Cambodia Travel Blog

Last Updated on March 13, 2023 by PowersToTravel

Welcome to my Cambodia Travel Blog

We visited Cambodia as part of our sometimes dependent, sometimes independent 63-day Southeast Asia Odyssey Asia in November 2017 to January 2018. We arrived in Phnom Phenh by speedboat from Chau Doc, Vietnam. See my Vietnam travel blog for more details. We spent several days in Phnom Phenh and its surroundings on our own, then traveled overland via private car, driver and guide to Oudong, Battambang and finally to Siem Reap.

We took a day trip from Phnom Penh to see the Wildlife Alliance center. It was an eye-opening experience, and great fun to meet Lucky the elephant and other rescued animals in the sanctuary. Greg really enjoyed experiencing the monkeys in their habitat. (It was really funny to watch the monkeys try to pick off and eat his moles!) While you may read reviews about it on Tripadvisor, be aware that there are two ways to see the center – on a Wildlife Alliance day trip, which we did, and as a walk-in. Definitely spring for the guided tour as the experience is full of insights about environment and wildlife protection in Cambodia, even information about living in Cambodia from the guides.

After we spent several days on our own in Phnom Penh, we engaged the services of Backyard Travel for our overland travel, and the Siem Reap guiding. We chose, then slightly modified, an itinerary called “Explore Cambodia” which doesn’t appear to be on their website now.

Once in Siem Reap, we spent seven days there. Angkor Wat was Greg’s Number One destination and we wanted to be sure we saw it completely, in the best weather. We also added some time to relax in the middle of this long odyssey. On reflection after the trip, we spent too much time there. We could have seen other things elsewhere on the 65 day trip, and limited Siem Reap to four days and been perfectly happy doing so.

At the end, we flew out of Siem Reap to Luang Prabang on Vietnam Airlines.

Our Cambodia Itinerary

• Day 1 – Arrival in Phnom Penh via speedboat from Chau Doc
• Day 2 – Free day wandering around, looking for Diet Dr. Pepper – check out the Pencil Store! We found Dr Pepper there. Diet Dr Pepper was nowhere to be found. Read the whole story.
• Day 3 – Day trip to the Wildlife Alliance. Great day out into the countryside to see their rescued animals and hear about all of their efforts to limit poaching.
• Day 4 – Pickup by our driver and guide Tia from Backyard Travel – sightseeing of temples and museums in Phnom Penh
• Day 5 – Drive north through Oudong to Battambang
• Day 6 – Battambang to Siem Reap
• Day 7 – Siem Reap: Rolous Group, Angkor Wat, Phare Circus. Do not miss the Phare Circus if you are in Siem Reap!
• Day 8 – Siem Reap: Ta Prohm, Angkor Thom, Bayon Banteay Srei
• Day 9 – Siem Reap: Tonle Sap Lake and markets
• Day 10 – Siem Reap: Free day (we arranged on our own, for our “free day” a horse cart ride which was really lame) I would have been happy returning to the temples for some different light on them but Greg doesn’t like to re-see things that way, that soon We didn’t really need a free day to relax, either.
• Day 11 – Preah Vihear – this was a long drive from Siem Reap to see a UNESCO World Heritage Site. We thought we were being really discerning in choosing this destination, however it actually wasn’t very interesting. Getting to the top of the mountain on the truck personnel carrier was fun, the road being rather steep, and the view from the top of the mountain was good. But the temple wasn’t that interesting to us, and wasn’t worth the long ride to get there. Definitely we would skip this if we were to live all over again.
• Day 12 – Siem Reap: Beng Mealea, afternoon free. Again, why did we build in so much free time? I know. The photographer in me says “What if we go somewhere special and the light is wrong or weather is bad – we might want to return.” However, Greg is not a photographer and he certainly doesn’t want to go back to see something he just saw, just to get the light right.
• Day 13 – Siem Reap: Morning free (again, what’s with all the free time?) and then a 5pm flight out to Luang Prabang.

Impressions

I am so anxious to write about Cambodia in my travel blog. While we traveled I took extensive notes but created nothing publishable. I want desperately to communicate how much I loved this country, but my list of to-do’s is so long!

Our guides were more than excellent! Tia was our excellent and humorous Phnom Penh-to-Siem Reap guide. We really bonded with our guide Riyen in Siem Reap. I felt I had found a sister and that we learned so much about daily life from her.

We learned so much about the sad history of the country from Tia, and much about the country-to-city juxtaposition from Riyen. We felt our understanding of, and empathy with, Cambodia was deeper than any of the other countries we visited.

At the request of one of my readers, I’ve finally gotten around to writing a review of Backyard Travel – Cambodia.

Summary

Until I get to writing the Cambodia part of the travel blog, what I have for you are two video slide-shows here.

I’ve also posted video slide shows of the entire Odyssey.  Click here to see them all.