Cambodia🇰🇭

Following on from Laos, the next stop is Cambodia in the South East Asia Route. Spend two weeks exploring Cambodia. You don’t need this long if you are only going to the main sights, like Angkor Wat, but if you are travelling around the whole country, two weeks is the perfect amount of time without rushing. Personally, Cambodia is at the bottom of the list in terms of favourite countries. Not because the country was dangerous or anything, but more in terms of what we got up to there. Either way it is definitely worth visiting and ticking off, however, if you don’t have the time, this is the country that can sadly be missed.

Phnom Penh

🏨Mad Monkey
Fly into Phnom Penh or cross the land border from Laos if you want to. For us at the time, we only could fly there because of the borders being closed due to Covid-19. You don’t need a lot of time here, so only spend a couple days before moving on.

Choeung Ek Killing Field & Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum (S-21)
The two main things to do in Phnom Penh is to visit the famous Genocide Museum and Killing Fields, where you learn the history of the Khmer Rouge regime and how it affected Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge was a radical communist regime, which imposed an insane ideology to create a classless society. In doing this they eliminated money, private properties, schools and anyone who was seen to be against them, like intellectuals or minorities. This genocide lasted for four years and killed between 1.5 and 2 million people through torture of execution, forced labour and starvation.

The Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum was an old school, which was turned into a vicious detention and torture centre by the Khmer Rouge. This museum is now an integral, historic place documenting the Cambodian Genocide, where it is believed around twenty thousand people were imprisoned and tortured. Tickets are ridiculously cheap and you can walk through the museum at your own pace. The classrooms are now preserved torture rooms with thousands of black and white prisoner portraits, some photos of bodies from the aftermath of torture. It was honestly horrifying seeing and reading all of this. There were also old torture devices, shackles, victim clothing and confessions of those tortured.

The Killing Fields is a memorial park full of multiple burial sites where the Khmer Rouge regime executed and buried their victims. We got a guide who spoke decent English and explained the history and burial site. I highly recommend this as you will gain a better understanding of the horrific events, which happened at the Killing Fields. As you walk around the park, you can see thousands of skulls, bones, clothes and you will see the forty three untouched mass graves. The Killing Tree, which is where executioners tortured and beat up children, has now been turned into the Magic Tree and is covered by bracelets left by visitors.

Bassac Lane & Night Markets
Do a pub crawl with the hostel one evening and socialise with other backpackers who are also staying there. There are loads of bars and restaurants that you can go to, on Bassac Lane. We spent one evening doing a bar crawl and one evening going for a girly dinner to Elia Greek Kitchen! There is also a Night Market full of different stalls that you can browse at!

Siem Reap

🏨Onederz Hostel

Stay in Siem Reap for at least a couple of days, however, you can spend just one day here to see Angkor Wat before moving on.

Angkor Wat for Sunrise
The main thing to do, not just in Siem Reap, but Cambodia as a whole, is to visit Angkor Wat at sunrise! This was the sole reason for my trip to Cambodia and it did not disappoint! To do this, you will need to be at the temple by 5am latest to secure a good spot to watch the sunrise. You can purchase your tickets online in advance to ensure a smooth entrance in the morning. Then pre-book a tuktuk, which you can split between other people to get you to the temple for 5am. Bring warm clothes as you will be waiting for at least thirty minutes for the sun to rise and remember to cover your shoulders and knees, otherwise you won’t be allowed inside!

Once the sun had risen we walked around the grounds of the temple, which features a massive moat, different towers, steep stone staircases that we could walk down and different Buddhist shrines. We spent about an hour after sunrise walking around this beautiful place.

Bayon Temple & Ta Prohm (Tomb Raider) Temple
After Angkor Wat, we arranged a taxi/tuktuk to take us to these two temples, which were only a short drive away.

The Bayon Temple is renowned for its incredible different stone towers, embellished with hundreds of different stone faces. This temple symbolises the Kings power and the belief of Buddhist faith.

Ta Prohm is known for its dramatic, jungle appearance, where massive strangler fig roots have grown through the ruins, some being around eighteen meters tall! It is located in the Angkor Archaeological Park and is known as the Tomb Raider temple after becoming famous for featuring in the Lara Croft, Tomb Raider movie, starring Angelina Jolie!

Phare, The Cambodian Circus
Another activity is to watch the Cambodian Circus perform one evening! After a random find in the Lonely Planet Guide, we all booked tickets and made an evening of it. They were surprisingly really good and we all had a fun time, the locals had honestly never seen so many tourists. Ignore the face masks in the photo, this was just after Covid-19, so there were still regulations in place!

Pub Street & Bars, Moving TukTuk Bar
Another main thing is to visit Pub Street and have a pub crawl stopping at all the different bars. We went here most nights and always had a fun evening, the locals loved seeing us and it was only a five minute walk away from our hostel! You could also join a moving TukTuk Bar and have drinks whilst cycling along the road.

Battambang

🏨The Place Hostel

You will only need one full day in Battambang. However, it can definitely be missed, if you don’t have the time! We got the bus from Siem Reap and arrived late afternoon, then spent the next day doing the two main activities. We booked the tour through the hostel, which included both activities and transport there and back, but you can definitely organise it yourself if you want!

Bamboo Train
One activity to do, is take the Bamboo Train through the Cambodian fields. By train, I mean an improvised, open-air railway, made of bamboo platforms on wheels, attached to a motorbike engine. It was originally built by the locals to get from one place to another, after the Khmer Rouge destroyed the railway infrastructure. However, it is has now been turned into a tourist attraction where you ride for about thirty minutes over very rickety tracks through the rural Cambodian countryside.

Bat Caves at sunset
The other main activity is to visit the Phnom Sampeau Bat Caves. This activity is where you watch the spectacular, but also strange, natural show where millions of bats emerge from the cave at sunset. Every evening for around forty minutes, a continuous stream of bats (middle photo below) leave the caves to feed for the night. This has become a tourist show, where you walk up a small hill to watch this happen whilst also watching the sunset.

Kampot

🏨Onederz Hostel

Spend a couple days in Kampot exploring the town! We stayed at Onederz here for a more chilled experience, the dorms were pretty good, modern, had a social area and a pool that we could use. We then hired mopeds from the hostel and spent two days driving around and exploring.

Bokor National Park
First activity of the day was driving around Bokor National Park. It took roughly an hour to get to the entrance of the Park and then we drove through the winding roads, taking in the scenery before stopping at one of the little food stalls at the top! Sadly, when we stopped, it started pouring with rain so we had to quickly but carefully make our way back to town! From then we didn’t see any views but it was still a fun day with everyone.

Acadia Backpackers Waterpark
Arcadia Waterpark is another place to spend one afternoon. It is a hostel but I would recommend not staying there as I’ve heard the rooms are pretty bad! If you don’t stay there, you can book an afternoon to sunset boat tour and use the facilities there, which include a small waterpark. By small, I mean it has three things, a jumping ledge, a huge waterslide and a bean bag, which you can sit on and then other people jump onto it, making you fly into the water. You then go onto a home made floating raft, which takes you up and down the river until sunset! The price you pay includes a complimentary drink and some food at sunset, so it was an overall really fun day as we had such a big group.

Koh Rong

🏨Nest Beach Club

Spend a few days here enjoying the beaches and sunshine! The hostel is right on the beach, has a restaurant and provides different activities to do. If you want to walk into the mainland part of the island, it’s about a ten or so minute walk and has a lot more restaurants and local stalls to browse!

Nestival
Apart from exploring the island and the strip of restaurants and food stalls, Nest Hostel on Koh Rong is known for its famous festival, called Nestival. It happens every Saturday and includes drinking games, socialising, sometimes a fire show and it lasts pretty much all night. It is a really nice way to meet other travellers because everyone who stays at Nest tends to go to this festival so it is a really fun evening.

Koh Rong Sanloem

🏨Onederz / Mad Monkey

Koh Rong Sanloem is the other island you should visit. It is a much smaller and quiet island, giving it the perfect place to just chill on the beach, hike to the mainland viewpoint or take a boat around the island! We stayed here for a few days doing this before making our way back to the mainland.

We stayed at Onederz, which is right on the beach and by the main shops and restaurants. We were recommended Mad Monkey as well, but it is more isolated on the other side of the island. It is more known to be the place to stay if you want to be offline with no WiFi or signal, so definitely stay there if you want some time off grid and to enjoy some peace and quiet!

Other things to do in Cambodia

Some other things that you could do, that we didn’t manage to fit in are:

• Sap Lake Floating Villages - Siem Reap.
• Pepper Corn Farm - Kampot.
• Boat Tour, visit Long Set Beach, see Glowing Plankton - Koh Rong.
• Boat tour to M’Pai Bay, Lazy Beach, kayaking on Saracen Bay - Koh Rong Sanloem.
• Hike to the Lighthouse or Freedom Waterfall - Koh Rong Sanloem.