travel

We did separate flights to and from Ireland because it was too hard to schedule a 36 hour layover on Qatar (and they didn't fly direct anyway). From there, it was Qatar through Hamad International Airport in Doha; since we were flying business class, we had access to the lounge, but this time we only had a two and half hour layover. It was long enough to take a shower, at least! Qatar flew direct to Phnom Penh, but not to Siem Reap, so we actually had to take a little puddle jumper from there to Bangkok, who's airport was ginormous but not too difficult to navigate (not shown on the map)

In Cambodia, we started the tour in Phnom Penh, then drove south to the shoreline and then west.  We did a lot of activities and stayed at different places along the way.  Then we did the drive back on one day, and the drive to Siem Reap the next, taking one long jog to see Sabor Prei Kuk.

Most of the flying part of the trip was on Qatar business class, our favorite for these other-side of the world trips. The business class lounge in Doha hasn't changed since the last time we were there, but the airport has added a giant solarium which was fairly impressive.

Found it kind of funny that Qatar business class has it's own comfy bus, since a lot of the flights don't get to pull into the terminal.

We flew out of Siem Reap, which has a new airport an hour away from the city. The old airport is shut down. Apparently the bigger planes were casing the temples to collapse. The new airport is giant, modern, and almost completely empty. China funded it. It's a little unclear what all the extra capacity is for.

We flew through Bangkok on the way back... it seemed like it was bigger than Heathrow. And a lot better organized. The Qatar business lounge was small but very nice and it had a martini bar.

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