Battambong -Bamboo

6 hours on a bus & we arrived in Battambong and were delivered into a tuk-tuk ambush as we got off the bus. One $ & 5 minutes to our hotel. Battambong is the second largest "city" in Cambodia but appears to the outsider to be a small country town surrounded by huge rice fields ,cattle,and fish farms. Here again we visited the site of Khmer Rouge activity prompted by a chance meeting with a mancunian who taught political science at the local college. This was not quite as shocking as our previous visits but contained a building, a monks refectory ,that had been left locked by them since 1979 because the Khmer Rouge used it as a prison.  As a diversion from pagodas,wats we decided to take a ride out to & then on the bamboo train. This runs a 7km each way trip for $10. We sit down on our train which consists of 2 axles (one with drive belts in place) plus a wood & bamboo platform which sits on the axles. Add a  small 2 stroke engine & off you go at what I worked out must be at top speed 40kms per hour. When you meet someone going the other way one carriage is taken off the tracks the other rolls by & is replaced all in a couple of minutes. Shame my camera battery ran out when the first shot was taken.  Next stop Siem Reap & Angkor Wat

Palace & Persecution 21 March

A visit to the Royal Palace here was underwhelming as one of the principal attractions was the Throne Room but they didn't tell you before entry the day we did that it was closed. The other main attraction was the "Silver Pagoda containing some finely worked gold caskets & decorative items  surrounded by 100's of gold buddhas of from tiny a couple of inches to several feet tall. The silver floor that the pagoda is famous for turns out to be silver tiles mainly covered in carpet  with many currently held in place with gaffer tape ! 
Our penultimate morning in towns was used by yisiting the Cheung Ek Genocidal Museum better known as the Killing Fields (more correctly one of, as there have been 300 such sites found in Cambodia).We were "greeted by"two one legged men, presumably from land mines, with caps in hand that you could not ignore.Our $5 dollar entry fee included the audio tour which I would normally have rejected but turned out to be invaluable as it contained a detailed explanation of what we were seeing. Most of the buildings on the original site were recycled after the war & have been replaced by simple shelters with a brief explanation of the originals purpose.Approximately half of the mass execution spots/graves -they used the cheapest form of murder they could - have been excavated revealing the remains of 10,000 men,women & children. One grave was found to contain 100 headless men accused of being traitors or of having vietnamese heads on cambodian bodies. In some parts of the site you come across fractions of clothing or bone disturbed by rain or wildlife which is quite macabre.. The audio tour included one piece recorded by a guard recounting his duties & a short life history of a young man who avoided death & ended up running the documentation centre recording details of evidence for the regimes prosecution. Sad to say the trial of some very senior figures is still incomplete by a tribunal who won't accept the evidence of  "Duch", the head man at the S-21 interrogation centre, against them.  A chilling place togo!

Tomorrow we have a 6 hour coach ride ($5 each)to Battambong .

Phnom Penh - Cambodia

A 1 hour hop from Bangkok to here then a 1 hour taxi ride ($10 US) & we arrive at our hotel which is fine.First day in we thought that we would see the Royal Palace, just up the road but we were not dressed up enough for it so we spent a very interesting time in the National Museum next door which was packed with articles from Angkor Wat both pre & post the conversion of the Khmer kingdom from Hindu to predominantly Buddhist. There was also quite a lot of finds & information from its iron/bronze age a 1000 years previous to this. The Khmer food is similar to that of Thailand without the injection of chillies although generally in Thailand the food was toned down to western  tastes so extra chillies were called for by me.
 Our second day was much more sombre as we visited the Genocide Museum which is in a primary school which became S-21 Interrogation Centre used by the Khmer Rouge between 1975-9. It has been preserved as it was at the time  Something like 15,000 men,women & children were "processed" here , the general concensus being that only 14 or so survived. The process consisted of photographing them and keeping  them in a mixture of cells ( some a tiny 0.8 x 2 mtrs) between torture sessions until they confessed to whatever crime against the regime that they were accused of e.g being intellectual . Once they confessed they were taken to the killing fields  for execution . I wondered when seeing the methods they used whether they learned "waterboarding" from the americans  or vice versa. The enormity of this is that S-21 was one of many centres that resulted in 25% of the population dying while the world looked on.

Ayutthya by plane & train

.A short hop by plane & an 2 hour train ride for 35p each - air con courtesy of ceiling fans & open window - & we arrived in Ayutthya & 5 minutes later at the Bann Thai resort. This was a small complex of about 15 mainly self contained villas/bungalows  set around a small lake & bounded by a canal which backed on to our villa.You would not have known that 4 months earlier the whole site was under 4 feet of water as evidenced by tide marks on trees. It was a 10 minute walk to the ferry across the river (8p each) and we wandered through the local market down to the historical site. Ayutthya was in the 14th century the capital of ,as was then, Siam which covered most of present day northern Thailand & parts of Cambodia & Laos and traded with Iran,China and later in the 16th century France,Holland& Portugal . It has many wats some of which we only scratched the surface. We visited Kanchanaburi site of the Kwai Bridge & rode the "death railway" ( they call it scenic now ?) & visited cemetery commemorating the the 17,000 servicemen of all countries who died in its construction. This number is dwarfed by the 100,000 Thai,Burmese, Malays & singaporeans who also lost their lives a chilling thought . Our last visit was to Lopburi ( a satellite city for the king of Ayutthya) for the regional museum (set in the old palace ) & very interesting , the monkey temple and a couple of Khmer style wats. Tomorrow Phnom Penh Cambodia.

Farewell Chiang Mai

Our last day in Chiang Mai was spent lazily with an evening outing to a local cultural show which started with a selection of local food accompanied by traditional music. This was followed by demonstrations of local dancing of various northern Thai styles including an impressive sword dance by a particularly fast & athletic young man. These were followed by moving outside to a covered arena ( past the inevitable stalls) where the dancing was by local hill tribes & children. An excellent value evening.All that remained was to have one last glass of wine with our lovely hosts  at the Green Tulip. Tomorrow Ayutthya !

Doi Suthep & Hmong Village

Doi Suthep is the second most important temple in Thailand (the first houses the emerald buddha in Bangkok). It sits on a hilltop @ about 5500ft & is reached via 330 steps or in our case the cable car. It is quite small & was crowded with pilgrims ( it was a weekend) circling the stupa three times with flowers, incense & candle reciting a prayer.  On the lower tier there were demonstrations of local dance and music by children from local schools. The other item on our itinerary for the day was the Hmong or Meo village who originated in southern China but have lived in the area now for some 50 years. With the exception of an exorcism ceremony being performed on a local house - the highlight of which was to be an the slaughter of a chicken which we bowed out of - it was essentially a craft market for local products + a liberal sprinkling of goods imported from elsewhere. Our evening was spent at the Chiang Mai night market where we happened upon a free outdoor performance from a blues duo made up of a 60 year old Liverpudlian and a young local guitarist. This ended early as "Boy" had to play the local blues bar at 8.45. We went along & were treated to an excellent 3 piece band driven along by "Boy" in Buddy Guy mode that was unmistakable. Another piece of musical fortune.

Maetaman Elephant Centre etc

An 8am pick up for this & a long drive to the centre. Thses elephants "work" for 6 hours a day & are then turned out to roam loose until the following day. On arrival we fed the mother & baby & then watched them all being washed which they clearly liked before sitting down for the "show ". The playing of harmonicas (in time) amazed me as did the "artists" in the group & the football was fun & the also showed them shifting timber as they would have done for 12 hours a day before mechanisation.. We then did the ox cart ride to the retail opportunity  followed by the elephant ride back part of which was up river giving them an opportunity to spray passing rafters. Lunch was good buffet & it was then our turn on the rafts. After this we moved on to the butterfly park & played spot one - there were so few. The orchid house next door was however excellent with an enormous collection of colours & types . We passed on "Tiger Kingdom" as clearly questionable but did like the elephant poo paper place - not very smelly at all !

Chiang Mai - 6 March

A 2 hour flight from Phuket & a 10 minute taxi ride & we arrived the Green Tulip House in Samlan Road & are greeted by a very effervescent lady dressed in black leggings ,a purple top & purple Doc Martens - not the usual attire for a Singaporean in their 50's. Our double room was small,functional & spotlessly clean which made it a bargain for 15 pounds a night which included a tea/toast/fruit breakfast.
After a week of rest by the beach the idea of sightseeing appealed so we booked up a sequence of tours through Nine the other half of the dynamic duo running the Green Tulip.
Our first was a trip up the river Ping on a scorpion tailed boat ( only 3 of us) with an excellent guide who regaled us with a history of the river accompanied by some lovely sepia toned photos from the early 20th century. We later stopped to see his garden where after introducing us to the some important local flora e.g mulberry,jackfruit,mango & tamarind he pointed out a particularly large ants nest high in a tree . This he said he would harvest to eat the eggs in 2-3 months. Over lunch he demonstrated locally made eel,fish & snake traps. Next task for the day Thai cooking class ! We were given a menu to choose which dishes we wanted. Jenny & I chose different dishes to have as taste of each others produce. We were taken yto the local market & introduced to the local ingredients ( small green chillies are known as mose shit chillies. We were split into three groups for our different dishes then tried the results. it was great fun & the food was surprisingly good - the only drawback there was too much of it !

PHUKET

Phuket is essentially a beautiful beach destination dotted with small enclaves, e.g Patong , of the kind of excess that Thailand is notorious for i.e discos & bars with  predominantly female staff and male custom. Kamala where we stayed for 8 days was smaller & much more relaxed but still had a lovely beach and enough variety of restaurants to satisfy the most eclectic of taste buds all of which were very reasonable and good quality . Our stay was split between the beautiful Aquamarine Beach Resort ( a 4* 70% off deal ) which was a 15 minute uphill/downhill walk into town & the Taro "hotel" which was a brand new serviced apartment closer to town but without the pool complex & excellent buffet breakfast of the Aquamarine. We generally just wandered around the town stopping occasionally to rehydrate, usually  in the Kho Kee Bar & Restaurant a lovely friendly family run place on the beach road. Great value . Our one extravagance was a day trip to Phi Phi island  where we declined the included snorkelling option in favour of a long session of swimming & shade bathing either side of our buffet lunch.