Sihanoukville

This place isn't so great. We went snorkeling and that was really good. I got to see corral and some life in the corral. Sea Urchins and the like. It wasn't very colorful but it was better than a lot of other trips, a Dutch guy tells me.

The next day we moved to a hotel closer to the nice beach, 8USD a night, with a gate and fence with razor wire all around it. The bathroom even has a hot shower and toilet paper rather than the hose many places have, although some places lack even the hose. I feel pretty posh staying here.

Once we settled in we headed down to the beach. The beach is pretty interesting. The whole beach is lined with shacks which have chairs in front of them, close to the water. The shacks want you to sit in their chairs so you buy their food and drinks. The staff can be playful at times. One woman took Evan's hat and wore it until we left the place. We left one place to go to another and they said we were rude customers to a friend of ours. They seem to be very emotional about that sort of thing.

The whole time your trying to relax in your chair Khmer women are walking by with fruit and lobsters on a large disc they carry on their heads, some want to give you massages, give manicures, land mine victims beg and the worst of all, children try to sell you bracelets and sarongs. One kid bugged me for 20 minutes straight, begging me to buy a 1$ bracelet. I had to stand up and go swimming to get away from him. The ocean here is full of garbage.

On the plus side, the seafood here is unbelievable. We ate barracuda almost every night, and it is a tasty, wonderful fish. At night, the shacks move the lounge chairs out of the way and set up tables, almost right up the water. The beach becomes a strip of restaurants. It's pretty weird. There isn't much space to walk so you pretty much have to walk through each shack's turf, and as you do, they beg you to eat at their place. Some yelled at us as we passed their turf looking to one with favorable music.

As you walk to the beach at night to get your grub, men ask you if you want a ride on their motorcycle. If you turn them down for that, they offer you drugs. That's quite the business, motorcycle rides and drugs. Smart. I think we were offered opium, but only one of us heard that.

If you want beaches, skip Cambodia. Anyway, we're off to Phnom Penh tomorrow. That should be cool. From there we'll take a river ride up to Siem Reap where we will spend a couple days in Angkor Wat.