Last updated: 2011-10-26

Itinerary

Day 1

Gathering in Phnom Penh at our hotel.

Day 2

In the morning you take a bus to Snoul a small town 4-5 hours drive from Phnom Penh. It is very convenient to make a stop over in Snoul for the long trip to Mondulkiri. You can make an excursion to the Vietnamese border, 15 km, or take a walk in the city and see the market, visit a restaurant or just sit down somewhere and watch the daily street life.

Day 3-5

The bus ride to Sen Morrom in the province Mondulkiri continues in the morning. The road is in a bad coondition and the trip takes around 5 hours. Mondulkiri is the least densely populated province in Cambodia, 35 000 inhabitants and 80 % of them are from some minority tribe. The province is on a high plateau so the climate is more cool than in the rest of the country. Be prepared that it can be a little bit cold in evenings and nights. With Sen Morom, the provincial capital, as a base will you for three days see parts of the province, the spectacular water falls Senmononrom and Bu Sra. For one night will you live in a family in the village Pou Tang were you according to your capacity can take part in village daily acctivitetes.

Day 6-8

Bus to Kratie (3 hours) a small riverside town with a charming character and a lot of colonial atmosphere left intact.

Kratie escaped damage despite of being occupied by Khmer Rouge. It has a distinctly French feel with some elegant riverfront facades. Life in the town evolves around arrival and departure of boats. Kratie is said to sport the best sunsets in the whole country and besides is home for rare Irrawady dolphins. To watch the dolphins you might consider going to Kampie (15km). Although you can see them at any time of the day, mornings are considered the best time for spotting them. Cambodians traditionally believe that the dolphins (psout) are part -human, part-fish, and do their best to look after them. Actually they became a tourist attraction quite recently. There is a viewing platform, from which you can survey the river from midstream. The WWF asks the visitors not to go out to view the dolphins on motorboats.

Both Kratie and Kompong Cham are good places to make excursions with bicycle on mainland or to villages on islands in Mekong.

Day 9-10

Boat or bus to Kompong Cham. The ride takes 2.5 hours. Kompong Cham is Cambodia's third biggest city, but the province is the most populated province in Cambodia. Kompong Cham was an important trading post during the French period and a centre for rubber production.

11-13

Continue to the seaside town of Kep in the morning, a bus-ride on 5-6 hours. Kep is a town where the old elite used to keep seaside houses. The royal family still owns some land here. A lot of the houses were ruined in the chaos over the previous years and there still are houses in a horrible state left. But in a very slow pace there are some investors trying to build here. The restaurants by the sea serve different kinds of fish and seafood. In the morning you could walk to the pier to wait for the few fishing boats returning to Kep. The chief attrtaction in Kep is a possibility to go for a boat ride to off shore islands. Once you go to Rabbit Island you will find a largely uninhabited island and lovely beaches. It takes roughly one hour by boat to reach the island.

The south coast of Cambodia is a world of tropical beaches and unspoilt islands. Much of the coastline is dotted with fishing villages making their living from the sea. Kampot is a small town with a lot of colonial French architecture still left. The houses are quite stylish although shabby these days.

The atmosphere of the town is nice and friendly. It is situated only ten kilometres away from the sea. Kampot River runs through the town. You can visit waterfalls or go on boat rides along the rivers around Kampot. It is also possible to rent a vehicle to go to Bokor Hill Station at 1080 m. in Bokor National Park. On top of the hill station you will find Bokor Palace, which is practically in ruins nowadays, but once was a magnificent hotel where people came to gamble. If you do visit Bokor Hill Station you have to watch out and follow the paths carefully. This was a Khmer Rouge stronghold, and the paths can still be mined.

You can rent bicycles or motorcycles to go to the countryside. There is a reasonably large-scale salt production going on here. Kampot is also well known for producing some of the best pepper in the region. At some places you could see shrimp paste production.

You could stay the night in a monastery, 3-4 kilometres away from Kampot. The monastery is situated just beside the river and there is a school next door. You can visit the school and perhaps follow the monks in their activities in the monastery.

Day 14-16

Rented bus to Phnom Penh. This is a growing city with all positive and negative sides the growing cities have. The consequence of the last ten years' development is that you can find almost anything in Phnom Penh. There are supermarkets, lots of international restaurants, fashionable clothes to buy, but you will also find that a big part of the population live in poverty. Around the city you will find shantytowns with garbage strewn out in the streets. Once in a while the government tries to hide the problems connected with poverty. They sweep away some areas and build factories or modern apartments. But the problem does not disappear, and shantytowns re-appear somewhere else instead.

Close to the river the Royal Palace with its Silver Pagoda is located. There are 5000 silver floor tiles in the pagoda. You can also visit the National Museum, a perfect start to later explore the Angkor area. Here you find really good pieces from both pre and post Angkor periods.

Phnom Penh has got a few traditional art treasures, but there are also quite a few "sights" that are not so pleasant to the eye. Tuol Sleng Museum in the old high school with the same name is one such example. It was here that Pol Pot´s security forces held thousands of people for detention and torture. 17.000 of these prisoners were taken to the execution groun at Choeung Ek, one of many killing fields in Cambodia. Visiting Tuol Sleng is horrifying but necessary.

If you ask Vuthu can he help you to go to the place were they are holding the trial over Khmer Rouge. It is an interesting visit but also an sad experience because the trial has been postponed so long that many of the top Khmer Rouge people are very old or already dead. Let´s hope that some justice vill come out of this trial.

Day 17-20

The boat to Siem Reap leaves at 7 a.m. The boat ride will take about five hours and you will first travel along the river and then continue on Lake Tonle Sap, the biggest lake in Cambodia. During rainy season between May and October the water level is so high in Mekong River, that the water flow changes directions and backs up into Tonle Sap. This creates one of the world's best fishing waters and you can see lots of fishing activity on the lake. During the rest of the year the water flows in normal direction, floating downwards.

After arriving to Siem Reap you can explore the floating Vietnamese village that occupies the northern edge of the lake. It stands on poles in the water. With Siem Reap as a base you have almost four days to explore Angkor, one of the biggest and most important world cultural sights (UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1992). The area was once the heart of the Khmer Empire. The temples are built from 802 to 1432. The Angkor complex is spread over an enormous area and you would need at least a week to see everything. Some of the old temples are surrounded by thick jungle, some almost grown together with the forest. As soon as you leave the main area around Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom with its Bayon temple you will find temples much less visited. You have to decide for yourself where you set the limit of how much you want to see. The variety of all the different shapes of the structures and the abundance of delicate details are something you can not have come across elsewhere in the world. In Angkor Hinduism and Buddhism are mixed. This is most exemplified at Bayon, where you have many hundreds of heads of the Bodhisattva of Mercy (Avalokitesvara) in a setting that is otherwise mainly hinduistic.

On the walls surrounding Bayon and Angkor Wat you will find fantastic relieves of legends, both traditional Khmer legends and Hindu epos (Ramayana). Around Angkor Wat relieves are almost a kilometre long and if you want a thorough study, you will use most of your time here.

Banteay Srei and Ta Prohm are another two favourites. Banteay Srei is famous for its golden coloured beautifully decorated temples and in Ta Prohm you find that the whole temple area is left just as it was found more than hundred years ago. The trees have grown together with the buildings and they have given the temples a much more abandoned fashion than anywhere else. For many Ta Prohm is the favourite of the more than 100 temples in the area.

You can travel around the area on two roads that lead to most of the sights. One is 17 kilometres long and one is 26 kilometres long. You can rent a bicycle to travel around the area or a motorcycle (vespa), but you will have to show a driver's license if so. You can also rent a motorcycle with a driver or a cyclo. Whatever choice you make you will have to know that before getting to Angkor area proper you have to travel about 6 kilometres just to reach it and the same distance going back again. Entrance ticket for 3 days is included in the price for the tour.

Outside of the Angkor area you can visit the holy mountain Phnom Kulen, 40 kilometres away from Siam Reap. This is not included in your Angkor ticket price.

Day 21-22

In the morning will you go to by boat to Battambang. This is probably the most beautiful boat trip in Cambodia.The on the way to, and around Battambang, is a heaven for birds. So if you are interested is this a good place for bird watching.
Battambang is a beautiful city with a lot of old French colonial architecture. People say it is the best preseved city in Cambodia.You have the chance to explore the town and its surroundings.

Day 23

You will go by bus from Battambang to Poipet, the border town to Thailand. The ride to Poipet shouldn't take more than three hours and you will have time to get to the Thai side in time to catch the train to Bangkok and you arrive early in the morning day 24 in Bangkok.

Day 24

Day room in a hotel is reserved and tour ends.