9th Nov - A Monk's Blessing

Overnight we sailed to Phnom Pen.  It is even hotter here than it was in Vietnam.

Our morning trip was to the monastery at Oudong. There are thousands of Buddhist monasteries in Cambodia, but this is the largest of them. It was certainly impressive and very beautiful.  We walked around the complex and entered the largest of the pagodas - where 2 monks gave us a blessing.  This included the monks throwing handfuls of lotus petals and jasmine flowers at you.  I wasn't expecting it and got hit in the face by the first handful.

Arriving at the Raffles by tuk tuk

In the afternoon I went on my first Tuk Tuk ride - to the Raffles Le Royal hotel.  It was certainly an experience.  Which side of the road do they drive on out here you ask? ALL sides.  It was complete mayhem, but somehow we arrived at the hotel in one piece.   We had a quick tour of the hotel, whose main claim to fame seems to be that Jacqueline Kennedy stayed there and had a drink with the King of Cambodia in the Elephant Bar.  The cocktail served to her was called a "Femme Fatale" which is cognac, champagne and frais de bois.   So we were all handed one of these cocktails as we arrived.  Then we went for afternoon tea in the hotel lounge.  Very elaborate and a mixture of traditional and Asian afternoon tea foods.

There was another mind-bending tuk tuk ride back to the ship where some local children did traditional Cambodian dances.

It is Independence Day in Cambodia today (from the French) so there were fireworks at 7pm which we watched from the sun deck.

The pace of the holiday so far has been quite tiring and I had just had a huge afternoon tea at the Raffles, so I decided to skip dinner and just get an early night.