We had not had any beach time since our days in Zanzibar and the Swahili coast. After 2 months of winter in the Caucasus and Nepal and exploring inner Thailand and landlocked Laos, it was high time for our return. We could not have picked a better spot than the island of Koh Rong Sanloem off the south coast of Cambodia. Until recently most of this coast was pristine white sands and a few sleepy bungalows. Then Chinese mass tourism came in a truly horrible force to the city of Sihanoukville, Cambodia’s main port and the gateway to these beach paradises. Just an hour from Sihanoukville by ferry, Koh Rong Sanloem has escaped (so far) mass tourism and is a genuinely gorgeous and peaceful spot. Our time on the island was split between two places with two purposes: Saracen Bay for chilling and M’ Pai bay for diving!
We arrived in the city of Sihanoukville at dawn on 23rd Feb. We had to wait for about an hour before a a couple of trucks ferried everyone down to the port. We agreed that Sihanoukville is without doubt the worst place we have seen or passed through on our trip. Monstrous Chinese hotels have popped up everywhere, but the Cambodian government have not had the time or money to build any actual infrastructure. The result is a whole area of massive concrete buildings with no road or sewage system, dirt everywhere and stench. We tried to have coffee and breakfast at a cafe near the beach but we felt sick just being there and getting the frequent whiffs of sewage. The cafe had toilets, but no running water…
In among the usual confusion of travelling in this part of the world, we eventually found our boat – a 2 deck catamaran – but learned that because of choppy waters it would not be stopping at M’Pai bay. While an ominous sign, this was fine for us as we were headed to Saracen Bay but it left a host of others from our bus stranded. As predicted, the ride was rough and we arrived in Saracen Bay feeling pretty rattled. Walking down to the beach, everything seemed deserted: empty or closed up bungalows and beach resorts. We later found out that the ferry had dropped us off at the far end of the beach and the hub was a good kilometer or so further down the beach.
We had not booked a place to stay so did our usual of finding the best deal on offer. We stopped to enquire at the first set of bungalows that looked simple with nice hammocks outside, and to our horror, were quoted $190 per night… It was certainly a shock having paid $7 for the last bungalow we stayed in! We eventually managed to negotiate for a nice bungalow a little further along, a few rows back from the beach for $40 per night, at a place run by a Ukrainian family. The combination of very strong winds and waves on the beach and our struggle to find somewhere affordable to stay left us somewhat irritated and was not a great first impression for Saracen Bay. While still very quiet with no road let alone ATMs or cars, the place is clearly more resort rather than backpacker-focused. As we got settled in and the wind died down, however, we liked what we saw: a vast bay with jungle backed pristine white sands. Saracen Bay is very much the main strip of the island but it is drop-dead gorgeous! We just spent our first day here relaxing on sunbeds and taking in this beautiful place. Katharine had a very affordable mani/pedicure in her sunbed from a lady who just turned up and was very persuasive. In the evening, we walked up to a pier further down the beach from us and enjoyed watching the sun setting over the green island. We had a quick drink at Tree Bar – seemingly the main hub of what little activity there was – and explored around. It was strange but excellent to be in a place where the beach is the road. There are dozens of bars and restaurants, mostly extensions of bungalows of varying levels of poshness, and each offering near identical menus and fresh seafood and fish barbecue on the beach.
Day 2 saw a return of tranquil waters and no wind and we got a real feel of this tropical paradise. After a leisurely start to the day, we decided to walk to “Lazy Beach” (it was a hard life), one of the other beaches on the western side of the island. We walked for about 30 minutes in the heat of the day and only saw a handful of people in what was otherwise raw, thick jungle. We eventually made it to Lazy Beach and immediately fell in love with the place: a large bay with fine yellow sand, waves rolling in, jungle backdrop and almost entirely devoid of any human development. There is only one resort on the far south end of the beach, which has managed to tastefully blend into the forest with wooden thatched huts. We made this place our paradise home for the afternoon, swimming, reading and chilling, before we had a tasty lunch at the resort restaurant and cold Angkor beers. It was truly blissful. We returned begrudgingly to Saracen Bay, this time via a narrower, more direct and more beautiful path through the jungle. We arrived back just in time to make use of one of the paddle boards our resort had. It was our first time paddle boarding for both of us – it was harder than it looks but a great way to see the sun setting over the island. We had a superb pizza at the pizzeria on the south end of the beach (the best of our trip for certain). After a couple of drinks back at Tree Bar, we went for a night time dip in the sea to experience the luminous plankton that we had heard a lot about. As some sort of defence mechanism, plankton light up when faced with movement in the water; so just a light swipe in the water revealed hundreds of sparkles all around us!
25th Feb was moving day again for us, but not before a very leisurely half day on the beach! Katharine had a cheap massage and had another go at paddle boarding in tougher conditions than the previous evening, while George kept it to swimming, sunning and reading. Our destination was M’Pai bay in the north of the island. We took a local small wooden ferry that looked like an old fishing boat. While rustic, being a slow boat and sturdy enough meant it was not too bad navigating the waves. We sailed on, reflecting of a great 2 nights/ 3 days in Saracen bay. The Ukrainian family in particular had been a key part of making our stay feel easy and welcome. The place is seemingly run by the son who can’t be much older than 22, with the mum running the kitchen, the granny inspecting rooms / checkouts and 2 or 3 other younger siblings / cousins providing the grunt work of manning the reception and restaurant. Ukrainian and Russian tunes blared from the sound system most of the time. It was a really surreal setup but truly excellent at the same time!
We arrived in M’Pai bay around 5pm and loved what we saw. As an actual lived in fishing village, the place has a much more authentic, rustic, down to earth feel and has now been discovered by backpackers. Much as we loved Saracen bay with its picture perfect white sands, M’Pai bay was definitely more our vibe. As we disembarked and started walking along the beach towards our guesthouse, we bumped in to a pair of British travellers called Nicky and Tom who we had met in Don Det, Laos! They were chilling on bean bags on the beach sharing a glass of sangria of truly epic scale. We stopped for a brief chat and said we would join them once we had checked into our guesthouse. “Wildflower” is a fantastic little guesthouse / hostel run by a British couple (Dom and Steph). It is pretty new and has a spacious, open cafe / bar / Mexican restaurant on the ground floor with a handful of rooms upstairs. Our room was simple but nicely decorated and a perfect base for the next few days. Before arriving we also checked in at the Dive Shop, “Ecosea Dive” to say hello. We were told to be there for 8.30am the next day to start our PADI Open Water diving course!
We returned to the beach and joined Nicky and Tom in getting our own huge sangria. The two are friends from the UK, Nicky being a nurse and Tom working in digital marketing. They had been joined on their travels in Cambodia by a younger Dutch girl who was nice but bizarrely fussy about eating no local food. She seemed to subsist on fried potato (how very Dutch). We had a lovely evening exchanging stories with these guys and went for dinner at a restaurant just next door that is seemingly run by a 9 year old local girl called Lisa. Speaking to her, we learned she was the youngest of 10+ siblings and the only one in her family who spoke English. While her mum ran the operations and kitchen side of the business, Lisa was the boss in front of house. While this was concerning on the one hand having such a young child working full time, it was also understandable in a way given she has become an integral part of their family’s income source… During her work, Lisa has grown past confident to now exude spoiled brat vibes. “Takes no shit” would be one way to talk about it, she is incredibly direct in conversation and simply demanded to have her hair braided by Nicky while we were trying to make our order. Over the next few days, we learned she had told some French tourists to “fuck off” and she also point blank denied us service on another evening when they didnt have any of our choices from the menu and we asked to stick to drinks! We were not really offended but it did certainly highlight the pitfalls of relying on an emotionally developing and erratic 9 year old to run your customer service! We hope she comes out of it confident and wise and not scarred…
We started our scuba diving course bright and early on 26th Feb, after a truly exceptional breakfast at our guesthouse. Not only did we hugely appreciate the quality of our eggs, avocado, beans etc., but they also had Yorkshire tea – a true game changer! It was a brilliant small highlight of home comforts after 3 months of travel. We reported at the dive shop and met our instructor, a Russian / Kazak lady called Anna, and our fellow student in our group, Maya from Israel. Having never dived before, we had initially signed up to the 2 day, “Scuba Diver” course, with the plan to upgrade to the full Open Water course if we enjoyed it. Having snorkelled before and loved it, we were keen!
The course started with us signing paperwork acknowledging all the various wonderful ways we could become injured or killed while diving. Anna reassured us if we did certain simple basics – particularly continuous, slow breathing – we would be absolutely fine. The first half of day 1 was a lot of theory, watching videos and doing quizzes as a group. In the afternoon and early evening, we learned how to use the various bits of gear and got into the water for some skills practice in shallow water. We took our first breaths underwater which was certainly a different experience but not quite the immediate “wow” for us. We practiced swimming, clearing our mask, finding our regulator (breathing tube) etc. underwater.
It was a huge amount of info for one day and we were told we had an exam the next morning. So, we did the sensible thing… and went drinking! We had tacos and margaritas at Wildflower, before continuing a little up the beach to the main beach bar. We immediately heard the sound of screeching of the girls from our Siem Reap night bus recognising us – so we not so reluctantly joined them in standing / dancing (mostly standing….) on the bar and getting involved with shots. It was a fun evening and a nice surprise to see these guys. Eventually, we did the sensible thing and went to bed before things got too out of hand!
Katharine was certainly feeling the effects the next day having strayed onto spirits earlier than George… We were a little concerned as the theory we had learned on day 1 was pretty clear on diving while feeling sick was a bad idea. Katharine mentioned this to Anna just to be safe who said it was fine so long as it was just a minor hangover. In the end, jumping in the water is what cured it! We started the day with our exam which we passed in flying colours. It turned out even making mistakes was OK though as you just sign below a declaration that “I have had any errors explained to me and understood” so it was hardly high intensity. We then went off for our first proper dive!
It was a cool if slightly tense feeling being on the boat with a load of other drivers (most very experienced) and a lot of gear – almost like you are in a plane waiting to be given your signal to para jump. Our first dive was to 10 metres and was on a nice sandy bottom for us to sit and practice core skills at depth. We slowly descended into the water by following the anchor line, practicing equalizing pressure on the way down. The water was rough and visibility was poor making this far from a relaxing way to do our first dive! We eventually made it to the bottom after Maya had some difficulties with equalizing. Removing, replacing and clearing your mask was definitely the toughest challenge for Katharine, while George weirdly struggled with anything that involved removing the BCD (jacket) or weight belt and putting it back on again. Katharine had something of a wobble with the realisation that you are deep underwater with no mask on but managed to keep going and complete the dive which finished with 20 minutes of just swimming around and getting a feel of buoyancy.
We got back to the boat for a short break before moving to our next dive spot. Katharine felt a little rattled and it took a lot of courage to get back on her horse for the second dive! Our second dive was to a slightly deeper 12 metres and this time to a coral garden. Visibility was about 6 metres, but given we could get up and close we still got a proper feel of this magical underwater world: vivid coral of different bright colours everywhere! Marine life was aplenty, although not quite the huge volumes we had seen snorkelling in Indonesia – apparently due to overfishing in the area. Katharine found herself struggling with buoyancy and inadvertently floating up to the surface. This was not a problem at the depth we were swimming but stressful nonetheless and she grew more anxious about how much air she had left – which in turn makes you use it up faster!
Having completed 2 dives, this was our decision point as to whether we continued to the full Open Water course or stopped for the “Scuba Diver” course. Feeling a little rattled once again, Katharine initially decided to stop here. Over lunch we reflected and talked through some of the ways to manage buoyancy by controlling your breathing – something our instructor Anna had not really explained but which George heard from others on the boat and found immensely helpful. Katharine had gained more confidence from speaking to a couple of the other instructors who said they experienced similar challenges when starting and that it is exceptionally common for people to struggle with buoyancy and the mask replacement exercise! So we both decided to carry on and joined Maya for 2 additional theory modules in the afternoon. In the evening, we did more skills exercises in the bay shallows, practicing mask replacement and buoyancy which gave us both greater confidence. There was a slightly hairy moment when a fishing boat moored near us and our instructor Anna’s float signaling to boats there were divers below, got caught in the boat and she was forced to swim along its path! Thankfully the boat was stopping and she was able to untangle herself easily enough. It really emphasised the dangers of boats to divers…
That night we had a much more low key evening, and went in search for barbecue fish and was the night we were denied service by little Lisa. In the end we found a superb barbecue with and got chatting to a recently retired British couple, the husband having made a business in creating lamps, and the wife having been a wealth advisor.
28th Feb was our third and final day diving on Koh Rong Sanloem. We had a delayed start due to rough waters early morning but we eventually kitted up and headed out on the dive boat. Our first dive was effectively our deep water skills exam, where we each had to demonstrate the various emergency skills we had learned. Despite feeling nervous on the boat, Katharine nailed the mask replacement exercise and grew increasingly confident in the dive! We also practiced emergency resurfacing from 6 metres. Our second dive was back on the coral site, and this time we were able to properly enjoy the stunning under water scenery. We resurfaced as qualified open water divers!
We said our goodbyes to everyone, after the dive shop had brought out a cake for Maya’s 22nd birthday! The rest of the day we spent resting back at Wildflower and reflecting on an incredible achievement! It had been a rollercoaster but we were delighted to have completed the course and ticked off another major bucket list item from our megamoon. The next day we headed back to mainland Cambodia towards the capital Pnom Penh with a view to moving quickly on to Vietnam the day after. Koh Rong Sanloem had been the perfect 6 days of beach time. In Saracen Bay we sampled a truly world class beach in still pretty undeveloped conditions. M’Pai Bay was the perfect all round package: local fishermen going about their daily business, kids zooming down the hill on the island’s one road sat on a skateboard, chickens and puppies wondering around, beach bars, a local nine year old business tycoon, incredible breakfasts at the Wildflower, and, of course, diving!
tranetrottingthemegamoon.travel.blog 