Travelled to Phnom Penh, bus broke down!

Hello from a road in the middle of nowhere!!

This morning we had brekky then went for a walk down our street. We saw a tree being cut down, little kids were holding ropes to block off the road. When they cut the tree down it flew towards waiting cyclists - eek!! We also saw some really dodgy scaffolding made of bamboo and wood, as well as a school full of little kids. 

We got a small bus at 11.30am to the bus terminal, and boarded a large bus to Phnom Penh....or so we thought!!

We stopped halfway in a town called Kampong Thom. There were heaps of street vendors here selling lots of dead bugs to eat - ew. We had a quick little toilet break and were back on our way. 

Then the real excitement happened. I am currently sitting in a dark, stationary bus. Why?? The road the whole way was really bumpy, but about an hour out of Phnom Penh we felt a huge clunk and the bus dropped to the right, then scraped along the road and finally stopped (which was good because for a minute I thought we might fall over). It turns out our axel broke so the wheel was on its side. We are waiting for a replacement bus. So far it's been an hour, and I think we have to wait about another 30 minutes for the replacement. We are all currently telling ghost stories and having some family bonding time haha. I would like to take this opportunity to thank nan for discovering how to reload my torch battery last Monday night, I've already used it for the sunrise Angkor Wat tour and now in the bus!!!! The really funny part was when the bus lady said "thank you we hope you travel with us again" etc after the second journey because she has to as her job, and everyone on the bus laughed and laughed including her!!!!!

Hopefully we will be in Phnom Penh about 8-8.30pm and I will add to this later on. 

One other thing, mum you will laugh at this. I thought I'd lost my cardi, the blue one from Italy. I'd just told myself to get over it and that it would keep some Cambodian kid warm, when I did one more check on the bus because I could not think of a logical place I lost it! Turns out it was on the seat behind me....oops!!

Love

Claire and Laura

Xoxox

11.46pm. We ended up arriving at the hotel at about 9pm after waiting for two hours for a new bus! Quinny (our guide) bought us two slabs of Angkor beer, so we had a bus party, telling stories, chatting etc. It was actually a lot of fun and a great bonding experience for our "family" (Quinny refers to us as the family!). We had dinner at 10.30pm at a local restaurant haha. I showed James, Jo and Tom some AFL on the iPad! I felt like the little kids in the NAB ad explaining the rules 'if you kick it between the big posts...!'. Haha. Hard to tell in the dark but it seems a much bigger city here with some tall buildings and traffic lights! Love to all xoxo