On our last day in the Kingdom of Cambodia, if you think we'd be sleeping in at our hotel and just wait around for our car transfer to the bus terminal, you're actually wrong (even though I kinda wish we did just that).
Glimpse of a sunrise sky..
Like I said, no Sea View here guys..
My mom was back on her mission to send yet another postcard from the post office here in Sihanoukville. This wouldn't have been a problem per say had the roads in this part of the country been half as developed as its surrounding buildings! (which isn't really much..) On top of the really troublesome way over to the post (where I booked our usual ride through PassApp), well guess what? The f^($ing driver cancelled our book when we were already out in the middle of nowhere!!! It was a literal highway robbery when he didn't really give us a chance to say no when he arranged to transport us to the post office and later back at the hotel at the cost of $40!!!! What the effing f^($!!!
I hope that postcard was worth it mom (even though it hasn't really arrived in the Philippines as of now yet..) #AllForA$40Postcard
That pointy tip is just good for..
Lesson learned the expensive way, NEVER use PassApp in Sihanoukville (better not go AT ALL). So we did another round of freshening up--since you'd feel full of grit and dust after a trip like that in the roads of Sihanoukville (#BringFacemask)--then we waited a little in the hotel room after we'd packed our stuff, before we decided to wait at the lobby instead for our car transfer to take us to the bus terminal going back to Phnom Penh.
Fortunately, the ride back to Phnom Penh was a smooth one and we even had a decent stopover at a cafe on the way.
Takeaway food! #LastMealinCambodia
It was a long ride back and we even encountered horrible traffic along the way to the airport, fortunately our local tour agent, Ms. Chumpy, was reachable in WhatsApp and a couple of really nice locals helped us in coordinating with her the traffic situation. They let us know where to properly get off so our Phnom Penh airport driver could safely come meet us, so it wasn't really all that bad of a day.
Leaving on a jetplane!
But I guess the day was really trying my patience as I had to seat beside a wailing infant for the duration of the ride to our layover in KLIA2. At this point, I was sleep deprived and hungry as hell..
Technically dinner but having it at midnight = midnight snack
Don't know what mom chose..
...but at least you can see some noodles in mine
My hunger now already satisfied, it was time to get some real sleep around here, and since I wanted to have a good night's sleep (and also didn't want to risk another crying baby), I dragged my mother to the nearest airport hotel:
Let me tell you people, the Capsule Hotel was BETTER than the hotel we had in Sihanoukville!! Why? Because they managed to have breakfast even without a freaking dining area! HA! #LifesAJoke
To The Philippines and beyond!
And yeah, that's about it. My overall rating with Access Travel is superb! (Not really gonna blame them for that Sihanoukville hiccup, 'cuz yeah.. I did get a heads up from a co-travel blogger #HeMadeItLookSoGood) It's my first time booking with Access Travel and I can say I'd still book with them, especially when it comes to really customized tours. You don't really get much of that kind of service here in the Philippines and I'm so happy with Access Travel & Tours that they helped me tick off a travel destination from my Bucketlist! HOORAY!!!
Turns out, the bus ride was nothing spectacular though I did remember it making a couple weird stops just for a bathroom break. One being in a really dark highway with tall grass, and another being a legitimate bus stop with real urinals. Not that I even thought of doing my business in the first stop.. We then arrived at Sihanoukville at least an hour and a half earlier than our ETA, so we took the time to notify and local travel agent of our arrival thru WhatsApp (Yeah, this app proved to be really handy in this part of our tour).
A peak into Sihanoukville's landscape
Passing by the Golden Lions Rotunda
We got picked up from the terminal a little past the designated time that was indicated in our itinerary, so it really was all a rush once we got to our hotel:
No sea view here, but they've got a nice pool though..
The dining area that served no food.
Rooms looking barely finished..
Since our itinerary indicated that our boat tour would start at 9AM, we only had at least another 30 minutes to freshen up and get changed for the day before we left for the pier. Upon getting our boat tickets however, we found out that our tour was to start at 10AM.
Since we had a good hour to kill and with no boat in sight, we decided to have breakfast instead at the Yasmin Cafe by the pier, no matter how our local tour agent, Ms. Chumpy said that we would have food on the boat:
I wasn't up for anything big, so I tried their fruit salad instead...
Mom had coffee and a sandwich
We then waited another hour before our boat actually arrived! So yeah, I could brush off the delay since they did have a nice open deck and all..
They really had food on board #CuteBreads
Until we were later informed another hour later that the boat had suffered engine failure!!! Like really, how the hell were we even supposed to start our island hopping now?! This is where WhatsApp really came in handy 'cuz it was really nice of Ms. Chumpy to have done all the talking while I just held my phone out like some ignorant tourist. After much negotiating refunded ticket, and some impromptu resolving, the crisis was mainly averted.
As you can see from our "FINALLY!!!" faces
In the end, Ms. Chumpy only found us a ticket for a one island tour (Koh Rong), which wasn't all that bad since at least we still managed to have time at the beach:
We left the main island of Sihanoukville at around 12NN and we were advised to be the Koh Rong's pier if we were to leave that same afternoon at 4PM. We later found out that most establishments on the island were only open between the hours of 12MN-12NN so we didn't really get to see some of the restaurants (like the Sky Bar).
Lunch 'cuz I'm just too tired to eat anything at the moment
It was a good thing our driver knew where we would be docking 'cuz we arrived on a completely different pier back in Sihanoukville! Our driver turned out to be a stickler for whatever the agency just ordered him to do, so we couldn't really ask him to stop by a restaurant just so we'd grab some dinner for takeaway. We ended up walking a good two blocks from our hotel that night freakin' hotel didn't have ANY food AT ALL just to find a decent place to eat.
We encountered Escape Cafe, where we had a quick dinner, before I booked from the PassApp a ride back to our hotel (it was getting pretty dark down by the roads). I needed the nightly swim by the pool after the harrowing events of the day, and somehow I now started to miss home.. We leave the Kingdom of Cambodia in my next post, but there are still more experiences to be encountered!
