Beautiful Georgetown

Thursday 27/11

In the morning we didn't wake up too early as we were going to have a nice day checking out the city. And Georgetown really was what the title says - beautiful. The beauty in it was the street art. We hopped our bikes and after we had gotten to an information centre for some maps, we were off to explore the wonderful streets.

First things first though. We bought our tickets to got to Langkawi island. The place were we got them was close to the port. And while Pedro was off to buy tickets where he could pay by card, I stayed to chat a bit with a local guy who was, to my surprise, very educated about history. He knew about USSR, and was up to date about the Ukrainian situation. As I had not been reading news so much, it was great to get some recent news. Soon Pedro returned and had the tickets already with him. Then we took the map to see the first place to stop for pictures.

Ernest Zacharevic is a Lithuanian artist, he created these 3D street arts in Georgetown. I must admit, these look even better in real life than in pictures.

This one with the bicycle appeared to be the most famous one. It had the most tourists and tuk-tuks stopping by. There were also some locals selling souvenirs there. We also fell for the souvenirs. I got some lovely magnets to bring back home.

The city has also other sorts of arts here and there.

For the end of the day we left our bikes at the  hotel and took a bus across the island. There we stopped in a neat looking place for dinner. While we were waiting for our food the waiter let us into a music room they had just there where Pedro played a bit of guitar and some drums. Turned out to be a peaceful evening.

We Got on a Bus Again

Wednesday 26/11

As we had gone to bed very late the night before, it was not easy to get up early. But we had decided to start the ride to centre early, so we would not have problems later on. We knew that with bicycles it was not easy to get around in the city.
Pedro lead the way again, as his navigation skills had proven to be fabulous since the beginning of the trip. I was surprised how easily he found the way through the highways. Needless to say, I was delighted that I did not have to get on a highway again. It had been much too scary on the night we arrived to Kuala Lumpur.

We tried to ride towards the Petrona towers, but there was a think mist in the air, and we could not see the towers, it was as if they had sunk to the ground over the night. We stopped near the towers to take the last pictures, first we stopped on the other side, where there was a parkish area. We sat down to enjoy the view, and then an officer came to tell us that we are not allowed to park the bicycles there. It seemed ridiculous as we were the only people there (it was quite early), and we were not disturbing anyone or damaging anything. As the officer left we remained in the place and took pictures. We then went to the front of the building, and again officers were eyeing us as if we had a visible bomb on us. It was so silly of them! When we stopped for pictures, two (not just one, but two(!)) officers approached us to tell us that we should keep bikes on the side. It all seemed as a joke, I really did laugh out loud. But we got the pictures taken and then we headed towards the KL Sentral where our bus was going to depart from.
We stopped in some shops to buy snacks for the trip. We arrived at the bus stop early, and then we waited. The bus was right on time. The driver, his helper and Pedro placed the bikes and our panniers in the buses baggage area. The bus was very comfortable. It had two seat row on one side and one seat row on the other side. There were not many people on the bus. Each seat had a screen in front of them where the passengers could watch movies, listen to music or play some games. Seemed extremely fancy. Then the helper guy went around to give each passenger a pillow. Later on he gave everyone a snack. We did not expect this at all! Later on I found out that we could have taken a regular bus route, not a fancy one, for half the price. But who knows, maybe the other companies would not take our bicycles, so either way, it was good.

We disembarked from the bus and headed towards the town centre where we would get in a hotel and see the city. However, along the way I had encountered a problem - another flat tire. The back tire was very used by now, I had suggested to Pedro that we should change it before the tire itself gets a hole, but we never did that. We stopped there were I had discovered the flat tire under a highway where there was a decent place for us to rest the bikes. Pedro again pulled out his repair kit and was awesome to fix the inner tube.As he was fixing the tube, cars and scooters were passing by and giving us strange looks. At one point there were some police officers, it looked like they were trying to regulate the traffic. The tire was fixed we were ready to keep going.

Once we arrived to Georgetown centre we got to our hotel. We showered and settled in, then decided to go out and find where the port is to go to Langkawi, as we figured that would be a good option to do later on. We found out that there are three ferries per day going across. The ride is about three hours, and they had two in the morning, one at 8:15 and one at 8:30, and one in the afternoon at 14:00. As it was late, we headed to the hotel to decide about the plan for the next few days.

We ended up deciding to stay in Georgetown for the next day, and take the first ferry the following morning. It ended up being a great idea!

Kuala Lumpur

Tuesday 25/11

We set to to wake up at 8 in the morning to we would not get to the Batu Cave when it was extremely hot. But with getting ready and stopping near the metro station for breakfast we ended up taking a lot of time. We had to get to the city with metro Ampang Line, switch at station Bandaraya to Line Port Klang stop Bank Negra and ride it all the way to Batu Caves. 

Metro chip.

The ride was an hour long. What we found interesting was that they had special coaches for ladies only.

Coach for ladies only.

Once we arrived the view was already intense. We first saw a huge statue of Lord Rama.

Peter Lamb and Lord Rama.

We kept walking, but already from there we saw the amazing statue of Lord Murugan and the high stairs we were going to climb. They consisted of 272 uneven concrete steps.

Lord Murugan next to the 272 steps.

While going up the steps we met the monkeys that our host had mentioned on the previous day. The monkeys were used to tourists, extremely rude and cheeky. They are known to steal from tourists anything that they can grab or snatch from hands. One of them actually grabbed a fruit out of Laura's plastic bag! 

Cheeky monkey with the stolen fruit.

The climb was not as bad as we expected it to be and we were up in no time. The view from the top of the big flight of the stairs is phenomenal.

View from the top.

We then continued into the caves, water was dripping form the walls, it was wet, fairly dark and humid. Once you get there, there is another smaller flight of stairs that take people right to the temple. It looked sad inside as in the corners there were old things, like unwanted furniture and garbage. But there were also beautiful pieces of art. 

The cave is deep but on the top there is a huge hole where light came in. We walked around while taking pictures and enjoying what we saw.

Inside the cave.

Then it was time to head back down. Again we got to see the nice view from the top, and meet some more monkeys along the way.

Monkey enjoying coconuts.

We then took a metro back to the centre. Santiago and Laura got off a stop before us. We got off at KL Sentral so we could go to the bus station and decide how to get to our next stop.

Peter Lamb pointing out to the rules of metro.

Due to lack of time we decided to head straight to Penang. We were thinking about taking the train, but again, there was no way they would allow to take the bikes on the train. And also, to our surprise, tickets to many of the destinations were sold out up until December, some even the end of December. Later we found out that is was most likely because it was school holiday in Malaysia at that time. So it was decided, we were going to take the bus. After a long time of thinking and looking through multiple options to multiple destinations we got tickets to go to and island to Georgetown in Penang. We got tickets for the following day noon and paid 149 ringgit for two tickets and we did not have to pay extra for the bikes.

Rainbow in KL.

With that finally settled we walked around a bit, but then it was time to meet up with our fellow couchsurfers. Alina and her friend Yan were nice and offered to give us a ride to go see the Petrona towers. For that we had to meet up with them at the metro station Kampung Baru. So we all gathered together and went for some food. As Pedro and I had recently eaten we just had some drinks. Yan joined us a bit later, sadly she had had a car accident. But thankfully she was fine and the most damage to her car was that the front number plate was falling of because a screw was lost.
Alina and Yan then drove us to the towers were we took some time to take pictures.

The Petronas Towers.

Couchserfers and the Petronas Towers.

After more and more pictures we got back to the cars. We then drove to a hilltop where there was a beautiful view over the city!

In some time we were back at our host's house. Guy from Indonesia ran off to get to the airport, he had an early flight the following morning, so he decided to stay the night there. Back at Alina's place rest of us stayed to chat, and once again it was very late when we got to sleep.

View of KL from a hilltop.

To The Big City

Monday 24/11

The hotel where we stayed not only had a pool, but also breakfast included in the price. We decided to seize the inclusive breakfast, but as it started only at 7 in the morning, it meant a late start for cycling. And since we did not have internet in the room we took our devices to the breakfast table and in the end we only finished our breakfast after eight. Further more, we took a long time packing, so we started cycling only at around 9:00! This was no good, no good at all. But turned out Pedro had a plan to cycle till Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA), which was around 50 km away, but Kuala Lumpur was 110 km. And his plan was to take some transportation from the airport to the city. This turned out to be a good idea as we started much too late to get to the city, and it also started to furiously rain while we were at the airport.

It was very difficult to get to the city with bicycles. The train was not an option, as they don't allow bikes there. And as for the bus, the only company that might take bikes had transfers to the city only from the other terminal. To get to the other terminal we ended up paying 12 ringgit. Of those 1 was for each person, and 5 per each bike! Unbelievable! And we never got the bike ticket. Meaning that the driver most likely put that extra 10 straight to his pocket. Then from the terminal we payed 10 per person to get to the city. There was no extra charge for the bicycles. This seemed strange until we realized that the driver sold us d tickets. What a joke! Turns out the guy has a full pocket of tickets with other time stamps that he resells to the passengers. There is even another guy who encourages people without tickets to save the walk to the ticket counter and buy tickets from the driver. What a scam!
But we got to the city, and that's all that really mattered at this point. We got off the bus in KL Sentral. It started to rain again so we did not go anywhere, just sat in a place where there was internet so we could get in touch with a girl who said she could host us. Yes, Pedro managed to get a positive response even though he sent the couch request only in the morning. Alina had already agreed to host four other people, but was kind enough to also accept our last minute request. The four other people surfing the same couch were:
One guy from Sweden, Kim, who has been travelling the world for two and half years now.
Then there was a couple from Argentina, Laura and Santiago, they had been travelling for a few months now.
And there was also a guy from Indonesia who was on a two week trip in South East Asia. Unfortunately I do not recall his name.
It was difficult to get to Alina's place because the city is not very bicycle friendly. As we had no other choice, we got on the highway, at one point I got myself into a very dangerous situation. The car did not see me even though Pedro was riding in front and indicating that we're switching lanes. The car approached with a high speed and the driver was clearly not paying enough attention. I heard tires squeal and now I just wanted to get off the road ASAP!
After a while we finally got to our host's home, and I was glad to put the bike to the side for now. It first looked like nobody was home, but soon Alina appeared in the window and came down to let us in the house. We sat down for a quick chat, but soon it was time to take a shower. Around that time Laura and Santiago also arrived to Alina's place, and minutes after them Kim came. While I was in the shower, Yan, a friend of our host had also came. It took some while for everyone to shower. But once everyone was ready Alina and her friend Yan drove us all out for dinner. We stopped in a place where there were many vendors selling local dishes. So Yan went to order food from many vendors and then we all tried the different dishes. Some were really spicy, but for me all seemed very tasty. With bellies full it was time to drive back to Alina's place because the Indonesian guy was waiting already by the door. As we were in a car with Yan, she took her time to drive back and was super nice to stop by the Petronas towers so we could get a close-up glimpse of the tallest twin towers in the world. Once we also were back, we all stayed up for a long chat. We had agreed to go to the Batu caves with the Argentinian couple the next day.
It was very late when we all finally headed to sleep. 

It Ain't Always Easy

Sunday 23/11

It was yet another morning. The alarm went off and and unwillingly we had to climb out of the bed. The hotel had some coffee and tea for breakfast. They also had toast, and we were wise enough to buy a nice chocolate-peanut butter spread the day before just so we would not have to have plain toast. After having some food in our systems we were ready to hit the road. When we begun to cycle the sun was already up, but most of the people were still asleep, so the cities streets were quite empty.
For me it was not such a good cycling day, I felt weak. The road was not wide, so some cars when passing were much to close, this made me feel unsafe. The road had some ups and downs, for me this was also a challenge as I'm not too experienced and my knees were beginning to hurt. The scenery was very beautiful but I was feeling too down to fully enjoy it. Meanwhile Pedro was on a good pace and he stopped often to wait for me. Along the way we passed some forests where monkeys lived. 

They were quite shy, so it was hard to get a good picture of them. However, we had a good look. Some of the monkeys had little ones in their arms. We kept cycling until about 11 o'clock when we turned off the main road to some hotel where we thought to have dinner. But they did not have a kitchen, however, we asked if we could cycle down to their beach area just to have a peak at the sea, the woman we were talking to did not mind at all. We cycled u a bit up and down passed the neat houses they had with rooms, at the edge where the sea was they even had a pool where people where busy enjoying the hot weather. One thing to note that local, Muslim people swim with their clothes on. For me this was strange because naturally I find that swimming with as little clothes as possible is more comfortable and less of a hassle than dealing with wet clothes. But religion is religion, and what ever makes them happy was fine with me. We went down to the beach, took some pictures, enjoyed the view but then headed back to the road to keep going. 

A few meters later we saw a sign for another hotel, we followed the sign deep in thorough the forest till we reached the place. The parking lot was full of cars, so this must be a really good place, I thought. We got there and asked if they had anything to eat, and they said that in an hours time they will have some lunch. So we set our bikes to the side and went for a walk along the beach. Once we reached some rocks we stopped and sat down in the sand for some rest. The view was nice and no people where around, so we sat there for more than an hour. Later on we went back to have lunch. We sat down and they bought us two plates of chicken rice, the most common dish in the entire South East Asia, I believe. Don't think I've mentioned this before, but they serve food with fork and spoon, very, very rarely will they have knives. And if you ask for one, there is a good chance they will not understand what you're asking for. But it's not so hard to get used to that, as a big majority of the dishes don't really require a knife. The food was nice, after the meal we just sat there enjoying the view to the sea. It was very peaceful. 

We were then joined by another cycler. He asked if he could join us, and of course we did not mind. Jeff is from England, he is also cycling a lot, he has a job that he can manage working for half a year roughly and the other half he spends travelling. He said that now he is on a five month journey. He has travelled a lot, so it was nice to heat about his experiences and tips and suggestions for our future trips. We chatted for quite some time. Jeff said that he would find a place to stay somewhere nearby, but we had decided to get to Port Dickson that day. So we all begun cycling, but parted soon after we reached the main road.
The sky had gotten very cloudy, and soon before we reached the city it started to rain a bit. Later on we actually met Jeff again, he said that in the area he could not find a decent priced place, so he had cycled to Port Dickson as well. It started raining more and more, we stopped at McDonalds got some food and hoped to get online and look for a place to stay. But their WiFi was down, so now we had to stay there and wait for the rain to pass. In a matter of minutes it got dark, but the rain did not stop.
After spending quite some time in the overly air conditioned cold "restaurant" the rain calmed down and we got out of the place in search for a WiFi or accommodation. We got internet and managed to book a nice looking place not far from where we were. The hotel had a pool, it was closed but the receptionist did not mind us using it for some minutes. So after getting our things to the room and having a nice shower we went to the pool for a swim. But then, of course, it was time to get to sleep and get some good rest. The following day we were going to arrive to Kuala Lumpur.

Getting to Malacca

Thursday 20/11

As we had not cycled much the previous day only about 37km, today we had to get going and get some kilometers done.
We ready to leave Pulai at around 8 in the morning. The sun was long up and we had a quick breakfast at the hotel. Pedro, as usual, navigated us to the right roads.
We spent the day cycling until we stopped for a rest in a park. Pedro hanged one hammock up in a tree. While I slept on a bench in a a wooden shelter near by. While we were resting some schoolboys stopped on their scooters and popped some petards of some sort. 

Later on we stopped for dinner, we had some rice with chicken. After we continued to cycle until we found a nice looking Home-stay, we knocked on the doors and rang our bells, but it seemed like nobody was home. So we sat down to wait hoping that who ever run the place would show up soon. While we waited, the sun set, and from a nearby mosque we heard people praying. Some while later we finally saw some people there, seemed like a son and his mother. We arranged a decent price of 45 ringgit. As we settled into the room it started to really rain outside, we were truly glad that we had a roof over our heads at this time.

Friday 21/11

Morning came sooner than expected, we woke up not very early, the sun was already up! Yesterday we had cycled close to 90 km, and today we were up for another decent day of cycling. For breakfast we stopped at one of the only places that was open at an early hour. We had a Indian dish served with curry sauce. Pedro loved the dish, and it was very nice, so we both asked for another one. This time for the brake we stopped in a coconut plantation and hanged the hammocks on some trees we found there.

It was a good place far away from the road, so we had a quite time while relaxing. Once we continued cycling two cyclists passed us! At first they did not stop, they flew passed us at a very impressive speed. Later on we met them as they had stopped for a quick stop. We found out that the two girls were from the UK. One of them, Katherine, is cycling all the way from Australia to UK. And the other girl is a friend of hers who joined her on cycling adventures for the distance from Singapore to Bangkok.
After getting to know each other it was time to keep rolling. We stopped for the day in a city called Muar. We went about looking for a guesthouse that was not expensive, and meanwhile we saw that the two British girls were also in the same town. They stopped at a hotel, and so did we. We got a double room for 45 ringgit. 

This was a special cyclist discount. After settling in the room and having a shower we went our for some well deserved dinner. The city was full with life and open market. We sat in a nice looking place and the lady working there helped us with understanding the menu. The food was good!!! :D
Once we got back to the hotel we went straight to sleep!

Saturday 22/11

We got up at around seven, got ready, but on our way down to our bikes we stopped on the second floor where the hotel had it's WiFi area. So you can imagine that there we wasted a lot of time. While we were sitting there, the two girls passed us as they were going downstairs. We greeted them, and wished a good ride! When online things were finally somewhat done it was again late to begin a cycling day.

Yesterday we had cycled about 84 km, so we had not far to go to get to Malacca, only roughly 50 km. We got to the city in a good time cycling all the 50 in one stretch. We found our hotel that Pedro had booked online and checked in. The place was cosy. Near the reception there was a world map with pins in many countries. As there was no pin placed in Latvia, later on I put one in there. So I was their first guest from Latvia. We were feeling very lazy so we took a lot of time doing nothing but resting! The hot midday passed and we got our lazy asses out to the city. We agreed to meet up with Vaidas, the guy who surfed the same guys couch as us back in Dubai! We went to the hostel where he said we would find him, but as he was taking a nap, we decided to drop by again later. As we wondered the streets of the city, it started to rain. It was refreshing at first, so we kept walking about. We were in China-town area, and there was a market of some sort with people selling all sorts of things, including street food. We were forced to stop under one of the shelters because the rain grew in power, and now it was truly pouring!

It was most likely the wildest rain the two of us had seen. The sky turned from white to completely black in a matter of minutes. The thunder roared so loudly you'd think it was a war field, and the lightning was so bright it light up the entire sky when it struck. The water came like a river that had lost its direction. It was truly wild rainfall for at least an hour. The street vendors tried their best to save their things, but much of that was too late. Once the rain had finally calmed down a bit, we decided to keep moving. We went again to Vaidas hostel where he was playing chess with some local man. It was great meeting him! After he won his game he took us to a very cheap Indian restaurant where we ate roti. Roti are pancakes made from dough ball that is stretched out and folded and cooked on big pan surfaces that they have. If you take one that has something inside, it will be placed there after the stretching and before the folding. That evening we fell in love with roti, especially roti pisan (roti with banana)! After dinner Vaidas headed back to his hostel where he had to entertain some guests. Meanwhile we walked about the nice city. The cities streets were full of people, probably because it was a Saturday and that week some festival was taking place there. We did not manager to catch anything from the festival, but nevertheless we had a lovely walk around. While walking along the river, we saw a street musician who was playing his guitar and next to him he had a dancing donkey toy. We chatted to the man a bit, and then I even danced alongside the donkey a bit while bystanders had a good laugh.
Vaidas had invited us to join him at the hostel, it sounded like a nice idea, but as we decided not to stay another day in the city, it was time to head back to our place and get some good rest.

Another Border

Wednesday 19/11

We woke up later than planned. Sharon had left already while the four of us where still asleep. Jose and David also left before us, they planned to start the day with a visit to the botanical garden. We took the liberty to sleep in until about noon. Gosh we had missed some good sleep. But now we had at least rested well and we were ready to face the border. It was not very far until we reached the bridge. We rode our bicycles on the line that was for motorcycles. On Singapore's side they stamped our passports for leaving the country. On the other side we had no problems, the lady border officer stamped our passports allowing us to stay in the country for 90 days. Great!
With that done we were ready to cycle closer to the west coast as that is where the weather should be better. In Singapore we were told that on the east side of Malaysia there are monsoons at the moment, so we set to leave that cost for the next time we visit the country.
We did not cycle very much as it was relatively late and we both were tired. It was hard to find the right way, so we settled in a guesthouse soon after the border. As Malaysia is rapidly developing at the moment, more people spoke English than in Cambodia. Here it was not hard to find people who knew English, which made travelling slightly easier. 

Singapore

Tuesday 18/11

Because it was 18th of November I put Latvia's flag ribbon around my arm, that's the least I could do.

Today was going to be the day when we explore Singapore. As we were far from the centre we had to take the public transport to get there. Sharon, our host, was super helpful and gave Pedro and me two spare transportation cards. We just needed to top them up when possible.
We left the place with Jose and David, and we spent the entire day with the two of them. I had met Jose when he was in Riga, and I knew for a fact that he loves to walk about a lot! So I mentally tried to  prepare myself for some walking. We took the bus to the metro, and then the metro to the other metro line, and then finally we got to Little India. Singapore is said to have one of the best public transportation, maybe that is so (but as they don't allow bicycles on board, I hesitate to agree). We walked and walked, took some pictures (while Jose took a lot of pictures). We got to see a lot as we walked pretty much the entire day. The highlight, of course, was Marina Bay Sands. I recall that I wanted to sit a lot as my legs were not used to so much walking. The city is, in fact, very lovely and organized. And compared to Phnom Penh where we had just spent the entire weekend, the city seemed to be like from another time. Also, the cost of everything was much higher, which for us took some time to get used to. As I'm looking at the differences, I'd like to note that most of the population here know English. And the streets are much cleaner than in Phnom Penh where one would actually need boots to pass through some of the trashed streets of the city.
In the evening we met up with our host and another guy, we were all chilling on a bridge in city centre. Apparently that's what youngsters do, because going out to bars and restaurants is much too expensive. So they buy some snacks and drinks in the store and enjoy the nice weather while sitting outside. Later on more and more couchsurfers showed up, I lost track of how many they were, but we were a big company. We left quite early (around 22:00), Sharon had to work the following morning. Portuguese brothers were going to spend the day still in Singapore and later take a night bus to Kuala Lumpur. And as for us, after some doubting whether to stay another day or not, we decided to head for Malaysia the next day. As we were entering the metro station, I realized that I had lost the metro ticket/card. This was silly of me, as the card was not mine, it had about 8 Singapore dollars since we topped them up, and now I needed to buy a new ticket to get back to Sharon's place. 
We finally got back, it was late, and soon we all headed to sleep. 

Flying Into The Future

Monday  17/11

Phnom Penh, it was finally the day to leave the city. Since we had spent a quite a long time there, we were more than willing to head away. We had our flight to Singapore at 15:30 from Phnom Penh's International Airport. As planned, we had hot dogs for breakfast, and Maria joined us even though she was about to leave for work. On Friday we had arranged at one of the bike shops that they would pack our bikes into bike boxes. It was very pricy, $30, but the guys at the bike shop did a good job, wrapped the frame with newspaper, and found boxes that could fit the bicycles. One of the guys then found a tuk tuk driver that agreed to take us to the airport. As expected, we had to bargain about the price, the driver first said 20 dollars(!) but we ended up paying 10.25. Our bike boxes could barely fit in the tuktuk, leaving very little space for us. The ride was quite long, and mostly went along the Russian Federation Street. When we arrived to the airport it was early and the check in for our flight had not even started yet. So we set our things on trolleys and sat down to wait. It was around two when they begun check in. We had purchased luggage space 25kg each, so total of 50, once we had the bikes placed there was still some weight left, so we also checked in my big black pannier, and took Pedro's panniers with us as hand luggage. The security line was quick and we got to our gate fast. Again, it's a small airport, so not too many flights or people around. At the waiting area we seized the time to have a meal, some nice warm chicken sandwiches. Those were also overpriced, just because it was an airport. We got to the plane, and after everyone was aboard the pilots took off into the cloudy sky.
The flight was roughly two hours long. We arrived in Singapore, there was zero problems at the immigration, both of us got stamps that we could stay 90 days in Singapore. We stopped after to assemble our bikes and then it was quite late, but we had to get to the city!
We had found a host in Singapore, Sharon. We were lucky that she was hosting two Portuguese brothers, Jose and David, who happened to be Pedro's Couch Surfing friends. So them two and the host did not mind if we surfed the same couch. The thing was that Sharon lives close to the border to Malaysia, which is pretty far from the airport, so now we had to figure out how to get there. To our surprise, the city is extremely bicycle unfriendly, there is no bikes allowed on the metro or buses, and a regular taxi would not only not fit the bikes, but it would cost a fortune. We were advised to hire a special big taxi that had a fixed rate of 60 Singapore dollars! Very expensive, but it was really to only real option, as cycling would take ages, and there were only highways, and it was dark already. We managed to fit the bikes in the big taxi. The ride was long, about 40 minutes, but the driver took us to the right address, so we knew we wouldn't have to wonder about searching. We soon found the right apartment, and we were glad our host was home and awake. Soon Jose and David arrived, we were charting a bit about our trips, and what to see the following day, but then it was time to sleep.

Phnom Penh Weekend

Saturday 15/11

Wow, time sure passes quickly. We begun our trip two weeks before this Saturday, can't believe that two weeks have already passed. But luckily this holiday of ours will keep on going for a while longer! :)
On Saturday we seized the time to sleep in and rest well. When we finally woke up it was close to check-out time. Since we had no replies on CS we asked if we could stay another night, and it was no problem. So we slept in a bit more and in the afternoon we realized that we are getting really hungry! :D
So we finally got out of the hotel took our bikes and went out to the city. We cycled a bit around, then cycled a bit along the river. The water was not very clean, but the riverside was pleasant. Later on we stopped at a place called Variety, the restaurant had a lot of seating places, and many waiters were sitting about. We got off our bikes, 'parked' them, and sat right by. We assumed that one of the bored out waiters or waitresses will bring us some menus, or at least tell us what they have that we could order. But as it turned out, none of them spoke English, yes, out of about 10 people, none spoke any English at all. They ended up calling another girl from the kitchen, I assumed, as she didn't have the same T-shirt as the rest of them. We told her that we wanted to eat something (which should have been obvious). She asked one of the waiters to bring a menu, she apologized that it is not in English, but it had some pictures and she stayed around so we could asked her what was what. We ended up ordering some stake and vegetables for the two of us to share. While waiting for the food, all the waiters and waitresses where stating at as. Also, while we waited we were thinking what to do later on. We decided to go see a movie - Before I Go To Sleep. It would start only at 22:10, so we still had plenty of time. We had our meal, the stake arrived and it was much too rare for us. So we asked for it to be cooked a bit more. After the meal we decided to head back to our hotel to rest a bit and blog a bit. Then it was time to go back to the movie cinema. We decided to walk there, the air was nice, not too hot, and the distance was about 2km, so less than 30 minutes to walk. Cycling did seem as an option, but we decided it would not be safe to leave bikes outside while we watch the movie. We were maybe half way there while crossing a smaller street a scooter passed right behind us. It seemed to be very close, but nothing unusual..until I felt that the back person on that scooter had grabbed the strap of my bag and was pulling it as the scooter kept going. I was pulled sideways as the bag was across from one shoulder to the other side. Luckily the man let go fairly soon after realizing that he could not get it. Was also lucky that he didn't have a knife to cut the strap. Would've been a big loss for me as my wallet and passport were in the bag. After all it also contained tickets for the movie, so the trip to the cinema also would be a waste. We kept on walking and only then we realized that we were pretty much the only people who were going by foot in the streets. We were glad to arrive to the cinema. The movie was nice, I liked it, as it was a mystery. But Pedro found it a bit too scary. :D
After the movie we decided to save yourselves from the streets of Phnom Penh and took a tuktuk back to our hotel. It was late and time to head to sleep. 

 

Sunday 16/11

As we had had a late evening, and not many plans for the day, we were sleeping in again! When we finally woke up Pedro was checking his email where he had a response on Couch Surfing that a girl called Maria was willing to host us! Oh the joy!!! At around 11 o'clock we called out potential host to ask if she is still OK to host us for the night, and she said that she could! We agreed to meet up at 13:00 near the Russian market. So we packed our things, went for a quick lunch (breakfast, really) and the cycled our way to the meeting point. There we greeted Maria with hugs, and with all three of us on bicycles she showed us the way to her place. It was a few narrow stairs to go up, and then we arrived to her cosy place. She said she had moved in there just about a week ago. Her flatmates, a French couple, had been gone for the weekend. We sat down and had a great chat with our host. Maria is originally from Argentina, but had lived in Australia for quite a time, and in Cambodia for a bit less than a year now. She also just returned from a holiday in Indonesia.
Later on we went to the market, there we got some nice pants for Marta, and two t-shirts. We managed to bargain with the seller. He firsts said that the pants alone would cost 5 dollars. Of course, I did not agree, but in the end we paid 6 dollars for the pants plus two shirts. We then met up with our host, she had not been feeling too well, so we decided to make her and us some dinner. We were super happy for the opportunity to cook, and she could rest a bit. We cycled to the supermarket where while shopping for groceries we decided to make some pasta salad, and for breakfast we got some buns and sausages to make hot dogs.
The dinner turned out to be OK, we mixed a lot of ingredients, and covered the dishes with a nice salad dressing.
We stayed on the balcony eating and talking about all sorts of things! It was very nice to stay with a couch surfer after having spent a lot of nights in hotels and guesthouses. Night came, we all were tired and it was time to sleep! 

Honk, Honk, Honk, Beep, Beep, Beep...

Friday  14/11

Friday arrived! The day people are usually extremely excited about. However, since we're on a holiday, for us it makes very little difference - every day is exciting! Today we were going to arrive to Cambodia's capital city Phnom Penh. The distance left was only about 50 km, which was half of what we had cycled the day before. Therefore the plan was to get to the city before we stop for a break.
There was only one BUT, we had no idea where we would be staying until our flight that is only on Monday.
The way was straight forward, and more and more signs indicated that we truly will be arriving to Phnom Penh shortly. But that's not the only thing that was more and more, the traffic! Scooters, cars, pickups, trucks, ... seemed to appear out of thin air. There was noise everywhere. By now we were used to them all honking like crazy, but this was a whole new level. There was also some road construction work going on in some fragments of the national road nr.5, so this made the traffic even more hectic. But being cyclists we had some what an advantage since like scooters we could pass cars and trucks that were stuck. Good for us.
We had not yet arrived to the city centre area when Pedro saw a restaurant that had WiFi. So we decided to stop there and see what our plan for the rest of the day will be. We ended up spending a lot of time there. Pedro was eagerly searching for a Couch Surfing host for us for the current city. And I sent some requests for Singapore. During our stay at this place we had some drinks and a meal. We did some blogging and facebooking.
At this restaurant they had two TVs. Each was showing something else. But on one of them they played their own DVDs which where either strange Cambodian action movies or Cambodian karaoke.
We had spent literally hours at this place, so finally we searched online for a hotel where we could stay as there were no positive responses on Couch Surfing. We found one with a pool, online the price was 20$ per night. We thought about booking it, but since it required card details, we thoughts it's better to wait till we get there.
Then Pedro also found online a bike shop that we could go to for some tips. So off we went to this shop. We found it easily. There Pedro asked if they had bike boxes; we'll be needing them for the flight. They said that with them disassembling them and putting them into the boxes it would be 9USD each. They also offered us their own transportation. The guy at the shop said that it would total cost us close to 50USD. They'd pack our bikes and bring us to the airport. It seems a lot, but it's pretty much a hustle free option.
After the chat at the bike shop we wondered through the traffic to the hotel we had picked out for us. We asked the receptionist what the price was for one night, he said it's 15$. Great! So we took a room for us, at firsts just one night. We were allowed to bring the bikes inside the hotel and we locked them together not far from the reception. Seemed safe enough!
It was nice to settle into our room. It's quite small, has a desk and a bed in the room, and a small space to turn around. And there is also a toilet/shower. All together not so bad. Of course there is dust in many places, and the corners have clearly not been cleaned in a while. But it has air conditioner so we can stay cool! :D
Once we had our showers and rest time we went out to the city for dinner. The city, or at least the area where we're staying seems quite vibrant. There are many bars, cafes and restaurants around here. Always buzzing with peoples' chatters. We ended up looking like typical tourists because for the meal we had burgers with fries. But I really had a desire to have a juicy sandwich of some sort. And we also tried some Cambodian beer, which turned out to be nothing very special. Then we headed for the hotel and went to sleep!

They See Us Rollin'

Wednesday 12/11

We woke up early, as planned, and as usual. Again, we wanted to start cycling early so that we could do a good distance before the sun was too hot. Surprisingly it was not so hard. Guess it was because we had gone to bed early and had had a good rest. We got out of the guesthouse and went across the street where there was a market and there we purchased some snacks for breakfast. We had several different kinds of sweeties and salty things, most of which we could not figure what they were. The best one for both of us was the banana fritter. Yumm!

Pedro and Marta picking what's for breakfast.

After breakfast we kept on cycling and Pedro stopped at the barber's place and said that he was ready to get his hair cut! He seemed very excited. :) The barber cut his hair and gave him a good shave, all for one dollar! Pedro was happy and very pleased with the result.

Pedro at the barber's.

It was then time to keep on rolling.. Until Marta got a flat tire! Yes, I had cycled over some tiny needle like object that happened to puncture through the tire and make a hole in the inner tube. Good though that Pedro had taken with him from Portugal a repair kit. He fixed the inner tube and found that little object that had caused the problem! Saved the day! Thank you Pedro!!! ;) 

The flat tire time.

We then continued to cycle till a town called Pursat where we stopped for the market. There Pedro went to get some bread and muffins for lunch.

Market in Pursat.

Once that was done we cycled a bit more until we found a decent place where we could hang the hammocks for the break of the day. It was further off the road near some houses, there were some perfectly aligned trees waiting for us.

Though at one point my hammock was invaded by the sun and I was forced to move to another place, then Pedro did the same.
After the rest we continued to cycle a bit more, not too long though, it had been an eventful day and we both were tired. We stopped in a town in a guest house called Paris. There we stayed for a while to blog. Once we had rested a bit we were ready for dinner. Next door to the hotel was a nice 'restaurant' where we asked for some rice with some meat. The man got us big dishes of very nice fried rice mixed with some greens and meant. The taste was awesome! One of the best dinners so far. And the price was only 2$ per plate.
After dinner we went to a market where most sellers were packing everything away. But we managed to buy some very tasty cookies for breakfast. We also got some strange green snacks.
Then it was late already and time to go to sleep, after all we had to wake up early again!

Thursday 13/11

As usual the alarm went off at five o'clock in the morning. We had gone to bed quite late, so it was much harder to get up! We had WiFi there so that made the morning even longer. For breakfast we had the cookies we had purchased previous day. We left the hotel much too late, at close to seven o'clock. The sun was long up and heating the streets we were about to roam. I was very dissatisfied with the late start, because for me it is very hard to take the heat. So the say started off with me being Miss Grumpy. We cycled in the sun and I wanted to stop way too often and could not cycle fast at all! Finally it was time to rest! Pedro found an amazing place for us to hang the hammocks. It was under a house (as many houses here are built on tall 'legs' to avoid flooding). What's the best part is that the house was in the lake Tonle Sap. The view was beautiful!

Peter Lamb tying hammocks.

Marta resting.

We stayed there swinging above the water for the whole resting time. A few times some kids came by to go swimming. The place is not really suitable for that, but they still seemed to have a lot of fun. Some of them wanted to come and chat with us, but unfortunately the language barrier exists. So it was smiling and saying: "Hello!"
During the rest time I also tried the green strange snacks we had gotten yesterday. The texture was like it was play dough, the smell was sweet. But the taste was not good at all!

After the nice rest on the breezy lake it was time to keep rolling! We got back to the road and kept going. Soon I got really hungry since all we had had was cookies all day, so we stopped in a place where I could eat. It was rice with green beans and meat. Pedro claimed that he was not hungry. Again, it was time to roll. The more we cycled the easier it was for me because the sun was slowly setting. The air got lighter and soon there was no need for sunglasses. And soon we had to use some lights to see the road. Pedro gave me his headlamp so I could see the way. Then Pedro got hungry, so we stopped again, so he could eat. In that place there were some cute kittens that were a bit frightened, but wanted to cuddle. And AGAIN it was time to keep going, at some points we stopped to ask people where was the closest place to sleep, and they just indicated that it's very far. So we kept going and going and going. Finally we reached a town called Sala Phlov Veay where Pedro quickly spotted a guesthouse! The price for it was 5$. She gave us a room that had not been cleaned. But it would actually make no difference as evey hotel and guesthouse we had stayed so far had always been poorly cleaned. She was nice enough to give us clean towels and blankets. But later on I found out that the shower was broken, so I ended up washing under the tap. Pedro went in the shower a bit later and claimed that he was able to fix it. Oh well! It was time to sleep as the next day we were going to arrive to Phnom Penh.

Pedro & Marta on the road.