We had heard mixed reviews about Cambodia, with lots of people telling us a week would be more than enough to see the main sights, so the week is all we allowed. We ended up loving the country and really wished we'd allowed a few more days.
Soon after arriving in Siem Reap we caught a minibus to the capital, Phnom Penh. The road linking the two cities is perhaps the most important, but is certainly not the best, in the country. As part of an aggressive, largely Chinese funded, modernization project almost the entire stretch of road is a work in progress, making for a bone jarring 5 hour drive.
Apart from breathtaking scenery and friendly people, we find that what puts us in the best mood while traveling is really good food and drink. On our first night in Cambodia we got plenty of both, starting with an ice cold free welcome drink at our hostel (just one of the reasons we rate it as one of the best we've stayed at). We had read a lot about Cambodian 'training restaurants', not for profit venues giving disadvantaged youth a start in the growing hospitality industry, and on our first night we ate at one near our hostel. The food was amazing and incredibly cheap!
Soon after arriving in Siem Reap we caught a minibus to the capital, Phnom Penh. The road linking the two cities is perhaps the most important, but is certainly not the best, in the country. As part of an aggressive, largely Chinese funded, modernization project almost the entire stretch of road is a work in progress, making for a bone jarring 5 hour drive.
Apart from breathtaking scenery and friendly people, we find that what puts us in the best mood while traveling is really good food and drink. On our first night in Cambodia we got plenty of both, starting with an ice cold free welcome drink at our hostel (just one of the reasons we rate it as one of the best we've stayed at). We had read a lot about Cambodian 'training restaurants', not for profit venues giving disadvantaged youth a start in the growing hospitality industry, and on our first night we ate at one near our hostel. The food was amazing and incredibly cheap!
When many people think of Cambodia they think of the Khmer Rouge, the brutal communist regime that killed around 3 million people (a significant proportion of the country's population at the time) during its relatively short 4 year period in power. The regime's main policy was to move people out of the cities to work on rice farms, leaving Phnom Penh to be used most notably for torturing and executing anybody even vaguely suspected of dissent. The torturing mostly took place at Tuol Sleng (a school turned into a prison in 1975) and the killing happened out of town at the killing fields. Both have been turned into museums but we chose to just visit the former (the main attraction at the latter is a wall of skulls, which Cindy in particular didn't think she needed to see).
We spent the rest of the day visiting more cheerful sights in the capital, including the National Museum, Royal Palace, Silver Pagoda and Wat Phnom. We found the city to be really green, clean and spacious (at least compared to Sri Lanka, India and Nepal), so we were more than happy to turn down countless tuk tuk approaches in favor of touring the city by foot. We found the Sisowath Quay walkway on the banks of the Mekong particularly pleasant.
From the capital we took a mini bus four hours south west to Sihanoukville, Cambodia's main beach destination. We chose to stay centrally, close to lots of really nice restaurants. We hadn't seen a beach since Goa (India) five weeks earlier so we spent as much time as we could at the surrounding beaches, including the exclusive Sokha beach (which is mostly occupied by a five star hotel) and the more laid back Otres beach. We also took a day trip out to Ko Rong Island, although that was cut short due to rough seas resulting from a typhoon in the Philippines. We really loved the beaches and laid back atmosphere in Sihanoukville and of all the places we visited in 2014, this is probably the one that we really wish we'd allowed more time to enjoy.
Our last stop in Cambodia was Siem Reap, home to the Angkor group of temples. The temples are really spread out, so to see best of them you need to hire a car, tuk tuk or bike. We chose to take a full day bike tour, which allowed us to get off the beaten track to visit some less popular temples, as well as the must sees of Angkor Wat (the most famous and most popular), Angkor Thom, Bayon and Ta Prohm (famous for being featured in the Angelina Jolie movie, Tomb Raider).
The temples were certainly impressive, although for us they didn't make as strong an impression as the Taj Mahal or the Macchu Picchu. Big crowds didn't help and the combination of neglect, civil war (many temple walls are littered with bullet holes) and graffiti have taken their toll, particularly on Angkor Wat.
After the 40 kilometer ride around the temples, we decided to spend the rest of our time in Siem Reap treating ourselves to some massages, cheap local beer and a final few amazing meals (the best was at another training restaurant). In what seemed like the blink of an eye our week long Cambodia trip was over and it was time to catch an indirect flight to our next stop, Myanmar.