We spent three nice days in Battambang, recovering from the traumatic boat with some good food, luxurious air-con, BBC World News, and a swimming pool. No doubt the highlight of our stay was the trip we took out to the countryside with our best tuk-tuk driver yet: Mr Tim.

He started off by showing us a temple that was once a Khmer Rouge prison, proudly informing us that its not in the guide books, and a recently built memorial. He was remarkably understated when he told us that he was actually a survivor of the Khmer Rouge. 46 years old now, he was 11 when they took power, and 16 at liberation. He told us that his experiences very much mirrored the book that we'd all read. He showed us old Khmer Rouge hospitals, explaining that Pol Pot had killed all qualified doctors and nurses, so there was no proper treatment, and no medicine; he told us that he'd lost his entire family (mother, father, brother and sister) in one of the hospitals.

He showed us villages where they made fermented fish paste (probably one of the worst things I will ever smell), and rice paper, an 11th century temple, and a 1950s pepsi factory. We sat and had a Sprite with him, and he told us the most amazing anecdotes - our fave was one about the Vietnamese trying, and failing, to steal a solid gold buddha.

After a few days we took a 10 hour coach journey - with just a box of raisins - to Sihnoukville on the southern coast. Very nice down here (apart from all the gap yar types), and extremely cheap, so we're sticking around.

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