DA LAT

They bus was driving so fast this night that I arrived 04:30 in the morning. So no option for a guesthouse. And after hot Ho Chi Minh it's hard to imagine that it's almost freezing here in the dark. So I tok my sweater and hat and found a cafe for locals (moto and taxidrivers) that was already open. I stayed there for 2 hours and had some funny conversations with a big group of Vietnamese from around 60 years old. Most of them copuld speak English a little bit. I had shitloads of hot tea for amost nothing and enjoyed my time here. When it was light and warmer again I went outside with my backpacks and ended up at a nice and cheap hotel. My plan was to find an Easyrider and leave this morning. But the hotelowner's friend is a dentist and the pain is getting worse and worse. After visiting the dentist for free (! you just have to know the right people) he told me that there was no problem and I only needed a medicine; Rodogyl. So I had to take these pills for 3 days. After a long hike through town I went to the local market, asked for 4 bananas and they gave me almost a whole tree! I was earching for THe Hangout Cafe (the office of the real Easyriders) en had a talk with Tuan, the manager. We talked and talked, he went to the market and we made some fresh spring rolls. I watched his bar for a while because he had to arrange something. Twan, my driver for the next days took me back to the hotel. I will make a trip to Hoi An for 5 days (70 USD per day) and the only thing you have to pay is your own food. They know the good places, and every meal cost between 20.000 - 30.000 Dong. No special things this evening, can't hardly talk with this pain in my theeth.

HO CHI MINH, Chu Chi tunnels and shooting guns

At 8:15 we lef with a tourbus for a halfday tour to the Chu Chi tunnels. Wel, we got stuck in traffic for 4 hours. Visited the tunnelarea for 2 hours. This place shows how the Vietnamese surrounded the Americans during the war in 1970. They also show you all sorts of boobytraps. I thinks the guy in Hollamnd that made the traps in the forrest with the spikes in concrete, he visited this place :-) They show you documentary in bad audio. I crawled for 100 metres through the level 1 tunnels. They are a few metres below the ground, 1,20m metre high and between 60 - 70 cm wide. It's a good squating excersice and you will sweat a lot if you finish the whole tunnelsystem. The lower levels are closed to visitors after some accidents, people were getting out of air there. I also jumped in one of the small holes in the ground (like everybody) but my head was a little bit to big...you will know what happened...

THey have a shooting range and you cabn choose out of 8 weapons. You have to buy at least 10 bulleyts and it's not cheap. I paid 17 USD for 10 bullets for a M16. Shooting the M16 was cool. While alking back somebody forgot to finish al his bullets for the M60, so I tried that one. This was real heavy shooting!

On the way back I jumped off and walked around the main area's in former Saigon. Visited all the highlights in just a few hours. Sent a parcel back home, because my backpack was getting too heavy again; 20 USD for 5 kg. During the most busy time of the day I ket on crossing the streets between the motorbikes, loved it. They even have special (extra) trafficlights for motorbikes. I played some sort of footvolley game in the park with the locals and was stunned after seeing the aerobics excersice in the park, so funny.

Now it was time for a good meal, real Dutch; cauliflower, with cheese sauce and chickenbreast (oftewel bloemkool met kaassaus en kipfilet) yummie. This was easy to eat with this teeth inflammation. Booked a nightbus to Dalat.

I almost missed the bus after some incent at the hotel. The owner locked me up becuase he was really angry at me and shouted at me that I had to pay. I became very pissed at him and tried to make clear that Thomas already paid. After some struggling his wife came in and told him that Thomas already paid everything. The only thing he could say was 'Sorry....'

SIHANOUKVILLE - HO CHI MINH (SAIGON) long day of sleepless travelling

In the bus for 12 hours. Why do they play this loud karaoke if nobody ever joins in? Ow they had a Cambodian version of Blade (the movie), very funny in this language. In the morning I almost missed the bus, because my pickup (moto), the guy was sleeping. But I found the bus myself. In Phnom Penh I had to change busses, verybody send you somewhere else, but after some walking and without showing any tickets I was in a bus to Ho Chi Minh, don't know if it was the right one :-) I had to fill in all paperwork for the border and show them my Vietnam visa. And this was the first bus that used his claxon constantly...damn, earplugs are great.

The bordercrossing was a big contrast compared to the trip in Cambodia. Last ten days I've only seen beggars and many poorness. I crossed the border in the Las Vegas of Cambodia! Huge casino's and big hotels. Limousines and lot's of bling bling. Very strange to leave Cambodia like this. After several checks at the Vietnamese border (3 passport checks, baggage check etc.) I finally was in Vietnam. It still looks a little bit like a communist country.

Around 20:30 I arrived in District 1 in Ho Chi Minh City, the main backpacker area. And yes, this city is fantastic. People told me stories about the crazy traffic and the 16 million motorbikes in this city. It was kind of busy, but I loved it. Crossing the street was no problem, just walk and the moto's wo't hit you.

Finding accomodation was a little bit harder. Cheap places were fully booked so I shared a room with Thomas, an Argentinan that I met in the bus. Many hotels in this area, on the main streets but also in the small alleys that look like a labyrinth. Paid 16 USD for a room, but what a nice shower after all these months. We had a small beef BBQ, but it's impossible for me to eat with this pain.

09-01-2010 t/m 10-01-2010 KOH TANG, 2 days of (night)diving

Ready for 2 days of diving. Scuba Nation Dive Center was the only one that went out to Koh Tang for an overnight trip. The other companies couldn't get enough people. Arrived at the main Port of Cambodia. Not that big compared to my hometown Rotterdam. And here you can see the big contract with poor people again, crppy shacks next to the big containers and people actually live here. This this poor floating village was also the deck to our big diving boat. The boattrip to Koh Tang takes about 4 hours, to Koh Prins it's even 6 hours.

Diving near Koh Tang is perfect. Good visibillity, lot's of different fish, beautifull reefs and most important; no other divers and no tourism. The islands here are still virgin. And becuase not many people know about the quality of the divesite, we were the only group there this week (only 4 people!). Perfect! It was cloudy when we first dived in, but after we came up it was sunny. So many different species, even barracuda's and seahorses. Diving today down to 13 metres, with a visibility of 15 metres.

The nightdive was new for me, little bit nervous. My torch was not that bright so I had to follow the divemaster closely. Thilda, my divebuddy paniced so the divemaster took care for her. We saw blue spotted rays, squids and morray eels haunting. The nightdive was about 17 metres deep and the current was medium.

After a long day of diving we had a interesting conversation with a former refugee of the Khmer Rouge regime. He did his divingcourse with us and told us stories about the period he was a kid and lived in Phnom Penh. Impressive stories.

Next day woke up in the mist. I sleept on the upper deck of the boat. There is no accomodation on the islands. The first dive was at the area called Giraffe (the tree at this area actually looks like a giraffe. Great divesite, we saw some action of haunting fish killing squids. Great barracuda's, big triggerfish and more. The next divesite had unsuspected strong currents and ended up in driftdiving. So after these 2 days some new diving experiences for me. 2 wonderfull days.

At 16:00 we were back at Sihanoukville and I met some people from earlier this trip. BEcause I'm having mopre and more healthproblems I'm not going out today and take a rest. This also after some advise of my friends ;-)

SIHANOUKVILLE, another day at the beaches

Allthough the guys woke me up early, I was still active enough to get out early. Had some quiet time on the beach, did some running again and waited for the other ones to wake up. Nobody was in for renting motorbikes so unfortunately I stayed on the same beach today and nothing really happened. I booked a 2 day overnight divingtrip, but nobody would join me... The guys spent another night at the bars and came back drunk and vomitting in the morning.

PHNOM PENH - SIHANOUKVILLE into the sea again

Waited for our pickup for the bus. Well, the pick up were 2 guys that pciked us up and told us to walk for a while... The bus was more like a local bus than a VIP one but okay. And also the 3 hours were not really 3 hours. It took about 5 hours. Arrived at Sihanoukville at 14:00, the complete group jumped at the back of some moto's for 0,50 USD. Arrived at GST Guesthouse, ok for 7 USD and just 50 metres from the main beach. Finnaly at the beach and I didn't want to get out of the sea anymore. The rest of the group was realxing and sleeping and I wanted to do some excersice so running for an hour and after that more swimming. Still don't feel tired, I had only 2 hours of sleep last night because of all the talking. We met Craig again and celebrated his last night with a BBQ. Chantal was singing live at the bar, very cool.

We went to a bar again and I think I was the only one that was tired of partying, so I went back and the rest stayed out till 05.00 in the morning. Oh thanks for the wake up guys ;-)

PHNOM PENH, 7 hour cityhike and S-21 prison

Got some medicines easily without prescription. In de morning visited the Royal Palace. It was 09:00 and already steaming hot. In the morning I did a 5 hour walk through the city and visited almost everything. Local markets, silvermarkets, some temples, and much more. I told the other guys and the guesthouse to wait for me till 13:00, but they didn't. So After a short nap I went out alone and after a few minutes I already met new people.

Together with Romy I visited de S-21 prison, the place were people were tortured and killed between 1975 en 1979. Quite impressive and so much more to see then at the killingfields. When you want to read all the stories, you will need at least 2 hours. Most of the things are still in the same position as they found it and there are pictures on the wall with the dead tortured bodies on the floor and the beds. It's like scenes from a horrormovie. Hard to imagine that this was just 30 years ago on the same place. The complex was first a school before they turned it into a prison. They builded small cellblock from bricks and wood. Bardwire outside to prevent people killing themselfs. When you want to know more about the history of Cambodia, this is the place to visit.

We wanted to walk back and had a dinnerstop at the Riverside. This is the only place with better restaurants, the sidestreets don't have anything good to offer. After 2 hours of walking time for cocktails at the lake. The rooms were to hot so we decided to put the matrasses outside and sleep under the stars.

SIEM REAP - PHNOM PENH

Early wake up, bus from 07:30. After a normal bustrip of more then 5 hours we arrived in the big city of Pnohm Phen. This place looks like a real city. The tuktuk drivers a pushing again just when the bus arrived. They even wrote down some our names on a piece of paper if like they made an appointment with us. But we decided to take a free tuktuk, because we told them we would gop with them to the killing fields for a few dollars. We stay at the Boeng Kak Area in of of the lakeview guesthouses...well, it once was a lake... Since 2008 they are redeveloping this area and they are pumping out the lake. The sunsets are shit and not as many people told 'not to be missed' a long time ago. But this place is alot cheaper then the town center guesthouses. 3 USD instead of at least 18 USD.

We had some time left to visit the Killing Fields, also known as the extermination / genocide camp of Choeung Ek. Here the regime of Pol Pot excecuted thousands of people on a brutal way. Between 1976 en 1979 many people (including women and children) were tortured and put into massgraves. Around 9.000 bodies were found. Nowadays they only real remainings that you can see are the trees that the used for slamming the babies to death and some of the clothes and weapons. You can still see some clothes and bones coming out in one of the 43 untouched graves here. Around 8000 skulls and bones are shown in a huge monumental stupa. There are no other signs of these horrors (no buildings), but you can read some information on site. After this confrontating afternoon nobody was in a really good mood.

We had dinner in one of the many Indian restaurants in the Boeng Kak area. 2 USD all you can eat, cheap. But after this night you will know that this area has completely lost his backpackervibe. TRhe bars are filled with stoned and drunken locals (many too young). I'm feeling sicker with the day, so I went to sleep and I will get some anti-biotics tomorrow.