October 19, 2025
The breakfast at the hotel continues to be a winner but the boys rarely finish their waffles or pancakes. Instead, they stick to the warm bread/pastry basket that arrives each morning. Seou met us in the lobby and we headed to a massive lake, Tonle Sap Lake.
All we knew was that we were going to see a floating village during our boat ride. Once we boarded the skinny and long boat the captain and his 12-year-old son where the only others on the boat. His son wasn’t much bigger than Lenny but he knew how to help with everything on the boat. When we got on the boat it was tucked behind two other boats at the dock. Instead of carefully moving around them the captain just put the boat in forward and rammed them going back and forth until he could get out. There was even someone on one of the other boats when he was doing it!
As we were driving the captain’s son moved to the back of the boat and before I knew it snuck up behind me and was giving me a massage! It was a combination of funny and uncomfortable. His hands would make loud clapping noises when he would slap me on the back which attracted our boys to come over. They too tried his move but could not do it, neither could I when I tried on my leg. Eventually my turn ended and he moved on to Kayleen! I was delighted at this since she got a good laugh out of how uncomfortable it was for me. Once she was done, he played rock, paper, scissor with our boys as we drove.
The floating houses and shops were crazy to see. Seou told us how the wet season was coming to an end so people would start to move their houses out further into the lake as their current spot dries up. They usually have to move three times a year. The government has asked the people to move to houses on land and some have but others refuse as they like their life on the lake and don’t want to commute from land to go catch fish.
We even saw the tops of street lights from the boat and Seou told us how during the dry season there is a road below us that everyone uses. Lastly there was also a temple that got hit by lighting and was being rebuilt which I thought deserved a mention.
Next it was time for one of the craziest stops of the whole trip, a small crocodile farm in the middle of one of the floating villages! As soon as we got off the boat, we saw a few small enclosures with animals but once we explored a little we found the pit with 50 full grown crocodiles. There were two holes down into the water that the crocs would go in to cool off, though I questioned how often it is checked that there are no escape holes down there…
The little girl who was working there with her family was ten. As soon as we pulled up she was hustling to see if we wanted to hold the baby crocodile and/or a python. Then she showed us the bigger croc pit, followed by an area they raised catfish and frogs. They told us the frogs were careful to stay in their netted off area because they knew the catfish would eat them. Half joking, they said we could feed a catfish to the big crocs if we wanted but needed to buy a fish for the equivalent of ~5 USD. Best $5 ever spent!
I was excited to catch the catfish with the boys but they already had one ready we could use. Two of the women working there attached it to a long stick with a rope. The lifeless crocs could not see what was happening but must have been able to smell it from that far away as all their mouths started to open at the same time. We put the long stick over the railing and dangled the fish down. The idea was that when a croc would grab on, I would have to push my end of the stick down with all my weight to fight against him, like an upside down seesaw. It was a hard fight and the women were quick to jump in to help until the fish would rip…
We drove back to the dock and were ready for our next stop but not before making sure to give both hardworking kids we met a nice tip. Ollie continues to advocate for any hardworking kids we come across. Seou also mentioned as we were leaving that recently a crocodile farmer at another small farm on the lake fell in the enclosure to his demise. Glad he waited till we were done to share that!
Next, we had a quick stop at an artisans workshop that was sponsored by the government. It was a nice new space that had everything from a woman working on a loom to wood and stone carving. The stop was supposed to be short but when I noticed some industrial strength glue I asked if we could attempt to repair Ollie’s new water bottle. He was very excited at the prospect of getting back in the “new water bottle maintenance competition”.
After holding the broken plastic piece in place for 15 minutes it fell right off as the glue couldn’t hold. Seeing this one of the artisans decided the only way to fix it was by carefully drilling a tiny hole and putting a small screw into the bottle. 15 minutes later the repair was done and Ollie was back in the game. He was thrilled that his bottle was now powered up to be as strong as a metal screw. We tried to warn him that it could still easily break again if he was not careful.
We stopped for lunch and were the only ones at the restaurant. The food was fine but nothing memorable. We did play some Uno and Lenny exclaimed, “From California to North Korea!” at one point. I can’t recall exactly why he said this other than referring to something that was a far distance but we were all most shocked by him knowing what North Korea was.
After relaxing at the hotel for the afternoon it was time for our tuk tuk ride in the evening. We split into two tuk tuks and headed to a Buddhist Temple, a pagoda, for a short blessing ceremony. It had rained just before we arrived and the stone floors around and inside the pagoda were very slippery. Lenny took a small fall shortly after we arrived but was unscathed and went ahead with our blessing and string bracelet.
A Buddhist blessing string bracelet is a sacred thread, often called "sai sin," that is believed to offer protection, good luck, and blessings to the wearer. These bracelets are often made of simple cotton or nylon thread, frequently white, and are blessed by a Buddhist monk during a ceremony or ritual. The act of receiving and wearing the bracelet serves as a spiritual reminder and a way to accumulate positive karma.
On the way out of the temple Lenny took another spill, he was walking so carefully this time, and flopped into a big puddle. With half of his body soaked we jumped back into the tuk tuk and headed to the evening market to just drive through.
Lenny was asleep shortly into this drive. We cruised through the market that lined the road with Seou pointing out his favorite stop to get barbecued tarantulas. I asked him if there was anything we should eat here and he said with confidence and a smile that it would not be good for our stomachs. “Only OK for local people.”
We got back to the hotel with Lenny still out. I carried him to the restaurant where he laid asleep on the bench seat for all of dinner. Ollie enjoyed a more “civilized” dinner but there could be no Uno tourney play without Lenny.
After dinner we got him back to the room and he slowly woke up enough to watch The Twits while all piled into our bed. We were all excited for this to come out on Netflix given all our Roald Dahl listening earlier in the trip. The boys loved it but unfortunately it wasn’t a favorite of Kayleen or I. We let them both stay asleep in our bed for the night much to their delight.
