Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, was our first stop in the country. It is a large city with many dirt roads off the major streets. During our two days there, we visited reminders of the Killing Fields period of the country’s history.
We left Phnom Penh at sunrise on a boat that took us five hours up the Tonle Sap River to Siem Reap, the nearest city to Angkor Wat. We each bought three day passes to the Angkor temples, which cover an area of 77 square miles.
This overview provides some snapshots of our visit to Phnom Penh and Angkor Wat in Cambodia. As we visited some sites associated with the Killing Fields and genocide, be warned that there are some disturbing images that follow.
We took a 12 hour all night train from Bangkok to Surat Thani, on the coast of the Gulf of Thailand. From there, we boarded a ferry for a five hour trip to Ko Pha Ngan.
We spent three weeks visiting three major areas of the country: Bangkok, Northern Thailand and Southern Thailand. In Bangkok, our major activities were viewing the temples and seeing the city by foot and by ferry. In Northern Thailand we visited Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai. Southern Thailand, our last stop, was experienced on the island of Ko Pha Ngan.
We took a 17 day family trip to Japan in June 2002. It was the first time the girls had been to Asia, so it was a quite different experience for them.
After arriving in Japan, we spent the first three days in Tokyo. We visited several of the city sights, including the zoo, Ginza and Shinjuku. We also took a day trip to Nikko, which was a two hour train ride each way.
Our first extended bullet train ride to Hiroshima was a great event. Once there, we spent time exploring the beauty of Miyajima Island and also visiting the important and sobering sights associated with the atomic bombing at the end of World War II.
We began our second week in Japan by visiting Kyoto and the wonderful temples in the city. Also included in our time there was a day trip to Nara.
Our last stop before returning to Tokyo was in Nagano, the site of the 1998 Olympic Games. In addition to visiting this city and large temple, we took a day trip to Matsumoto to visit one of the few surviving castles in Japan.
