Ko Rong Island

We travelled overnight on a bus to Sihonoukeville, the coastal town of Cambodia. There used to be a beautiful coastline, but it has all been bought by the Chinese and so has become a concrete construction zone. Therefore we bypassed the mainland beaches and came straight to as island ,that has also been bought by Chinese but has not been developed on so aggressively. In fact most of the businesses here are owned and ran by Europeans, so it doesn't feel very Cambodian.

It is a very beautiful island with soft squeaky white sand and turquoise clear water. Some beaches are littered with waste dragged in the sea. I started cleaning the sea yesterday only to arrive at a beach that you could not see the sand because of all the palstic waste on it. Made my efforts seam quite pointless!

It is very much a backpacker haven and is geared around partying. Not really what I am after, but the cheapest option. We didn't join the drinking games or pub crawl, but still managed to casually drink enough to end up dancing on the beach on the first night.

Then yesterday we took a boat tour around the island, stopping at places for snorkelling, a village to see local life and some of the beautiful beaches on the island. It was a great day out packed with information. Rohit had never snorkelled before, so I taught him and he gradually became more confident and pretty delighted when he managed to do it in the dark and see the bioluminescent plankton. It was a great day,but very exhausting. After 11 hours on a boat we were pretty wiped out by the tips we got back.

Rohit has left this morning and now I am taking a boat to the neighbouring island, that is meant to be more quiet and peaceful. Hopefully there will be less gap year kids and a chance for me to do some yoga and go diving.Read more