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With a history both inspiring and depressing, Cambodia delivers an intoxicating present. The land of Angkor Wat, sure, but what most people don't know about Cambodia is its quaint charm, its various quirks, its smiling people, its gruesome history and an underrated but thriving beach scene.
Hopefully this one-week Cambodia itinerary will help you prepare for your own Cambodia trip whenever it happens.
How to get to Cambodia?
While you could most definitely fly into Cambodia from India or Thailand, the another cheaper, if longer and definitely the more exciting part is crossing over land into Cambodia from Bangkok as we did. So here's my day-by-day breakup of the one week Cambodia Itinerary from India.
Day 1: Bangkok to Cambodia land border crossing
We flew Air Asia from Bangalore to Bangkok and immediately took a bus from right outside the Don Meung airport to Aranyaprathet, the border town on the Thai side. Once there, we walked for ten minutes and arrived at the exit checkpoint of Thailand and then the entry one of Cambodia. A $30 on-arrival visa and an immigration formality later, we were officially in Poipet, the Cambodia border town, and from here we were urged to take a free shuttle to a bus stand, to get to Siem Reap through a 5-hour road journey.
Reaching Siem Reap nearly around sunset, we found the Cambodian city to be quaint and charming, with a canal running through the city almost dividing it into two parts with tree-lined boulevards on either side. We were pretty tired from that long and ardous day on the trip through three countries (India, Thailand and Cambodia) within a single day so just checked into our hotel in Siem Reap and headed out for dinner. This was our first brush with the concept of Cambodian beer gardens which are basically open-air pubs and yet brightly lit with LED-extravaganzas. And the most curious part about the beer gardens is the "beer girls", a bevy of young girls, with full makeup and rather skimpy clothes whose one job it is to entice the customers in! Well, we're not gonna say no to them, are we? So we sat ourselves on a garden table and had our first Cambodian meal, a pint each of Angkor beer and a vegetarian noodle soup - pretty tame for a place that served crocodile as 90% of its menu! (more on this up ahead.)
Day: 2 Angkor Wat Temple Run on bikes
Angkor Wat is the foremost reason most people travel to Cambodia. These 12-13th century Hindu temples constitute the largest temple ruin complex in the world, arguably after the temple ruins in Hampi in India.
Naturally, the temples are spread across a large area that makes it impossible to cover them all in a few hours or even a whole day. So most travelers do a guided car or a Tuktuk tour around the temples, however if you care for a lil adventure and want to do everything at a slower pace, cycling around the complex is much more fulfilling. We rented a bicycle each from our hotel for about $10 for 2 days, and started our Angkor Wat cycle tour at around 9 in the morning. A 30-minute ride covering 6 kms later, we were at the Angkor Wat entrance gates.
Which Angkor Wat pass to buy?
Built in the first half of the 12th century (113-5BC) over a course of 30 years by King Suryavarman II, and dedicated to Hindu god Vishnu, the Angkor area stretches over a circuit of over 60 kms, with multiple temples dotted along the circuit. If you're on a whirlwind trip, a one-day pass ($20) would suffice, provided you start the day at dawn, go on till sunset and use the tuktuk. However to completely soak in the temples, recommend buying a 6-day pass at $40 (usable over a week) and take your own time in getting to and appreciating the sites.
What to expect at Angkor Wat?
If this is the first temple of your trip, the enormity and the grandeur of the Angkor Wat will strike you, enamour you and maybe the dilapidated state of these once majestic temples will sadden you a bit. But take solace in the fact these temples have stood the test of time for over 800 years. For perspective, the Taj Mahal was built 400 years after the Angkor Wat.
(A couple of years later, the 9th century Prambanan temple that I went to on my Indonesia trip reminded me of Angkor Wat, even if the former was even more impressive.)
Take your time in going around the complex, admiring its many intricate carvings and sculptures. It would really help to view everything from a perspective -- these temples were built nearly 1000 years ago without any modern technology or tools.
Bayon Temple: The most impressive structure in Angkor Wat
After Angkor and catching a quick bite of noodles at the many stalls around it, we biked on and through what is undoubtedly the most imposing of all of Angkor Wat complex -- The Bayon temple.
After going through a gate, which itself is a marvel, a stunning arch with four smiling Buddha faces looking in every direction, across a reservoir lined with dozens of "Asura" (Demon) faces looms ahead.
The temple inside, moss and patina married with the stone, has faces of a god embedded all over its facades. The faces apparently belong to Jayavarman 3's (and you think selfies are self obsession!) and not the Buddha, making for a never-seen before spectacle and distinguishing it from the other Hindu temples.
Baphoun
Called the biggest jigsaw puzzle in the world, the temple structure at Baphoun contains a gigantic and recently restored reclining Buddha (perhaps still a work in progress) which itself is the temple building.
Where to view the sunset in Angkor Wat?
We were advised to watch the sunset at Bakheng hill and we did. However, the viewpoint was massively crowded, took forever to get to the top for a view which could be pretty much anywhere within Angkor.
Post Angkor: Evening at Pub Street
After a tiring 30-km cycle ride in the steaming hot weather, we definitely needed some unwinding desperately and Siem Reap didn't disappoint. The vibrant Pub Street with rows and rows of bars and restaurants offering a draft beer at $0.50 and of course the Khmer Spread, along with the usual Thai, Continental and other tourist-friendly spreads came through, reminding me of the Khao San street from my Thailand trip a few years ago.
Day 3: Catch the sunrise at Angkor Wat and cover the rest of Angkor Wat complex
In a bid to catch the famed sunrise at the Angkor temple, we reluctantly woke up at 5 am, and after a sleepy 20-min bike ride to the temple, found ourselves one amongst the hundreds who had the same idea! And there began the mad scramble for that postcard perfect photo of the Angkor Wat, with its reflection in the shallow pond.
There were miles to be biked and dozens of temples to be seen so we cycled on, stopping at the Bayon to soak in the impressive temple once again, this time with elephants traipsing around with passengers on their back. We stopped to check out a few more impressive, if smaller temples like the Elephant seat, the Preah Khan and the very unique Preah Ko, a temple on an artificial island, on the way to the bigger pull of the day --- Ta Prohm
Ta Phrom - The Tomb Raider temple
If you've watched the movie Tomb Raider -- Lara Croft, it's filmed in this grand temple Ta Prohm. Where grand Banyan trees as old or older than the temples are deeply embedded into the temple structure itself, lending an almost eerie and yet a visually stunning sight.
After a tiring 60km odd bike ride covering all the temples in the main circuit, we were back to our hotel and checked out some local restaurants around for dinner and ended up going back for a stroll and had a simple roadside meal of $1 bamboo noodles!
Day 4: Floating Villages on the Tonle Sap Lake
We were pretty sore from the intense bike riding the previous two days so despite having bought a 6-day pass for Angkor Wat, we decided to skip today and sleep in instead. For a change of scenery from heritage to nature, we booked a day-trip out to the Floating Village on the Tonle Sap great lake.
A one-hour ride to Tonle Sap and a transfer into a ferry got us to one of the most interesting (if a touristy) experiences of our trip. We rowed past rows of bamboo huts and cottages propped over stilts along the narrow lake. Apparently in rainy season the entire village gets flooded, keeping the houses afloat over these stilts! A most scenic boat ride in the mangroves later, we were anchored to a floating restaurant, almost at what looks like the horizon of the earth!
We were back to the good ol' Pub Street by 8pm and spent our last night in Siem Reap with some
more $1 beers, over the sounds of music blaring out from the nearby pubs, the landmine victims' music groups, and the banter of other merry making tourists.
The same night, we took an overnight bus to Phnom Penh for the second leg of our trip ($15 each, comfortable, AC)
Day 5: Day tripping in a rather dull Phnom Penh
While Phnom Penh, the Cambodian capital city pales in comparison to the surrealism of the Angkor in Siem Reap, still should be seen to set in perspective the contrast of the temple town and a bustling, chaotic metropolis. You could visit the national museum ($5) with an impressive collection of the artefacts from the Angkor period followed by the Grand Palace next door ($7). However if you're short on time and money, the Grand Palace is quite missable.
Relics of the gruesome Khmer regime in Cambodia
Those aware of the gruesome and poignant past of Cambodia and Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge regime, a trip to the Killing Fields and the Tuol Sleng Prison may be heart breaking but eye opening and perspective giving.
The Tuol Sleng was a high school converted into an ad hoc prison to capture the victims of the Khmer Rouge who were brutally tortured, impoverished and then taken to the "Killing Fields" to be executed. A cabinet full of skulls of a few thousand of the 1.7 million executed are on display, very reminiscent of the Nazi concentration Camp at Auschwitz that I would visit nearly a decade later on my 2-day trip to Krawkow, Poland. Not for the faint hearted.
Day 6: Beach bumming and happy pizzas in Sihanoukville
Having decided that Phnom Penh did not have much else to offer to a traveler, we boarded the 5-hour bus to the beach town Sihanoukville in South Cambodia. Reaching Sihanoukville just after sunset, we walked to the Serendipity beach area. Dotted with guesthouses, restaurants, water sports, boutiques, and cafes, Sihanoukville is not very dissimilar to other beach towns in Southeast Asia like Koh Samui, Seminyak, Kuta, or even Goa. Note: We did this trip in 2015, but I hear that Sihanoukville has completely transformed since and flush with Chinese funds and gambling millionaires, it's now a concrete mess full of skyscrapers.
Happy Pizzas in Sihanoukville
The standout part about Sihanoukville for us was the "Happy Pizza"- A regular pizza made extra happiness-inducing by topping it with a generous sprinkling of Marijuana (which happens to semi legal in Cambodia) so enjoy a sin-free helping. A night of proper chilling in Sihanoukville and rounds of happy pizza ensured we were full of good vibes and cheer about us.
(A year later we'd discover on our 5-day Lao trip, the Cambodian neighbour country also offers plenty of happy pizzas, opium shakes and others on the menu.)
Hung over from the Happy Pizzas, we spent the whole of next day doing nothing but chilling more in the sleepy beach town, lounging on the comfy 'satellite chairs' and beach bumming. To be honest, Sihanoukville isn't really the prettiest beach I've seen and if not for those pizzas, this part of our Cambodian trip could be easily missable.
Come noon, we hopped on a shared taxi with a bunch of locals and monks towards Siem Reap and essentially backtracked our entire journey back --- Siem Reap - Poipet - Aranyaprathet - Bangkok. A rather long almost 24 hour deal!
Day 8: Back to Thailand for the third time
Neither of us being a stranger to the Thai capital, we had a few hours to kill before our flight back to India, so we walked around the Pat Pong area. Being approached for "Ping Pong Shows" every 5 minutes notwithstanding, we had a great time, people watching, window shopping and of course hunting down vegetarian places in this great haven of the meats.
Day 9: A 10-hour long layover in Colombo
Even though both of us had also traveled to Sri Lanka before, we couldn't resist the temptation of going out of the Colombo airport to spend our few hours of a layover. There was an Ind Vs Pak World Cup match and we weren't going to muck about at the airport, in a land almost as crazy about cricket as us. So we got a quick and free transit visa, took a bus and an auto and landed straight at the famous "Cricket Club Cafe"- the Hard Rock Cafe of Cricket and watched the match over expensive draft beers.
In the break, we also managed to squeeze in a trip to the eccentric Ganga Ramaya temple with its hundreds of Buddhas and other religious paraphernalia all strewn around in this temple and the lake around it. Well worth a visit if you happen to be in Colombo.
Watching the rest of the match at the airport, and celebrating our win, over cups of coffee, we were 2 happy souls, getting into our final flight back home. This had been a heady, hectic, and yet one of the most interesting trips.
Some travel eccentricities and tips about travels in Cambodia
While the currency of choice in Cambodia is the USD, it transacts in multiple currencies like the USD, the Cambodian Riel and also the Thai Bahts!
Crocodile meat and crocodile leather is big in Cambodia. If you're vegan like I am, the rather explicit images of crocodiles through various stages of "leather making" wouldn't be a pleasant sight.
Proud of their hundreds of years of history and heritage the Cambodians surely are. Almost everything is called Angkor something. Grand Angkor Hotel, Smiling Angkor Shack, Angkor beer, the like.
Dominantly a meat based country, getting hold of bread may be a challenge. If you can't find enough veg stuff to sustain, hit a big supermarket and stock up on all the bread and jam you can.
Most ATMs in Siem Reap dispense money in dollars and charge a $5 convenience fees. To avoid, carry US dollars with you.
The word for hello in Cambodian is "Sustey!"
Despite the poverty and all other issues, the Cambodians are one of the happiest, warm and ever smiling people I've ever met.
