We were a bit jet lagged today, so we ended up waking up pretty early and grabbing breakfast at the hotel. It was quite tasty! They have a nice lobby area where breakfast is served with windows looking out into mini-gardens on either side.
Our first task of the day was to figure out how to get some cash, since the ATMs had been giving us trouble. We got a tip that the Post Office ATMs worked with foreign debit cards, so we struck off to try that out. There was one about a 10 minute walk from our hotel, but when we arrived we saw that it didn't open till 9:00. We walked around the neighborhood a bit until 9:00, and were extremely relieved when the ATM didn't reject our card!
After that, we headed off to Hanayama's headquarters, where I would be participating in their first Cast Puzzle World Championship. The competition consisted of 16 participants, most from Japan MENSA society and a few from elsewhere in the world. There were three rounds, the first two consisted of previous Hanayama cast puzzles, and the last which had a new puzzle.
Since Hanyama has over 40 cast puzzles, that was a lot of puzzles that I needed to know how to solve! I had been practicing, but there are of course some that I'm better at than others. Fortunately, they ended up choosing one of my favorites, Cast Baroq for the first round. I did fairly well, placing fourth about 24 seconds. A three of the Japanese competitors had very impressive times, with the best one at 15 seconds!
After the first round, the fastest 8 competitors moved on! The next puzzle would be Cast Enigma: another fortunate selection since I had been practicing this puzzle recently. It is a classic Hanayama cast puzzle, so it was definitely a good choice. I did fairly well again, with a time of 1 minute and 13 seconds, enough to clinch 3rd place and make the cut to the final round! Woo hoo!
The final round was a new puzzle by Vesa Timonen, Cast Cylinder. This beast kept the final four competitors for over 20 minutes! I according the commentary, I was in the lead for a while at the beginning, but I became convinced that I was a dead end and headed back to the beginning to try another approach. Unfortunately, I ended up being unable to solve the puzzle and watched my lead slip away to come in 4th. Quite disappointing since it felt within my grasp for a little while there. Ah well, at least I made it to the finals! Masata Karatani came in first, followed by Isao Mananami and Yuki Yamada.
As a thank-you for participating, everybody got special gold colored copies of Cast Cylinder, with 2013 Cast Puzzle Championship written on the pieces. Very nice! Now I can get a chance to finish figuring this puzzle out! A big thanks to Teddy Sakamoto and the folks at Hanayama for inviting me!
The event was fun, but also stressful: solving puzzles against 3 other people while a crowd watches is a bit unnerving. I think I'll stick to solving in my living room!
After the competition, we headed out to explore the area around Hanayama called Akihabara. This area has all sorts of electronics shops, arcades, maid cafes, and other random things, so it was fun strolling around and exploring the various shops. Kellian wanted to check out an area between Akihabara and our hotel called Ueno, so we headed there for dinner. We came across a great Tempura restaurant, which was quite inexpensive but also really tasty! It didn't look like a lot of food, so we also got some hot udon soup, but that ended up being way too much food!
After that, we wandered around a nearby shopping mall before heading back to our hotel, quite exhausted and a bit jet-lagged. Quite a long day!
Today Kellian and I headed to Japan for a bit of vacation as well as the International Puzzle Party! We decided to splurge a little bit and get the direct flight from Boston to Tokyo, which was awesome. First off, it took 13 hours rather than 22+, which is great. It was also on the new Boeing Dreamliner which has all sorts of fancy new features: variable tint windows, usb charging plugs everywhere, AC charging plugs under each seat, and an excellent in-flight entertainment system. Kellian and I passed the time watching a few movies and playing some of the games (Street Fighter!) on this system, we didn't even need to break out the iPad for entertainment.
Once we got to Tokyo at around 4:00PM, we made our way to our hotel. This involved taking a train and then taking a cab, which should have been pretty simple. Unfortunately, we had a heck of a time getting an ATM to give us some cash for the cab: we tried about 5 of them over the course of an hour without any luck. Eventually, we just started asking around if there was some place we could convert some USD into Yen, and there was actually one nearby. That was a relief!
We found out from a German fellow living in Japan that there was recently a change to the ATM network that may be what is causing the problems. He pointed us to a particular bank (Postal Bank) that should accept our cards, so we're planning to try that tomorrow.
Once we got a cab, he had a bit of trouble actually finding our hotel (The Edo Sakura), but eventually we got there! It is a new ryokan (traditional Japanese inn) with futons and tatami mats the rooms. Pretty neat and very clean since it was recently constructed.
After that, we headed out to grab some dinner, which was unfortunately just as the rain started coming down. We made a run for it and ended up finding a place, but not before we were pretty wet. Due to the rain, we couldn't be very picky and actually ended up at a Korean restaurant. Still, it was delicious!
Now Kellian is snoozing and I am finishing this blog up rapidly so I can do the same. No sleep for quite a few hours (I didn't sleep on the plane), so I'm looking forward to getting some rest!
Click here for the full set of pictures and videos!
A few days ago we returned from an amazing trip to the British Virgin Islands with our friends Greg Charvat and Katie Phillips. We chartered a boat from Footloose Charters and sailed around Tortola and the surrounding islands. It was an eight-day trip and here's the path we took (counter-clockwise, starting at Road Town):
We flew on a 5:00 AM flight from Boston to St. Thomas then took a ferry from St. Thomas to Tortola. While in St. Thomas, we grabbed lunch at a nice place called Gladys' Cafe before boarding the ferry to Tortola.
We had hoped to get to our boat in time to do the briefing in the evening, but the ferry took much longer than expected: it left late and the line to get through BVI customs went really slowly. In the future, we'll be sure to sit near the exit to the ferry so we can get at the head of that line! I think we arrived around 6:30 PM, just as it was getting dark. Our boat was named Moon Wind, which seemed appropriate since there would be a full moon near the start of our trip.
The provisioning (groceries) were to be delivered around 9:00 PM, so we went to grab a quick bite. The places on the dock were extremely overpriced, but we got a tip from a local fellow about a cheaper place that was about a mile walk away. Unfortunately, that ended up being almost as expensive!
Day 2
After the chart briefing and the boat briefing, we headed out! We managed to motor out of our slip without any problems and made our way toward the Sir Frances Drake channel. Since this was the first leg of our trip and we got a fairly late start due to the briefings (about 1:30 PM), we decided to make it an easy day and head for Peter Island, which was only about an hour away.
The wind and weather was perfect, and Moon Wind sailed quite nicely, so we made great time. When we arrived at Great Harbor, Peter Island, we did a bit of snorkeling and just relaxed for a bit. Then we headed over to a little restaurant on the island that was quite tasty.
Day 3
After having some blueberry pancakes for breakfast (cooked by yours truly), we headed on our way. Again, the wind was blowing pretty strong and we cruised along nicely. Here's a video of us under-way toward our next destination, Salt Island. We hit a top speed of 6.9 knots on this leg!
We arrived at Lee Bay, Salt Island, where we snorkeled on the wreck of the RMS Rhone, a mail ship that sunk during a storm in 1867. The stern of the wreck is shallow enough that you can see it quite clearly, but the bow is in much deeper water. The day we visited was particularly clear, so we got a good view!
After having some lunch, we made our way to our overnight anchorage, Manchioneel Bay in Cooper Island. This was another nice anchorage, that was pretty well protected. We snorkeled for a bit and had some wine and cheese as a snack before dinner.
For dinner, we headed over to a restaurant on the island, which was also pretty good. Most of the restaurants had 2-for-1 deals on certain cocktails from 5:00-6:00, so we made a habit of heading in before 6:00 to take advantage of that. Painkillers and rum punch are two popular drinks in the area.
Day 4
On the fourth day, we decided to head towards The Baths at Virgin Gorda first, where we would stop for lunch. This was listed in the guide as a must-see location, with some really cool caves to be explored. The book also had conflicting advice: don't forget your camera and don't bring anything you don't want to get wet! So I decided to play it safe and leave my camera in the boat. However, an image search yields some nice pictures to give you an idea of what it looked like. It was quite beautiful with the light streaming in from above, and the caves partly filled with water.
After making our way through the caves of The Baths, we arrived at Devil's Bay, a beautiful snorkeling spot with tons of colorful fish. Kellian had been a bit nervous about snorkeling up until now, but this is where she really got the hang of it! It is no surprise, since there was so much cool stuff to see.
By the time we were done, it was getting a bit late to get to our next anchorage, so we had to make good time. Fortunately, the harbor where we were headed, Trellis Bay on Beef Island, had plenty of mooring balls left when we got there.
In the middle of Trellis Bay is a small island named Bellamy Cay, which has a great little restaurant named The Last Resort. I had some ribs that were amazing, and Kellian had a vegetarian pizza that was also quite good. Probably our best meal of the whole trip!
Day 5
In the morning we purchased some ice, sunscreen, and a few other things from a local shop in Trellis Bay. Next, we continued our path along the northern side of Tortola, motoring through the narrow Camanoe Passage before putting the sails up and heading west.
We were sailing dead downwind, but decided to sail on a broad reach rather than on a dead run, since it gets a bit dull and hot running with the wind. Also, this course took us further from land, where the wind was more favorable.
Eventually we made it to Cane Garden Bay, Tortola, a nicely protected harbor with a beautiful beach that is nestled in the mountains. Due to its proximity to Road Town, it was a bit touristy for our taste. The beach had at least 5 or 6 restaurants that seemed to cater to the cruise ship crowd. Still, the scene was very picturesque! We arrived around lunchtime, and had plenty of time to explore and relax.
After lunch, we went to the Callwood Rum Distillery, which has been operating continuously for something like 200 years. They had a rum tasting for $1 per person, and had four different rums you could taste.
It was interesting tasting the differences: one was aged five years and had a pretty harsh taste, the one aged ten years was quite a bit mellower, one was filtered and had almost no flavor, and the last one had been sweetened with cane sugar. Having a sweet tooth, Kellian and I liked the last one and ended up buying a bottle to remind us of our trip when we got home (and drown our sorrows when it snows!).
We returned back to our boat and decided to swim a bit, but the snorkeling was a bit lackluster compared to what we had seen the last few days, so Katie suggested that we take the dinghy around to Brewers Bay, where it was supposed to be much better. So we hopped into the dinghy without giving it a second thought and off we went. Little did we realize, but it was over a mile to Brewers Bay! That's quite a trip in a small dinghy. We did eventually make it, but Greg, Katie, and Kellian were pretty nervous being so far away from the boat with only a dinghy, so we headed back right away. We definitely should have checked the charts before heading out!
After our adventure, we relaxed for a bit and then headed over to the beach to watch the sunset and sip piña coladas. It was pretty stunning! The whole time, pelicans were swooping in to catch these little silver fish that were all over the place. We grabbed dinner at one of the beach restaurants before heading back to the boat.
Day 6
We started the day off by heading over to Diamond Cay in Jost Van Dyke to do some snorkeling. At the chart briefing, we heard that there were lots of sea turtles around this area, so we decided to check it out.
The snorkeling here was indeed incredible! Kellian and I spotted three sea turtles, a sting ray, four squid, and two huge fish that were probably a good 3 feet long. This area also had some nicely developed reefs with all different types of coral and tons of colorful fish. Definitely worth checking out!
It would have been nice to spend a night here and check out some of the other areas of Jost Van Dyke, but our trip was drawing to a close and we needed to make our way back closer to Road Town. We decided to make our last stop Norman Island, which is only a few hours from Road Town. Norman Island was a solid 14 nautical miles from Jost Van Dyke, however, so we had a long sail ahead of us!
It was a tricky sail, the winds were quite strong, and we had to make our way through the fairly narrow Thatch Island Cut. Less adventurous souls would have motored through here, but we decided to try sailing through, and it was intense! The wind was shifty due to the land nearby, so we had to be careful not to let an errant gust knock us over. Our top speed was 7.0 knots, which is very fast for a sailboat of this type!
After about six tacks, we were back in the Sir Frances Drake channel and headed for Norman Island. The wind continued to blow quite hard, so we made pretty good time. I think it ended up taking us about three and a half hours, which was our longest leg of the trip.
We made our way for The Bight in Norman Island, a nicely protected harbor with tons of mooring balls. I should say that it is nicely protected from the seas, but the wind howled through like crazy! Something about the shape of the hills caused the wind to funnel through quite strongly.
We went for drinks at the infamous Willy T, a floating bar and restaurant that is known for being pretty raucous. We were there early, so things were calm, but the party went late into the night!
Day 7
The following day, we planned to head back to Road Town, but we had plenty to do before then. The day started with a hike up Norman Island. We found a nice little path that led nearly to the top of the island, which was pretty high. From here, we got some great views of the other anchorages of Norman Island.
We could see that the weather was rainy in the distance, but it mainly passed us with only a few sprinkles. We had been quite lucky with the weather!
In our explorations, the skeleton of a windsock led us to discover a helicopter landing pad! It was pretty overgrown, so probably no longer in use, but still a neat discovery.
After we were done exploring, we made our way back to the boat and took the boat over to The Caves at Norman Island. There are four caves that you can explore, none of which are particularly deep so you don't even really need a flashlight. They are partly filled with water, so you can swim right in. Unfortunately, no pictures of this since it was pretty wet! The snorkeling outside the caves was also quite good, with plenty of colorful fish all around and interesting coral formations.
Next, we headed on to The Indians and Pelican Island, a small island on the way back to Road Town that was supposed to also have some good snorkeling. Unfortunately, the wind was still quite strong, making the water very choppy. Katie and I snorkeled for a bit, but headed in after a while since we got tired of being tossed around by the waves.
Finally we made our way back to Road Town and brought Moon Wind back to the dock. I was a bit nervous about docking, but it didn't end up being a problem at all. Once we had docked alongside the dock, a fellow from Footloose hopped aboard and helped us get the boat into the slip. It is a good thing he did, since that was a pretty tricky maneuver!
Kellian and I went out for dinner together at a place I had read about named Dove, which got really good reviews. Unfortunately, we didn't think to make a reservation and ended up waiting around for almost 3 hours! Thankfully, the food was quite good!
Oddly enough, our waitress at Dove ended up being the same woman who was our waitress at The Last Resort! We recognized each other and chatted for a bit. It is funny how the same person ended up working at both of our favorite restaurants throughout the trip!
Day 8
The following day we packed up our things and headed home. It was an amazing trip and definitely something we'd like to do again!
Check out photos from our time in Bangkok here. As I mentioned in my previous post, we were unable to get to Laos on schedule due to weather delays, so we decided to head directly to Bangkok so we didn't waste any time. We switched our flights and booked our hotel from the airport's WiFi! It was all quite exciting.
We arrived in Bangkok around dinner time, but it took quite a while to actually get to our hotel because there was so much traffic on the highway. I think it actually ended up taking as long as our flight, which was about an hour and a half. We were pretty relieved when we finally got to our hotel, which was Siam @ Siam.
Not only is it an odd name, it is kind of difficult to tell to cab drivers since there is also a Siam hotel: "No, not Siam, Siam@Siam!" It actually ended up being a pretty good hotel for a reasonable price. The design was really unusual, very industrial looking in an edgy way.
We got in pretty late to have dinner and most of the restaurants were closed, but luckily there was a street vendor right around the corner from our hotel that was cooking Pad Thai! We were both quite excited to have some authentic Pad Thai as our first meal. It was quite tasty and really cheap!
The next morning, we headed toward the river for a tour on a long-tail boat, which the concierge suggested. They are these skinny boats with the drive-shaft extending pretty far off the back of the boat. They steer by moving the whole engine and drive-shaft. It was actually similar to the boats we saw in Cambodia, except more narrow. They really zipped along! We got a bit wet, but it was a really hot day so we didn't mind.
The first stop on our tour was Wat Arun. It is along the river and quite tall and ornately decorated. Quite a bit different from the temples we saw in Cambodia! We were able to climb up the stairs and get a nice view of the city as well, which was nice. The stairs were pretty steep as you can see!
After that, the fellow driving the boat took us through some side-canals off of the main river. It was pretty fun zipping through them and seeing the houses on either side of the canal.
The tour ended near the Grand Palace, which would be our next stop. As we walked off the dock, we walked into a big market selling mostly food which looked really good. We weren't quite hungry yet so we wandered a bit and the market continued along the road. They were selling all sorts of things, many sold these miniature carvings which seemed to be for some religious purpose.
After walking along the market for quite a while, we headed back to the food area to get some food. We found a nice looking street restaurant and grabbed some food there. I got Pad Thai again because I love it and it is particularly tasty here! I don't remember what Kellian got but it was also very good.
The Grand Palace was quite impressive, as you would expect! It was a walled area with a number of beautiful buildings inside. The main site of note appeared to be the Temple of the Emerald Buddha, which was a magnificent building with a green Buddha inside. It is actually jade, I think, not emerald, but it still looks quite cool. There is all sorts of other statues surrounding it, as well as very detailed paintings all around the walls of the building. It was pretty incredible! Unfortunately, we could not take pictures inside. This is a picture of me next to the outside of the building. They do like their gold! Check out the photos for more pictures of this area.
After a long day touring around, we decided to check out a Muay Thai fight! Muay Thai is also known as Thai boxing. It is pretty much like boxing, except you can kick and knee your opponent as well as strike with your elbows. It was pretty intense! We watched 10 matches, each of which was progressively more interesting as the fighters were more skilled. It was fairly expensive and lasted for quite a while, but we really enjoyed it! The athleticism was really impressive! There were two knockouts, which was pretty exciting too.
The next morning, we decided to check out Jim Thompson's house, a historical site, since it was right around the corner from our hotel and our friend Vichu recommended it. Jim Thompson was a silk trader who lived in Bangkok and his home consisted of a number of traditional Thai buildings that had been moved to this site, joined together, and adapted somewhat to suit his tastes. There was also a bunch of artifacts that he collected throughout his home. The interesting part is that he mysteriously disappeared during a trip to Malaysia. Nobody knows what happened to him!
The house and gardens were really beautiful, and they had a nice tour that explained some of the interesting architectural features of the home as well as background on some of the artifacts he collected.
After that, we made our way to our second hotel, where we were planning to stay in the first place: The Mandarin Oriental. This was a pretty fancy hotel, which was a nice way to end our trip. The room was very nice and the location was quite good too: right on the river with a great view of the city.
One neat feature is that they have a ferry that will take guests to a few locations along the river, so we decided to take it over to the sky train rather than walking. It is a really cool ferry, it looks like a house with beautiful dark wood. I don't think I got a good picture of it from the outside, but we got some pictures inside.
We took the sky train over to the weekend market, which is an enormous, sprawling market. They sold pretty much anything you could think of there. My favorite spot was where they were selling pets, they had some really cute looking puppies and bunnies that you could pet. It was a bit sad though since they probably don't have the best living conditions.
After wandering in the market (and eating some more Pad Thai!) we made our way over to a show called Siam Niramit. The show was incredible! It is a bit hard to capture how spectacular it was, particularly since we couldn't take any pictures. It involved some traditional Thai dancing, multiple amazingly elaborate sets, and beautiful costumes. There were even two elephants, a goat, and a chicken involved! Halfway through the show, a river emerges from the front of the stage that a dancer dives into. There were boats floating down the river with people paddling them. There were multiple people flying through the air at once. It was really a feast for the eyes, we loved it! Definitely check it out if you go to Bangkok!
When we returned to our hotel, we found a nice heart made out of white roses on our bed, as well as some delicious chocolates and papaya cut into hearts. This honeymoon stuff is great!
The next day we went to find Chinatown, which was one of the things folks said we should check out. I'm not sure if we just didn't find it or what, but we just found a bunch of street vendors selling watches, switchblades, and other random stuff. Oh well!
After that we made our way over to the Siam Paragon mall which was supposed to be particularly awesome. We're not really mall people, but it was a really nice mall. The food court was incredible, and there were a bunch of neat shops. There was a luxury car dealership that was on the 3rd floor, I wondered how they got the cars up there! It seemed a bit unnecessary.
After that, we saw a great puppet show at the King Power Complex. While it wasn't quite as extravagant as Siam Niramit (nothing really could be), the show was really good! They had some greats sets, and the puppetry was very good. Each puppet took three people to operate: one person operated the left hand and head/body, one person operated the feet, and one person operated the right hand. They performed some very intricate traditional Thai dances, and even came out into the audience so we could get a closer look and interact with the puppets. Definitely worth checking out!
The following day, we headed back home! It was an incredible trip but I was definitely ready to be back home! Heres' a picture after our long flight back.
A big thanks to everyone who helped us with our trip! I hope you've enjoyed reading about it, we had an awesome time!
Check out photos from our time in Siem Reap here! This was probably our favorite place out of the four countries we visited. The food was incredible and there were some magnificent sites to see.
We stayed at Raffles Hotel which was really nice. It is one of the few hotels that dates back to before the war, it was built in the 1930's and has plenty of charm. They still have the original cage elevator from when the hotel was first built, which was fun.
When we first walked in, we were greeted and brought to a sitting area for check-in, where they offered us cold towels and tasty juices made from mixes of local fruit. It definitely beats the usual experience of standing up at a counter that you get at most hotels.
When we went to our room, we were greeted by two kissing swans on the bed made out of towels, and between them they held a red rose. In front of them was a heart made of rose petals. How nice! There was also a bottle of champagne and some fruit.
We arrived a bit late in the afternoon to do anything, so we just chilled out at the hotel for a bit. At 7:00 they were offering a complimentary cocktail tasting, so we decided to check that out. They served samples of four tasty cocktails, but I only remember the name of one, Singapore Sling, which was quite good.
After that, we decided to splurge a bit and check out the fancy restaurant in the hotel, Restaurant Le Grand, where they served authentic Khmer cuisine. It was quite the fine-dining experience with white linens, a single tall candle on each table, and very attentive wait-staff. Not to mention, the food was unbelievable! I don't remember exactly what I got, but it was very good, as was Kellian's dish (which I think involved pumpkin). It was a bit pricey for Cambodia, but even pricey food there is pretty reasonable compared to what you would pay here for the same thing.
After a wonderful meal, we headed off to bed since we were tired from travelling and it was getting late. The next morning, we were quite pleased to find that the breakfast was also quite good. It was a buffet, but it was a good one! They had many things to choose from, including a bunch of different juices, six different types of honey, fruit, and pancakes, waffles, and eggs cooked to order.
The fellow who drove us from the airport to the hotel, Lin, was really nice, and offered to drive us around if we'd like and even arrange a tour guide if we wanted. This ended up being about half the price of going through the hotel, so we decided to give it a shot and met up with them after breakfast.
It turns out that we really lucked out on the tour guide Lin was able to find for us. His name is Soeun and he was the first registered tour guide in Siem Reap! He holds a fairly high position in the ministry of tourism, but gives tours on the side for some extra money. Lucky for us! He was extremely knowledgeable about all the sites we saw, spoke English well, and was really nice. Here are their business cards if you're ever in Cambodia!
The first spot we went was Angkor Wat, a massive temple complex near Siem Reap. If you only see one temple, this is the one to see. The whole thing is surrounded by a gigantic moat, then a huge wall. The wall encloses a 203 acre area and in the center is the temple, which is huge. Check out this aerial photo from Wikipedia for a sense of the scale.
So it is huge, but the really amazing thing is that much of it is covered in these incredible carvings. The outer wall is covered in thousands of carvings of dancing women called Apsaras. On the actual temple walls, there are elaborate carvings depicting various battles both real and from Hindu mythology.
Soeun informed us that the Cambodian people tend to think that they are Buddhist, but what they actually practice is more similar to Hinduism with Buddha added in. The religion switched back and forth so many times during the reigns of various kings that it all got a bit mixed up.
We took quite a while wandering around Angkor Wat, since it is so large. It was a hot day and we were pretty wiped out, so we went to grab lunch. Soeun recommended a place called Viroth that was really good. Kellian had one of the best curries she had ever eaten, and I had a traditional Khmer dish called Amok Fish which was very tasty. It was a very moist white fish stewed in a magnificently spiced coconut base. It was so good, we're working on finding a restaurant around Boston that serves something similar. No luck yet!
After lunch, we went back to the hotel for a bit of a rest. This was the hottest part of the day, so it seemed like a good idea just to wait it out a bit before venturing to the next temple. After some rest, we headed to Bayon, a much smaller but nicely decorated temple.
The most striking characteristic is the multitude of towers jutting out of the temple toward the sky. Each has four faces carved on it facing each of the cardinal directions. Also of note are the bas-relief carvings which depict scenes from everyday life during the time that the temple was constructed.
We saw a few other things (check out the photos for details), then headed back to the hotel. For dinner, we went to a place that had a buffet and a traditional Cambodian dancing demonstration. Some of the dancing was similar to what we had seen in Bali, female dancers gesturing slowly and moving through unusual poses. Other dances we hadn't seen before, like one with men and women dancing around with old tools used for fishing. There was some kind of love story going on too. I liked that the music was a bit more upbeat at least.
The next day, we were in for some more incredible sights with Lin and Soeun. First we stopped at Ta Prohm, a temple that has been overtaken by trees. About 500 years ago, birds dropped seeds on the temple and the seeds grew into massive trees. The roots cover the temple, and have caused quite a bit of damage. Unfortunate, but it looks very cool. It was featured in the movie Tomb Raider!
I found it pretty remarkable that the temple could support the weight of such big trees. I guess a lot of the weight is taken by the roots, but still it is impressive! Soeun told us that unfortunately the trees are not of much use, the wood is no good for carving or building, and doesn't even burn well!
The last temple we saw is called Banteay Srey. It is actually quite small compared to the other temples we saw, but it has remarkably ornate and well-preserved carvings. They were carved out of red sandstone, which lends itself well to more ornate carvings. You can see the depth and detail in the photo, it was really quite remarkable. There were many carvings like this all around the temple.
By this point, we were getting a bit overloaded with temples, so we decided to check out this school where they train people in traditional skills such as painting, carving, and silver work. They had a nice little tour where we got to see folks working at the different crafts. I particularly enjoyed seeing the stone carving after seeing all of the carvings on the temples that have survived for hundreds of years. Here's a photo of a fellow carving a wooden Buddha head.
Next, we decided to check out a nearby floating village that Kellian had read about. It turns out, this entire town lives on houseboats on the river. Depending on the height of the river, which varies dramatically, they can move the entire village to a different location. They mainly live by selling the fish they catch in a huge lake that is nearby.
We took a boat tour of the village, and it was quite interesting to see the way these people lived. Generally, they are quite poor, so some of the house boats are in pretty rough shape. In this photo, it looks like the house is probably just on stilts, but it is actually floating on the water.
They had floating schools, a floating water purification system donated by the USA, and even a floating volley ball court. It was very interesting seeing people living in such an situation.
After that, we went back for dinner and a shadow puppet show. Rather than waste our dinner on another potentially mediocre meal that accompanied the show, we headed to a place the hotel recommended, I think it was called Khmer Kitchen. Indeed, it was quite good!
Afterwards, the shadow puppet show was pretty painful. There was a lot of extended dialogue in Cambodian, so it was pretty dull if you couldn't understand what they were saying. They gave us handouts that summarized the plot, but without line-by-line dialogue it was really hard to follow. Also, the voices were pretty annoying and the actual puppetry wasn't all that interesting. Oh well!
The next day, we would head to Laos! We went to the airport and waited for a while, but our flight got delayed. Eventually, they told us it was cancelled due to bad weather! The next flight would not be until tomorrow. This was quite unfortunate since we only had one full day in Laos, so delaying our arrival by a day would mean that we fly in one day around noon, and leave the next day around noon, so it is hardly worth the trip.
The airline was kind enough to put us up at a hotel and feed us, but we were still feeling like going to Laos may not be the best plan. Once we got on the hotel's wireless, we found out that there was a flight to Bangkok that we could still make, if we hurried. However, we needed to go to the ticketing office to get a refund on our flight from Laos to Bangkok first, and buy our new tickets. It was going to be pretty tight, since our flight left in about 2 hours!
Fortunately, our trusty driver Lin was available when we called him and he was able to take us to the Bangkok Air ticket office in Siem Reap. Good thing we got there when we did, since they were about 5 minutes from closing! They were able to refund our Laos to Bangkok tickets, but they had shut down the credit card machine so we had to pay for our Siem Reap to Bangkok tickets in cash! Fortunately there was an ATM a few doors down, but it made me a bit nervous handing over that much cash.
In the end, it worked out fine: we got to our flight in time and ended up with two extra full days in Bangkok rather than two half days in Laos, which seemed like a much better plan. Stay tuned for details of the last leg of our trip!
