Ups and Downs

1 September - Woke up reasonably early because I had a booking for a trip out to one of the islands today. Asked the hotel guy if there was a big breakfast or a meager one provided by the tour and he said it was a big one - so I merely had a milk coffee at the bar upstairs (they're not nearly as good as their Vietnamese counterparts in Cambodia) - 8 o'clock rolled around and the hotel guy approached me and said that I couldn't go on the island trip. Apparently I was the only one booked in and they were canceling it - I told him to check with another company, at the beach the day before I'd been pestered by at least three groups trying to get me to do the same trip. He said he'd checked 20 -I thought, bullshit. I went downstairs and it turned out there was another girl also booked (whom he'd forgotten about) and he was extremely incompetent in trying to find a solution. Eventually I said stuff it and got my money back and then ran off to try to find another tour before it left (it was half 8 by this stage) - I jumped on the back of a moto and found one within 5m. The American girl, it turned out, was on my tail and she came as well. A very nice group of a few brits and an Australian (professional traveler) were on the tour also. First we stopped at an island for some great snorkeling (albeit with the worst equipment I've ever used) - we attempted to do some spear fishing with sharpened sticks but failed quite miserably. Had a fairly decent lunch before heading off for a very rocky ride to snake island where we mucked around with a volleyball and had an afternoon snack of freshly caught fish cooked on an open fire - the fish had been caught and thrown on, no gutting or preparation at all and we ate them like the savages we had become (and they were delicious). After that a small attempt at fishing with the moist basic reels I've ever used (line attached to an empty waer bottle) that netted in with no fish for anyone except one of the guides. I don't think I've caught anything on the end of a line since e some brief success I enjoyed when was seven years old, I think I'm going to give up on the fishing thing. Headed back to our start and had to ait two hours for pur ride back (eight of us squeezed into a five person sedan with three on a moto to get us back). Had another argument with my guesthouse over another small issue (everybody, never use GST Guesthouse in Sihanoukville, if you should ever be there) and then went for a run. It was already darkening by this strage so I had to run along the main road (the only lit road in town, which wasn't very pleasant) but as I'm going to spend all day in a bus tomorrow, going up to Siam reap, I really thought it was a necessary for a bit of a stretch.