SIEM REAP! Pt 1:A Wise Guys Snide Guide to Decide If You Need a Guide

Editor's note: Sorry for the delay, people! Zero to poor wifi access in addition to shear laziness is to blame for the month-long hiatus...we suck at blogging. We arrived in Siem Reap very early into our trip...like late November. Above photo: Our Tuk-Tuk Chariot, Navutu Dreams (we know, it's the name of a resort, but it's also a fitting name for a tuk-tuk).

We came into Siem Reap, Cambodia in the late afternoon after a short flight from Bangkok. As soon as we made our manners with Cambodian airport officials, we exited out into a world refreshingly green and serenity compared to our experiences in Thailand's bustling capital. The comparative calmness and apparent placidity on our 20 minute tuk-tuk ride from the airport was deceptive; however, as dust cast up from a myriad of motorbikes, combined with roadside smoke offerings of either well marinated meat or garbage fires, forming the conduit for diffused light shafts streaming through groves of trees. On the other hand there were a shit-load of motorbikes and babies. The further into Siem Reap we got the more we realized that beautiful shit was absolutely popping off here in a major way. Ladies in blue shirts shmobbed* up the river in wooden canoes enthralling banks of cheering Cambodians in all shapes and—actually most of them were small.

We arrived at the Boran, L’Auberges des Temples Guesthouse on an alley off of Wat Bo Road after it was recommended to me by my mother. As an aside, I generally don't just blindly take advice from mom dukes without thoroughly researching whether she's full of it or not, but I was tired of sifting through polarized online reviews and decided it was a good time to be a momma's boy— sometimes mama knows best. Our hotel was beautiful; it included a nice pool, insistent bag carrier guys, a well-tended garden, beautiful tiling and woodwork in the room, and a traditional Khmer shower (an enormous ceramic vase intended to aid one in their attempts at a real cultural experience.

Above is the aforementioned Khmer shower. The steps to taking a proper Khmer shower are:

1) Dip bowl in giant vase

2) Dump on body

3) Literal rinse and repeat

It was the kind of place that buys me future credits with Stacey to stay in cheap dingy spots, so we can save money to scuba dive more. Stacey was smitten.

Next up was to research and discuss the details of our time here, namely whether or not to hire a guide. Stacey was definitively in the pro-hire a guide camp, while I was in the pro-make Stacey happy even though I don't really care for guides/spending extra $ camp. Stacey won this battle, we ultimately decided to hire a guide.

Our guide was a man named Mr. Olvy, who was very kind, light-hearted, and knowledgeable about Siem Reaps current economic state, history, and mythology. We both personally liked him a lot and got to know a good bit about his life story and family. Most interestingly though, he shared his opinions about tourism and the Chinese/Cambodian politics. He was a little out of shape for some of the adventures we wanted to go on and was scared of heights, which prevented him from going to the top of certain temples with us (it was kinda cute).

Reflecting on our experience, here are the pros and cons of hiring a guide as far as I'm concerned.

Pros:

• Guides are nowledgeable about the history of the temples and interpretations of the carvings in the various ruin galleries throughout the area

• Guides have a good general sense of when and where each temple will be crowded

• They help negotiate the language barrier with non-English speakers (i.e. At restaurants, figuring out if Spring Rolls have shrimp in them because Stace is allergic...we should probably learn the word for shellfish/shrimp in every country we visit).

• They offer personal insights into what life as a Cambodian is really like, and make you feel like you have really connected with someone from another culture (God forbid you are that tourist who only comes home with a hangover).

• Guide keeps girlfriend occupied and interested, while I obsessively take pictures, drop lens caps in small crevices, battle Chinese selfie fiends for good angles, and yell at my tripod.

Cons:

• Costs extra $.

• Guide’s tendency to yammer on about nuances of ancient Khmer lore to a degree that I don't care about, resulting in suboptimal photo spots during history lectures, etc. EDITOR’S NOTE: To be fair, I am a total control freak about this kind of stuff; I like to eat less and go harder than most sane humans. I basically want someone to take me where I want to go when I want to go and be willing to stop at lots of places along the way, so I can take pictures.

• Takes control of daily itinerary, leading to awkward interactions when the itinerary ain't fresh (i.e. Boring spots for sunrise/sunset/golden hours)

• Too much time spent eating at tourist restaurants that serve the same food during prime temple exploration hours (I ain't out here to eat food all the time mayn)

• Driver and Guide's desire to go home before sunset, despite paying for an all day guide and driver

• Makes me feel obliged to listen and interact at times when I would rather do any of the following things: Tell bad jokes to my GF, take photos, and sing weird songs to myself. Don't get me wrong, I'm down for interacting, just not all the time

• To make the long story short (after initially making it long), we got hooked up with a driver and a guide for two of the three days and explored the area.

Furthermore, regardless if you decide to get a guide or not, choosing a proper method of transportation is still important. We travelled by tuk-tuk two of the days and by car the other day. See below for a few side-by-side comparisons:

SPEED: CAR WINS

TUK-TUK slow and hot (we used “natural air-con”) vs CAR Fast, thus better at weaving in and out of traffic and aircon

$$PRICE$$: TUK TUK WINS

TUK-TUK $15-40 USD/day depending on distance vs. CAR $65-85 USD/day

PHOTO OPS: DRAW

TUK TUK Better opportunities for Babies on Bikes* vs. CAR Generally, better opportunities to take photos because speed allows more range, thus more photo-ops.

BOTTOM LINE: Get a guide if you are really interested in learning about the history about each temple or if your girlfriend wants one. Don't get one if you just wanna look up the history about each temple on your phone and want to dictate the pace of your travel and/or want save money.

We’ll include more details about the temples in a separate post because they were so impressive they deserve their own post (and this post would be over 3,000 words if we didn’t split it out). For now, view the full Siem Reap photo gallery here!

*Babies on Bikes: We capitalize on the propensity for Cambodian parents to sandwich their babies (and young children) in all manner of seating positions on their Motorbikes. In the fading light of day, I equipped my camera [50mm 1.8 open wide at 1/4000 of a second), Co-pilot Stace with all the urgency of a young Draymond in the 4th quarter NBA finals, would bark, "Mega-cutie incoming at your 8 o'clock!!!" I’d swivel, she'd duck, I'd try to quickly lock focus on the epicenter of cuteness and unleash a burst of photo captures in hopes of landing a winner.