The Day After...

Hello! You can rest assured that Bradyn and I didn't die during the night from some bug bite contracted while scrambling through thorns (of which we are still picking out pieces from our limbs) and ants trying to get back to our kayak in one piece. We decided that although it was our cheapest play day when speaking in monetary costs, it was our priciest day speaking in physical costs. But we also decided that the Lord was looking out for us and we were so blessed. In large part probably because of so many prayers on our behalf!

Shortly after we got back to our hotel, the lightning display that we had seen while out on the ocean broke out into a storm. The wind howled and the rain poured all night long and most of the morning. We were so fortunate to get back to the mainland and that we weren't stuck out on the island, injured and in the pouring rain! As it was, it was dark long before we got to shore. But we made it back in one piece. We just had a hard time sleeping last night. After we said our prayers, Bradyn asked me if I see sea shells and a million crabs when I closed my eyes. I saw that and a bunch of waves! While I was trying to fall asleep, I kept waking up with a start, feeling like I was slipping on another rock.

After a rough night's sleep the alarm went off earlier then either of us wished, but we had to get up to catch our bus. At least that's what we thought. We had booked seats through our hotel the night before but they had failed to give us tickets for it. At least we hadn't paid yet. Our tuk tuk driver showed up and off we went through the rain and lightning, looking for our bus. On the way the tuk tuk got a flat tire so we had to switch rides. Bradyn was able to bargain that so that we didn't have to pay more because of the ride change. So we got to the bus station and saw all sorts of buses lined up. We didn't know what was going on and the rain was pouring! Pouring! And our driver keeps driving past the bus station. Bradyn and I just looked at each other and shrugged our shoulders. Turns out we were taken to the shared taxi station and told that there was no bus to Kampot (yet we had booked it the night before!). A taxi driver approached us and we asked how much a ride to Kampot would be, the answer $5 each. Great! Cheaper then the bus by $2.50 each. So we jumped on that idea even after we were informed that there were six passengers. four in the back and two in the front. While Bradyn and I were waiting for our taxi to get ready to leave, the driver suddenly approaches us and says, now there were two passengers, Bradyn and I and the taxi would cost $25 total. We didn't like the sounds of that so we were prepared to go back to our hotel and arrange for different transportation, but we didn't have to. We did have to wait for another hour and a half while our driver tried to round up enough passengers to make the trip worth his time. We piled NINE (read it!) nine people into a small car for a two hour ride to Kampot. It was all part of the experience right? By the time we arrived at our destination, Bradyn and i crawled out of the car, numb from the waist down because of lack of circulation. It's all for the sake of experience! And we saved ourselves $15 by going through it.

The rest of the day was spent touring the caves in the countryside. We went to two caves and at each one there was a group of small children wanting to be our guides. Previously, our driver had told us he would be our guide so we just let him deal with the kids at the first cave. Four of them tagged along and told us all sorts of things about what we were seeing around us. Smart kids and their english was great! They were cute too! One girl, I thought she was 4, but turns out she was 7! The kids here all look so much younger then they are. It's crazy!

We walked on. The first cave was supposed to be the "most impressive because there's a 7th century brick temple located inside the main chamber"(Quoted from our guide book). So in my mind I imagined climbing through a cave for fifteen minutes or so and coming upon a large open space where a brick temple - like a little ankor wat, was built. Wrong! We were in for a disappointment. Keep in mind this was the whole reason we came to this area and rode in the taxi. So, back to the story. We arrived at the entrance gate area to the cave and had to pay $1 each to enter. Up we climbed. Up cement steps and then we descended a few more down into the cave. There at the bottom of 20 steps, barely inside the entrance to the cave was a brick doorway - the 7th century brick temple! We were suprised I guess. Disappointed, but I guess it's pretty hard to get a large temple in a cave hey? It was preserved very well though. Since Bradyn and I are not so good at the archeology thing we didn't spend much time looking at the temple. We were back to the tuk tuk before long and just before we left the children asked, "could you please give us some money for school?" We gave them each 1000riels (equivalent to 25 cents basically, but we had already arranged for a guide previously.) They were quick to be laughing and talking with us again. They showed us grasshoppers the size of mice! They were huge!!!! I guess that's a whole meal in and of itself!

We were on to the next cave. Along the way we stopped for a quick snack of grilled bananas, coated with coconut and wrapped in banana tree leaves to cook. It was...good? Not bad, but a little wierd.

The next cave we arrived at and kids were running after our tuk tuk as we drove up to park. Once again a crowd of boys, this time quite a bit older, followed us wanting to be our guide. We told them before we left that we only needed one guide and were going to pay $2. That was it! the guiding is a five minute job! This time we were willing to pay one a bit more because our guide/driver said he wasn't going to guide us through this cave. This cave was more interesting then the first, but the boy who was guiding us was also supposed to shine the flashlight for us to see where we were stepping. He didn't do such a good job. The lack of light combined with injured feet from yesterday made the going slow. When we left that cave we weren't impressed with the boys and their behavior. They acted quite inappropriately and so we were happy to leave.

We got back to the hotel, bought a fresh coconut to try drinking the milk straight from it and then headed out in search of food. Supper tonight was interesting! I wouldn't say appetizing by any means. Bradyn ordered grilled crab and I ordered grilled chicken. Bradyn's order came and suddenly I was worried about what mine would look like. Bradyn's crab came out on a plate and it looked still alive! It was all attached and didn't even have any seasoning on it! I was glad it was Bradyn's meal and not mine! Unfortunately niether one of us knows much about eating crab so we didn't know how much of it he was to eat. We broke the body open and passed that up. So Bradyn ate the meat in the pinchers and some in the legs.

My order came. Grilled chicken legs with everything! I couldn't eat much. I more so played with the toes of the chicken. It tasted like the smell of the markets so I just couldn't finish it. But like always, we had rice to fall back on!

Ok have a look at this picture. Can you see the thrill of hiking to and seeing their cave temple? Ya, me niether. But here it is, one small room with a buddha statue. They even made us pay to help maintain buddha!

Look at the grasshopper! Yes it is as big as it looks! YUCK

Yum! Grilled crab. The only problem is that I didn't know how to eat anymore than the pinchers, or even if you do eat more. So I left it except for the pinchers.