Saturday Sept 22
We arrived at our hotel, Raffles around 10am from the Jahan. We were lucky as we got an early check-in - many others from the Jahan were also staying at Raffles but were unable to check-in until 2pm.
We unpacked etc and had lunch at the hotel. We had a car/driver and guide pick us up at 2:30pm for a private tour of Angkor Wat - private in the fact the car and guide were private but the Angkor Wat was teaming with tourists (the majority of whom were Asian) - fortunately it was the low season - it must be chaotic in high season. Somehow we were both a bit tired and our guide was somewhat disinterested and we had a hard time understanding him; as a result we were a bit underwealmed by this most famous Wat. We did not stay until sunset (sunrise and sunset are supposed to be important times to visit as the light can be amazing) - it was very overcast and there was to be no sunset to speak of.
Back at the hotel - we showed and had another underwealming experience - dinner at Raffles fine dining restaurant.
Sunday Sept 23
It turned into a rest day as the strange pain I had been experiencing became much worse so Dieter arranged with the hotel to get a doctor to visit. He diagnosed my problem immediatley as the herpes virus - what I had thought were insect bytes around my waist were in fact blisters and directly related to the pain - it actually seemed like shingles which is essentailly the same virus. He perscribed medication. I decided to just take it easy for the day - so it was a bit of lunch and a pool afternoon followed by dinner The Heritage Suites (5-10 minutes away by tuk tuk) - as it turned out Warren and Linda joined us as did Bonnie and Nigel (Perth) and Geoff and Mary (Brisbane) - all new friends we made on the Jahan. The dinner was excellent.
Monday Sept 24
We hired a tuk tuk and hit a few more temples - all very interesting particularly ones which the jungle had done it's best to take over. We had a farewell lunch at the hotel with Warren and Linda as they were off home to Sydney later in the afternoon. We had a quite afternoon - ie kip followed by a swim then we took a tuk tuk to Le Sofitel Hotel where we happened to find that their fine dining restaurant and a fantastic wine dinner for $60pp - the chef came out to meet us - he was German born in Hong Kong.
Tuesday Sept 25
Since our flight out was not until 5:45pm we had lots of time to visit a few more temples which we did in the AM. We had lunch in the hotel then spent the rest of the afternoon resting - I was still not 100% but was improving. We headed out to the airport at 3:30pm only to find our 5:45pm flight on Cambodian Angkor Airlines was cancelled - they put us on the 7:15pm Vietnam Airways flght instead - to Ho Chi Minh City - we were in a panic as it made our connection to our LH flght to BKK very tight. We called LH and in spite of the call dropping out they got the message and met us at the gate and expeditied our transfer - even re-checking our luggage all the way to Koh Samui. So we were safe - so we thought - that first glass of FC on board our LH flight tasted oh so good. Then a second disaster struck - after sitting on the runway for more than 2 hours LH cancelled the flight due to a mechanical problem. So it was all off - through Vietnam immigration and luggage collection before being bussed to a nearly hotel - the Movenpick which turned out to be quite good. We finally hit the sack after 1:00am - totally stuffed and with no idea what was going to happen in the morning. Well after a very short night and an excellent breakfast we were advised that a bus would pick us up at 10:15 for a mid-day departure. Check-in was a total schmozzle - LH had done nothing to re-book passengers' onward connections (of course most were going to FRA). Well we finally departed at 3:00pm so clearly we would miss our re-booked TG flight to Koh Samui. As we disembarked we grabbed an TG agent and she excelled - re-booking us on an Air Bangkok flight at 5:30pm - since it was going to be after dark where we arrived I called our hotel, the Conrad and had them have a car/driver meet us (instead of picking up the hire car we had booked).