A Not So Typical Valentine's Celebration Part 1

Okay, so here I am writing again. Cannot resist. Anyway, my husband is a very simple and private person. Do not ask me how he proposed, but let's just say, if you're a girl who loves the works, scattering of petals and a fanfare, accept him through thick and thin! But there are just some things that he will not compromise, and one of them is traveling.

My husband gave me the best honeymoon one could ask for- a trip to Europe. But I don't want to talk about that now, I'll do that in another post. But valentine's day, a day he does not believe in ("Valentine's is just a marketing strategy!") cannot be more memorable than this one....

Here is a detailed account of our trip to Siem Reap, via Cambodia. Some tips here and there, too.

PRE-PLANNING STAGES
Of course, I had nothing to do with Rod's itinerary. Everything we did was according to his plan. It takes months for my hubby to plan a trip. Sometimes he goes grumpy or frustrated because I don't get to help him out. But one thing to remember when my hubby plans trips, he is like a character from Heroes whose eyes go white and starts painting beyond his control. He is like that, and for many reasons I have become spoiled and ask me anything about making itineraries, I just shrug, hehe.

We decided to take 5 days, and 4 nights, and the most economical way to do this is to ride Air Asia. It had the cheapest flights to Kuala Lumpur and then to Siem Reap (we should have a direct flight!!!!).

With the wise decision to leave our daughter to my mother's able hands, we packed our stuff and headed for the Clarke Field Airport, Pampanga.


Day 1 - Thursday
Clarke Field Airport is much smaller than our domestic airport here in Metro Manila, but I don't want to think that that is the reason for their being more organized. Our flight was at 11:30 am, and Rod was wise enough to order food for us in the plane. By the way, if you have not ridden a no-frills flight, you'll be surprised to see that there is no food included in the low fares. And Air Asia in particular has seats on a first come, first served basis. But surprisingly, people line up and are not so greedy when it comes to getting seats.

Rod ordered a Nasi Lemak and a Nasi Briyani. Of course the spicier one went to me, and so we had to buy a small bottle of water, which caused us USD3.00 drat! That's P150 in the Philippines for a small, 5 gulps worth of water... No choice, though...

After our 4 hour flight, we arrived at the Low Cost Carrier Terminal (LCCT) in Kuala Lumpur and took a bus to the Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA). I admit it was pretty hectic in LCCT because these no-frills flights have so many of them and I believe are doing very well finding its market niche. So impressed was I that I thought, what if I owned an airline like this?

Anyway, we got to KLIA to ride the shuttle to our "transit hotel", the Concorde Inn. Well, the Concorde Inn is what you expect it to be, a budgeted hotel serving its purpose. So with only a few hours left (we had to wake up the next morning at 3:30 for our 7:30 am flight to Siem Reap), we took the train to get to KL Central. And that was a good experience, seeing green all around....We saw Putra Jaya and some other buildings, and realized that we are far behind already, with Malaysia's progress....

KL Central was not a very good experience for me, though. Maybe because I was tired, but there were just too many people in the train... We hopped off in KLCC Suria (they are all kl this and that it was quite confusing!) and marveled at the overwhelming Petronas Towers... the pride of Kuala Lumpur!! Rod, the camera man and the sights addict was so upset he couldn't get a decent picture of the towers in the afternoon (Sunset in KL is at around 7). And so we ate in a lovely restaurant called Madam Kwan's inside the Suria KLCC Mall, something Malaysian. Rod ordered Nasi Lemak (my hubby is not a foodie), and I was brave enough to order almost the same thing, but with prawns! Yummy, we were both so hungry we finished our food right away. By the way Malaysian food for us is not too expensive. Pretty okay for the ambience and all. After, we got ourselves some ice cream (you need it to get rid of the aftertaste) and went around going inside the mall's shops.

I wanted to shop some more but Rod and I had to see the lovely Petronas in its magnificence... So illuminating at night!!!! Rod took many pictures of the famous sight, while I enjoyed a hot but quiet night at the mall's park.

We rode the metro rail back to the International Airport and rode the shuttle back to Concorde Inn, where we packed and slept the few hours we had...

Day 2 - Friday
It was 4 in the morning when we ate a very simple breakfast at Concorde Inn. We were still groggy but quite excited to head for Siem Reap, our main destination. We booked a taxi the day before and spent around 7 rm for the long trip to LCC Terminal, which was so busy in the morning already. Air Asia is really quite impressive...

With the time difference we got an extra hour in Siem Reap. And the first thing we did was book a taxi to get to our hotel, Somadevi. Incidentally, Rod availed of a low price in Somadevi, I can't complain with its good facilities and breakfast, for only$40... really good price. We were ready to brave the heat in Cambodia riding the tuk tuks but the comfort that we found in our taxi possessed us to book our tours with our driver, Mr. Lee Ann (very nice man). For an extra $ 10, we were willing to forego adventure and thriftiness, because the Camry seats were heaven every time.

to be continued.....