14th February:
We had a chilled start to the day, including what has become my usual sweet and strong coffee from the hotel. Our plan for the day was to head to the beach, so we decided to find a good meal first as a late breakfast. What a meal it was! I had an aubergine sandwich, which was so much more than that. Two slabs of homemade whole wheat bread were fried and then smothered in spicy basil and cashew pesto, and then filled with what must have been a whole sliced and fried aubergine and tomatoes. It was amazing and kept me going all day. Kaja had some Turkish-style scrambled egg, which was delicious and huge too.
Feast eaten, we bargained for a tuktuk to take us the 20km or so out to the beach at Kep. Along the way, we passed mosques and locals in Islamic dress which is not something we’ve noticed in Cambodia until now.
The sandy beach was being hit with a bit of a swell, but many local families were playing in and out of the water. We paid for some seats under an umbrella on the sand but occasionally had a few minutes sunbathing too. There wasn’t much noteworthy about the beach, but some palm trees dotted the headland to our west. It might not have looked like a picture-perfect tropical paradise, but the water was certainly warm enough. Venturing in, there was barely any difference between water temperature and air temperature. Out to sea the Vietnamese island of Phu Quoc was clearly visible, hinting at our next country.
Heading back along the dusty road towards Kampot just before sunset, there was a loud bang just below me. The rear tyre had blown out on the tuktuk! Bizzarely, I’d just been thinking about this given the state of the road and was glad that we hadn’t hired bikes and had to deal with this ourselves. We were deposited at the side of the dual carriageway as our driver limped back (into oncoming traffic, of course) to look for a place with spares. We didn’t really know what was going on and, as it got dark, a few locals began to ask us for money. Fortunately, after about 20 minutes or so we saw the tuktuk coming back to collect us. The rest of the journey was dusty chaos, given darkness had now descended. I kept my sunglasses on for the dust and debris. By the time we got back, passing some kind of gig or festival next to the big roundabout with a durian sculpture, the layer of grime was so thick that I could barely see anything.
Whilst I was at the street food market getting us some more Khmer curry for dinner, a few spots of rain fell! This is the first time I’ve been out in rain since 4th December, and it was welcome given the relentless heat. It didn’t last though and within minutes it was back to being yet another hot, sticky evening.