Sihanoukville

View from my room at Mushroom Point

My dorm at Mushroom Point

Otres Beach

I made it to Sihanoukville a few days ago, via the bus from Phnom Penh. The bus was actually quite nice, although they had a TV on it and played at first some very loud Cambodian show, and then America's Funniest Home Videos (which I actually watched a bit of), and then a movie with a lot of guns and fighting. Needless to say, when we stopped at the halfway point, I went down and found my iPod for the second half of the journey. Hopefully I won't forget that on my next bus ride, which is tonight, and will take 8-10 hours! I have heard that the loud TV is a frequent thing on the buses here.

When I first arrived to town, I went to an area called Serendipity Beach and to a hostel called Monkey Republic. The whole area was very touristy, and the beach even more so, and the hostel was definitely a party place with loud music thumping well into the night. I headed out the next morning for a different beach a few km outside of town that had been recommended to me by Heleen. This beach is called Otres Beach and is way less touristy. In fact, the first afternoon, I was the only person on my beach other than a few occasional passers-by. It was awesome! The place I am staying at here is called Mushroom Piont, and has a great vibe, although this whole area charges way more money than I am used to spending lately, so my bill at the end of the day today will be high. I have had a chance here though to get my fill of Western food, as I had had enough of noodle soup and rice for a bit. I have also enjoyed quite a bit of relaxation and beach time, which has been great. There was a U.S. Navy ship on the horizon for the first couple of days I was here, and now it's gone. The mornings have been very sunny and hot, but in the afternoons it has clouded up and today rained heavily for a couple of hours - of course it was when I had to check out and carry my luggage down!

Another funny (in hindsight) thing is that although this is one of the most expensive places I have stayed at on my trip thus far, it is also the first place where there are no flushing toilets. The lady told me it is because they are made in China and they don't work. So the way we do it is that after finishing using the toilet, you pour water from a big pot in to flush everything down. Basically, it is pretty messy and ends up leaving water all over the seats and floor - although water on the floor is not abnormal since all of the showers in SE Asia are not separated by a curtain or area, so water is always all over the toilet and floor anyway. So, the point of my story is that of course the first place where toilet flushing is not possible on my entire journey is where Montezuma's Revenge comes back to get me in full force in the middle of the night! Seriously, you should have seen me trying to get that toilet flushed at 3 a.m.! It is funny now, but of course then it really wasn't.

So since my days here have consisted of lounging around on the beach, relaxing, and reading, I don't have much else to say about this place. I also haven't taken many pictures, but did try to put the ones up that I did take. The computer doesn't work at all for this for some reason, so I will do so in my next city, I hope. I will take the night bus tonight to Siem Reap, which is near the temples of Angkor Wat, which I am very much looking forward to seeing!

This is for you, dad, since you asked me to do this - the current time here is about 4:06 p.m.

Hope to hear from you all soon and thanks for reading!