We slept well, the mosquito net did the trick and kept us safe. We slept with the shutters open in an effort to get a cooling breeze which worked just a little bit. The sun shone in through the opening above our pillows and was crossed by the beams of light shining in through the gaps in the wall planks like some weird 3d art piece. I steeled myself for the first traditional Khmer bathroom experience, all went well which I found very surprising!
We grabbed a towel and headed to the beach. The beetles were doing their thing, it sounded like what I imagined tinnitus to be like, such a weird noise. We swam a length of the beach and back then sat in some hammocks strung right on the beach between two coconut palms. Large butterflies flitted past and paranoid crabs darted back into their sandy holes at the slightest sign of movement. We headed to HQ for breakfast and some drinks, detox shake for me iced coffee X2 for Em then found some wooden sun beds on the beach and read our books in the sun. The water was crystal so I stuck my goggles on, swam out to the rocky point which was like swimming through an aquarium. Fish of all shades and all sizes including lots of neon, a lobster, giant clams and sea slugs the size of your forearm, soft to the touch. There were also corals and sponges.
I had seen a supposed trick on the internet to attract turtles (clicking your fingers under water) so did this for a few minutes before remembering it also attracted sharks. I was pretty far out and freaking a bit at this thought….swimming in and stopping every now and then to look behind and under me. I was somewhat relived when I made it back to the shallows. Lunchtime came and Em had a Pina Colada (she’s on holiday) and we both had tofu sandwiches which were lovely. Back at the beach I persuaded em to come snorkelling but there was too much going on for her to be comfortable. Found a massive clam shell vacated (unwillingly I suppose) by it’s resident. It was unusual for a bivalve in that it’s shells did not seem to close tightly which puzzled me. We dozed and read all afternoon. At the end of the day we went to HQ for food (veg noodles for me yellow curry for em) and a few drinks eavsdropping on other travellers conversations.
We arrived back in our hut and scattered the geckos. There were some droppings on the floor, too big for rat so who knows what was roaming about inside our shack. We headed into the sea at 9pm as the cloud covered the crescent moon and spent 15 minutes swimming around in bioluminescence and playing like festive otters which was awesome, the little glowing plankton shining like fairy lights wrapped around our arms. Nobody else around, paradise to ourselves. And for those 15 minutes nothing else existed.
Leave a Reply