So the weird thing about Cambodia, Phnom Penh specifically, is that I've been there 3 times in the past 4 years for a total of maybe 5 weeks and it's starting to feel like a home away from home (away from home). I have nothing to say about it because I no longer do interesting things - I meet up with friends (colleagues), go to my favorite boutiques, cafes, bars and spas. I've stayed in the same hotel the last two times so no need to explore there.... the funniest moment of this trip was on the way to the airport I noticed a guy riding a motorbike on the sidewalk holding the leashes for two small dogs and I realized that was how he "walked" his dog - by driving slowly on his bike! How lazy have we all become???
So after a week working in Cambodia, I met up with Muna (from India fame) in Phuket, Thailand. We only spent the night in Phuket and left early the next morning for Railay Beach. We had picked Railay over Phi Phi, where we were originally going to go because I kept hearing how overbuilt and overrun Phi Phi had become since lax rebuilding guidelines post the tsunami. However, based on Railay - I'm afraid of what Phi Phi might be cuz Railay was pretty overrun. I guess the difference is that they had several beaches that were exclusively resorts, so if you pay the money you live on the nice quieter beaches. However we stayed in a cheap place (that was very nice but not a great location) that was on the side of the pennisula with no beach and just restaurants and shops and a very trashy/dirty walkway.
We didn't have a ton of time - the first day we walked around to one of the beaches
(Pha Nang) and decided it was a little crazy busy and there weren't any easy snack stands, only restaurants at the resorts. In one way the pennisula is really well thought out (it wasn't hit by the tsunami), there are nice walkways to get from beach to beach and the limiting of backpacker places to just two beaches leaves the other two relatively clean. But then there are areas just full of trash, along the walkways.... so close to getting it right.The second day we wanted to get away from the crowds so I suggested kayaking. Muna had never been so we tentatively started out and it was nice and easy. We decided to head for a island that seemed not too far away - although I had a nagging feeling that distances in water are always deceiving. About 2 hours later we tiredly landed on Ko Poda. I hadn't thought the whole thing through and was horribly sunburnt on my legs, just the front of
course. And had two lovely stripes across my feet. We laid out and had lunch and I snorkeled a bit (it was great snorkeling) for a few hours and then headed back. We were both a bit intimidated by the trip back because the way there had been exhausting. And it felt like we weren't moving at all - although the scenery was..... It didn't take us too long to realize that because we were moving with the tide, it was an optical illusion so we were in fact moving really fast (or much faster than on the way there).And that was sort of it. On the flight back, my flight from Phuket to Bangkok was really delayed so the connection in Bangkok was very tight. I thought I had been very smart to store my bag in left luggage in Bangkok but it did mean that I had to go collect it. Thankfully there was a Burger King in the Phuket airport so I could get a whopper there but I absolutely had to get one more Blizzard at the DQ so even though I was running through the airport I stopped for the Coffee Oreo Blizzard. Thankfully the next flight was delayed too. I should have made one more stop at Boots.... next time!
