

I’m not sure how the name is derived as there is no silver visible from the outside. Once again, although the emerald buddha was quite impressive the pagoda itself was less decorative than many other ordinary pagodas/temples we’ve seen.

Behind the pagoda is a large model of Angkor Wat that actually wa impressive. In fact being able to see the whole site from one viewpoint made us realise just how impressive the real thing is. After watching a large group of schoolchildren excitedly chasing the fish in the small moat surrounding the model we made our way to some exhibits of royal clothing, including a range of seven similar outfits that were all different colours - one for each day of week, a zillion small buddha statues - goodness knows what they were all for, and a selection of howdahs (elephant seats). The highlight of the tour was a great three piece band that played authentic Khmer instruments. They started playing some typical Khmer melodies with a tinkling marimba melody accompanied by an odd tuned gong instrument and the strange irregular drum rhythm. Sitting in the shade captivated by this pure Cambodian moment we noticed that the song had changed and recognised an odd medley of ‘When the Saints’ and ‘Auld Lang Syne’. What a mood breaker.

Walking back in the hot sun past several large monuments celebrating various historical events we eventually hailed a tuk tuk and returned to the hotel to pack and wait for the shuttle. While sitting in the hotel lobby one of reception girls asked if we were waiting for a bus shuttle. “Yes” we confirmed and gave the details of the bus company. A confused conversation later it turned out we were sitting in the lobby of the Frangipani Living Arts hotel and had ordered the shuttle for the Frangipani Fine Arts hotel. Why would they name two hotels so similarly? Anyway, no dramas. Back into a tuk tuk to the bus station. On the way we passed a scooter towing a trailer full of chickens. Not in cages you understand, dozens strapped down on the wooden platform and two large bunches hanging from a pole by their feet. They all looked in a very sorry way and only a few were moving - barely.

The bus was delayed by about 30 mins and got held up in the traffic in the outskirts of the city we passed several large clothing factories that were all finishing for the day disgorging flat bed trucks by the score all packed with workers standing on the back, some with 50 odd people jammed together in the late afternoon heat. And we think our commutes are bad!

Eventually we arrived in Kampot an hour late and found the tuk tuk driver we’d arranged with our hotel amongst the melee of other drivers all keen for our business. The town of Kep, where we were staying, is another 25km away so we had a long ride in the darkness enjoying the fresh clean coastal air after being in smelly dusty cities for over two weeks.

When we arrived the resort looked good and the helpful staff showed us to our room and settled us in with a plate of fresh fruit. As we were hungry we went straight to the restaurant and on our return Yvonne noticed the apple had been munched! We guessed a mouse or something similar and, not wishing to have our bags eaten into, Glenn set off to arrange an alternative room, fruit in hand as evidence, leaving Yvonne perched on the bed. Once the reception guy had been shown the fruit he apologised profusely and offered to replace it, totally missing the point that we did not wish to share our room with a small creature.
We did end up in a smaller room for the night with the promise of a larger room tomorrow and our existing room home to two baited traps.