Siem Reap, Cambodia.

We spent 4 days in Cambodia between Ho Chi Minh and Hoi An in Vietnam.

On arrival it was so much more Westernised that I had imagined! The airport was a lovely building and the 15 minute drive to the hotel down Airport Road and Route 6 took us past some really large fancy hotels!

Our hotel, Saem Siemreap, was just on the outskirts of town, just a $2 tuk-tuk ride away. Not quite close enough to walk in the heat though!

The main thing you notice within your first hour of being in Cambodia is how happy, friendly and smiley everyone is. It’s lovely and really welcoming!

During our time in Cambodia we had a private tour booked in for Angkor. We had a driver named P and our tour guide Mr T.

Mr T was a very chic guy with loads of bling and he was incredibly knowledgeable. He told us that he is one of the top guides for tourism in Cambodia and has trained over 1,000 guides. He gave Angelina Jolie and Jackie Chan tours of the areas when they were both filming movies there. Once he found out we were English he kept saying he has been in 3 Rick Stein movies and have I seen them!? Took me about an hour to clock on. He worked with BBC2 to create Rick Stein’s cooking programs that were in Cambodia! Now this guy could well have been making all this stuff up but I chose blindly to believe every word he said!!

On our day at Angkor with Mr T we started with Ta Prohm, this was built for the King’s Mother. It suffered a lot of damage over the years but that has lead to it turning into a jungle covered temple with the most amazing trees going on top and out of the building. This is where Tomb Raider was filmed. Next we went on to Angkor Thom which is a 3km walled and moated royal city. This was the capital of the Angkorian empire. The city has 5 entrance gates each crowned with 4 giant faces. Inside Angkor Thom we went to see Bayon and the Terrace of the Elephants. The terrace is a 300m long wall carved with elephants. Bayon is deemed the next best thing to visit after Angkor. It has 37 standing towers with most sporting the carved faces.

The best was saved until last, visiting Angkor Wat around lunch time. This is the largest religious monument in the world and one of the seven wonders! Angkor Wat was very busy but as Mr T knows the areas well he navigated us round a much quieter way in. You don’t quite appreciate the size until you can see it from above which was could when we left Cambodia via plane.

It’s madness to think these temples were built around 1000AD and then once the capital was resettled at Phnom Penh they were practically untouched for over 600 years until it’s rediscovery in 1860 by the French. Then unfortunately having the temples used as military bases under Pol Pot caused a huge amount of damage to the buildings which has taken and is going to take many, many years to rectify.

The tour was fascinating but hard work, it was incredibly humid and the temples are set over a vast area meaning you need a driver to take you to each site. You also have to pay a $37 ticket fee to enter Angkor. This money is used towards to restoration work. Under 12s go free. In a couple of the temples Faye wasn’t allowed in certain areas for health and safety. So Mr T stayed with Faye whilst I did these parts. It was mainly the tops of temples that had incredibly steep staircases and it was very hard work getting up and down them! I was told they were built like this as a representation that it is not easy to get up to heaven. These staircases would be where people would go every day to pray and meditate as they are up high and closest to ‘heaven’. Faye being 8 was a good age for doing the temples, any younger and she would of struggled. There aren’t many toilets, it’s very hot, and for a child it may all look a little bit similar. It’s also not hugely accessible so having a pushchair would be hard work!

Another highlight for us in Siem Reap was Phare Circus. I came across this via Tripadvisor as it had excellent reviews. It cost $40 for the two of us which is very expensive compared to everything else in Cambodia. We got a 10 minute tuk-tuk ride over to the circus which was in a big top that was luckily air conditioned! The show turned out to be brilliant, everything the reviews said it would be. It told the story of a young man not being accepted into the village because he looked different to everyone else. It was told really well and was very funny. The gymnastics and acrobatics were insane! It’s highly recommended by Faye and I!! The company Phare, take children off the streets and kids from disadvantaged families and train them up for the shows to give them an opportunity to earn money for their family and change their lives. They’ve helped over 1200 kids and over 150 have gone on to be performers around the world.

We also had a tuk-tuk driver for a few hours one day to take us to a few sights. The excellent thing about the drivers is that they wait for you. They have hammocks they whip out and have a sleep in the tuk-tuk whilst they wait! Saves the hassle of finding another one or a taxi when you want to leave places. Our driver took us to the war museum which is an outdoor museum with free guided tours from people who were in the war. The site is on an old landmine site and they have collected weapons and machinery that was used. They are still in the process of building structures to house the exhibits which is what all the donation money is going towards. Faye was super patient here as the guide did speak English but it wasn’t easy to understand. That’s not in a negative way at all, I am incredibly grateful all these people have learnt English because I don’t know any Vietnamese other than Hello! The museum was chilling and incredibly fresh, the war only ended in 1999 and wiped out 40% of the population. There are also still active land mines near the Thai border and it’s going to take another 5 years before they can deactivate them all. They cost $20 to make but $500 to remove. It was a brilliant guided tour and we learnt a lot from it.

Another fun evening experience was going down to the night markets and pub street, it’s really lively and a great atmosphere. The night market was actually really night tiki huts and friendly vendors. For $10 we had a cocktail in Island Bar, brought a bag of goodies from the market, visited the fish spa and tried some scorpions!! You can get a massage for $2 here! We ate dinner in a lively restaurant on the corner of Pub Street, we tried crocodile for the first time! It was tasty!

I know I mentioned it earlier but the Cambodian people really made the experience for us. Just the happiest, loveliest people!