Cambodia - Kingdom of Wonder
The first morning, my husband John had planned out our sightseeing. He hired a local taxi driver (tuk tuk driver really) and arranged that he would stay with us until we had seen everything we wanted to see. We set off and it was lovely and cool flying round in the tuk tuk. If you stayed still for a moment, you would just melt in the heat! First up was the Royal Palace which is still the official residence of the Royal Family. Much of the Palace was off limits to protect the privacy of the Royals but the gardens and the Silver Pagoda were spectacular.
After the Palace, we headed to Tuol Sleng - the school which was used as an interrogation centre and torture camp during Pol Pot’s reign of terror back in the 1970s. I found the visit to the museum quite disturbing and afterwards we just sat in the gardens for a while, where it was so quiet yet so peaceful. I needed time to simply absorb and reflect on what I had seen. We were to visit the Killing Fields that afternoon but I cried off, perhaps it could be a trip for my next visit to Phnom Penh.
We then stopped for lunch and headed to the Russian Market which offered a huge collection of souvenirs, silks and lots of interesting bric a brac. We had our list from the kids and got great value and we were delighted with our purchases.
That evening, we headed down to the river. This is the area where the best restaurants are the the most lively bars. I was introduced to the popular dish ‘Amok Trey’ which was basically fish covered in spices, wrapped in banana leaves and steamed – really tasty. The area was really busy and we had a great evening before the jet lag hit us again!
The next day, we took the bus to Siem Reap which was about a 7 hour journey from Phnom Penh. I found that taking the bus rather than flying gave us a much better insight into the country and you can see so much more. It was very green due to the heavy rainfall it had experienced during the recent monsoon. We passed lots of small villages and the kids at each village ran out to wave at us. The people of Cambodia are really so lovely – very gentle and friendly.
Siem Reap was buzzing with tourists who had all come to see “Angkor Wat” - the famous temples just outside Siem Reap. We booked our Tuk Tuk the next morning at the hotel to bring us to the temples and to stay with us for the day. The temples were situated in a huge national park outside Siem Reap. They had been buried in the rainforest up until about 150 years ago when the ruins were discovered. There was an entire village of temples - absolutely incredible. My top tip for this tour would be to make sure to have a good guide with good English and that is something I can easily arrange for my clients.
It is very easy to add Cambodia on to a holiday to any other country in South East Asia. There are direct flights from there to Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and Malaysia. On this trip, I combined Cambodia with a few days at the beach in Khao Lak in Thailand along with 2 days in Bangkok. I will be heading back to Cambodia soon to visit the areas I missed last time and this time round, I will be adding on a few days R ‘n R on the island of Langkawi in Malaysia plus a couple of nights in Kuala Lumpur. All the tours I offer are tailormade private tours and I have noted a huge surge of interest in this area due to the fantastic value it offers in terms of airfares and accommodation.