From Phom Penh we arrived in the beach town of Sianouksville, Cambodia's 3rd tourist hot spot after the capital itself and Siem Reap. Although the place felt seedy and had a famous reputation for bag snatching and scams, when we arrived at the beach for sunset and grabbed a couple of very cheap drinks, we felt great to be on the beach again after 2 1/2 months.
We took a boat snorkelling and spent part of the day on 'Bamboo Island' sitting in the hot hot sea watching poor tourists get urchins in their extremities.
The downside to Sianouksville as we saw it was the amount of children working and begging on the beach. There were also plenty of adults doing the same thing, and Kae and I had to develop tactics such as speaking in pretend French to deflect them. One young boy offered to play a game of naughts and crosses. If I win I get a free bracelet, if I lose I buy a bracelet. I naively asked him how much the bracelet might cost me, and then quickly changed my mind and said we should just play for fun. He told me that he hopes my plane will crash on my flight home, told me ''you are bad man" for emphasis and then sauntered off to the next table to do the same thing all over again.
The upside of the seaside town is the ridiculously cheap seafood bbq. 3 large prawns, a barracuda fillet and 3 squids with chips and salad for $2.50, with cold draught beer at 50c a glass. We had this exact same meal three times before we left.
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