Road Trip from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap 
 
Today I had the road trip from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap for 6 hours with Mekong Express Bus, I was quite dreading it..But then I decided to buy two tickets for me for the Mekong express bus. The other seat was for me to stretch my legs, extra $11 was not going to break my bank..The road trip of 6 hours, was much easier then the plane flights, there is no check in, airport security, passport control. What a relief! I could see the countryside as well and Khmer music was relaxing so I slept most of the time as I was comfortable.

 
The bus gives you luggage tags on showing them they will release your luggage on arrival at the destination and they release your luggage. This journey can be done in reverse as well, carry tissues, wet wipes and bottle of anti- bacterial. They give you one bottle of water and snack but I got two of each for my two tickets.. I could see that the other travellers were envious of me, the snack had meat so I gave it to the two cheerful Aussie guys sitting across me. There is half hour comfort stop about 2/3rds into the trip if you wanted a quick lunch or drink, there is a loo on the bus but best to use it more earlier on the journey.
I had not got any breakfast at 252 as I left at 7 am so I ate the cold spring rolls and dumplings which I had packed from the Vegetarian restaurant. They were still very delicious :)
 
        Komplonk Phulk
 

I arrived at Siem Reap from Phnom Penh bus stop at 1.30 pm, here there are many Tuk tuk men keen to get your custom but Thean, the hotel tuk tuk driver was waiting for me with big smile, I got a nice welcome drink at my hotel, the Angkor Pearl and my suite was lovely, the staff very attentive. I was picked up by Holystone Tours to see the Tonle Sap lake/Floating villages. There were 4 people in the group all very friendly, the first stop was to Wai Thmei killing fields and our guide was very informative. Khmer community is still recovering from the effects of Khmer Rouge and the Pol Pot regime which lead to the deaths of a quarter of the Cambodian population. Then next stop was to Komplonk Phulk which was a big eye opener, we saw houses on stilts, floating pigpens, flower market and villagers enjoying their life; There were few boats practising for the races on Sunday, some were all women racers.

 


 
The village has a school and monastery where prayers were taking place, this was very tranquil and we had soft drinks at floating restaurant; Then we headed towards the forest area to see the beautiful sunset from our little boat. Our guide Vidhyea chhoun was brilliant and gave us excellent information on almost everything. He said he arranged tours to Beng Mealea etc, but I had already made other arrangement. I really enjoyed my trip to the lake.