So, the plan was to stay in Sihanoukville just for 1 night then go the next morning to our beach side hut with hammock on Koh Rong Samloem: a quieter beautiful island a 2 hour ride away from the mainland of southern Cambodia, for a week over Christmas.
Well, Sihanoukville itself was slightly worse than we thought. We knew it would be touristy - hence just 1 night stop over, but you couldn't sit down on the beach without getting hassled to buy something, which was a real shame because the Sea was gorgeous. Anyway, we booked our ferry for the following day and grabbed some food after a brief walk about.
We arrived early the next morning on the pier, there were about 25 of us heading to the island on a small 'speed ferry'. As we were getting on the French manager of the boat said its going to be an uncomfortable crossing as there are big waves today, followed by ' but this is normal for this time of year' - kind of took it with a pinch of salt thinking, yeah, yeah, that's fine, I love the sea and waves! After half an hour it started to get bumpy, people were getting soaked, water was around our feet washing up and down with the boat, then as we finally came in to the big bay of the island the captain was riding in with the waves and as I looked at the back of the boat sometimes all I could see was a wall of water. Everyone was so relieved to get there but as we tried to come along beside a wooden pier it became clear this was gonna be tricky. We were a good 2 metres away from the pier and rising and falling away from it just as much with the waves coming in. The locals got a big wooden plank board and for a few seconds at a time it stayed in contact with the boat and the pier, about 4 people took the leap of faith across with small rucksack but eventually our boat manager called it and thankfully said it was to dangerous! - you think?!!! Realisation kicked in when she said we'll have to go back, half the remaining people on the boat kicked off and said there's no way they were gonna go through that again, so she stepped up and announced 'I am the manager of this boat, you can jump off and swim to the beach at the risk of your lives but we're going back!'. I love swimming in the sea but with our luggage thought it might be tricky.......We were going back as did everyone else......shit!!!!! Emma and I were luckily at the back - quick escape if need be! I soon got drenched as the little plastic sheet that acted as a window came loose and the mass amounts of spray poured in. Back through the waves we were climbing up then came slapping back down, people started throwing up then it got a bit scarier and they were asking for their life jackets, the manager held on whilst pulling a few down from the top, then I got scared enough to stand up and grab a few for both of us, it was pretty terrifying, almost waiting for it to capsize, I left my rucksack and decided to hold on to seats instead although they started coming away from the floor as we rocked, Emma was started crying and although I tried to smile and tap her leg I couldn't say it's gonna be alright.
Anyway!!! It started getting calmer and my white knuckles started to release their grip, we got back to the pier we had left about 5 hours later, shaken and soaked!! We were met by another lady in charge of these boats being very apologetic and explaining the other 2 boats that left that morning turned back after 1/2 way, 1 had a window smash in and chairs pulled away from flooring......great, so we carried on because???!!!???
Anyway! We were refunded and both agreed we were not going to attempt to return to the island and so we had to realise we weren't going to be on our dream island over Christmas that we had booked for the week!
We found a hotel in town and booked up to see us through the busy Christmas period. We knew things wouldn't run smoothly throughout this trip, but that was scary and a real blow! Hey hoh, we had somewhere to stay, got food, showered and chilled!!!!
