Cambodia: South West Coast: 8-12 May

The bus from Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City) left around 6.30am. One of the really funny things that happen in SE Asia when you book a bus through a travel agent/hotel is; a minibus will pick you up from your hotel and ride around the whole town picking people up taking ages and then take you to the bus which was a two minute walk around from where you were originally picked up from the first place. The bus ride to Cambodia is actually not at all bad, getting to the border around 11am. They collect $25 for the visa from you on the bus ($20 for the actual visa officially, $5 probably for the driver’s new SUV fund) and take all the westerners passports to the desk where they fill out all the forms and you pretty much just have to walk through to the Cambodian side after having your fingerprints taken. As soon as you get into the Cambodian side the higher level of poverty is apparent immediately. The roads are more beat up as are the houses and shop fronts along the side of them, and the people are too. The bus got to Phnom Penh around 1pm where we were catching another bus to Sihanoukville. I wanted to get some island beach time in before setting off inland.

Emily and I at Phnom Penh Station - picture by Stu

Dealing with currency and money is kind of complicated in Cambodia. You can pay for anything in USD (as long as the notes aren’t at all ripped), but anything lower than $1 is dealt with in Riel. 4000 Riel is $1, so if you pay for something with $10 note you get change back in $ and Riel so the chances of getting less back than you should have are high if you’re doing a speedy transaction, but this didn’t happen to me once that I know of so its definitely not like everyone is trying to scam you at all.

This is what I was told from a variety of sources to expect from Cambodia: Massive poverty, people begging sometimes aggressively and small children grabbing onto you or your things and shouting back when you get mad at them. Oppressively hot. Corrupt government officials making life hard for the general populace and sometimes tourists through scamming and therefore not being the friendliest of people, more out to get your money. But it could not have been a more opposite experience, and I’d actually say that Cambodia is less like all these things than some of the other countries I’ve visited. The first experience of friendliness and efficiency is when we got off at the busy bus station in Phnom Pen. There were chickens, food stalls, people, bags and bustling everywhere, but when someone working there found out we were in time to take an earlier bus he practically poll vaulted over it all across the station to get us a new ticket for the next available bus. There was a definite feeling of organisation and helpfulness which I wasn’t expecting from the accounts I had.

We took the next six hour bus to Sihanoukville on the tip of the South West coast of Cambodia. This is the second most popular destination after Siem Riep and so is packed with tourists and didn’t seem anything special to me, at least not at Serendipity beach which has truly been overtaken by the hoards. But, a good place to meet other backpackers and have a gay ol’ time. I was told that five years ago this was a peaceful beautiful haven with some shacks and a couple of restaurants, well not anymore! There’s a beach, and tons of bars and hotels and it feels like a bit of a dirty tourist trap to me. I have heard that there’s still a mini stronghold of the original hippie expats running business to support the local community, but you’d have to wade through a lot to find that. I don’t know what the rest of Sihanoukville is like though as I only saw Serendipity beach, but I did hear there were still some peaceful pretty spots around the area. One good thing about the place though is they had dorm rooms for $1 a night, and you could eat a good meal for around $1.50. We just stayed at the first place that had a vacancy for $3 a night for a dorm and $8 for a bungalow – Big Easy. Standard Western backpacking place, quite happening and some good Western food, but the staff seemed stoned most of the time and didn’t really seem to have a grip on things. The bungalows were okay but the dorms bathrooms were really grimy and smelly and were kind of poky and hot. They had electricity blackouts both nights we stayed in the accommodation but the bar kept going, you could order food and get wifi 24hrs. The food is kind of pricey in the Western places so find some street food for sure, and boy the beer is cheap. Around $50c for a brew (of unspecified quality), and most places in town offering free shots, buckets, beers... basically the place is one big piss up so avoid the streets at night if this isn’t your thing.

Serendipity Beach Sihanoukville

There was no time wasted in booking a two hour boat ride to Koh Rong for $9.50 for early next morning. This was the place I was aiming for, one of the ‘soonest to be overdeveloped’ islands in SE Asia. We got there just in time before all the crazy development started in earnest it seemed, because there was some frantic construction going on during our stay. But now there is still one tiny ferry and only two daily boats. It’s a pristine, white sanded, turqoise watered island paradise and if you’re looking for chillaxville, this is it. There are around four places offering bungalows, and two restaurants on the beach and a tiny ‘village’ on the beach for the local workers and that’s pretty much it. When we got off the boat we were greeted by the manager of Coco’s who welcomed us and offered some lemonade and an introduction to the island a few steps away at their restaurant which was a nice landing. Pretty good business for them too as they can then show you around their bungalow accommodation before you see any others, which is right next to the small pier. I think that the bungalow managers might have some kind of gentlemen’s agreement to take it in turns to greet a boat arriving as I saw someone else do it for the next one. The bungalows on the island are on the expensive side, around $20 and they can go up to $50 or more, but on the pier as you get off the boat is Koh Rong Dive Centre offering rooms for three people for $5 each which was definitely the cheapest accommodation we could see on the island. It was really basic with an outside shared bathroom, and also it backed onto the only two bars that stayed open until 3am each night and there were no windows, not a lot of sleep going on until after then unless you have heavy duty earplugs. We were so laid back and chilled out after our days lazing around there though that we were tucked in and comatose babies early each night. The dive centre offers two fun dives for around $60 and will take you to 12 meters without certification; Emily did this for the day and had a really good time. They teach you beginner skills and then down to 12 meters you go, but the dive sites are a long way off from being the best in this part of the world.

Koh Rong - it won't be like this for long

Emily on the boat to Koh Rong

The main pier, Koh Rong 

Accommodation at Koh Rong Dive Centre on the pier

We really wanted to stay at Tree House bungalows but they were totally booked up and even though it was low season, awesome little bungalows built on stilts that felt like you were living in a tree house right on a beautiful secluded beach. The sand is pure white and the water so warm and clean you can see right to the bottom even at 4m deep. The sea is calm and flat, so you can float on your back on the warm shocking blue water of the gulf of Thailand for ages and never move position. We attempted to swim to a tiny island with a monastery on it with snorkels, but the visibility was actually really poor that day and we couldn’t see a thing through the clouded water (probably kicked up by some far off storm) so we turned back and swam around the rocks near the shore hoping to get some use out of the snorkels and flippers that we’d hired for $5 each that day.  We ate honestly the most delicious seafood barbecue I’ve ever had from Coco’s every night, and ate so much of it that we got a free plate from the restaurant probably just for raving about it so much! Prawns, red snapper, tuna, with tangy lemony dressing and delicious grilled vegetables and fire baked potatoes with garlic butter, so yum.

Pure white beach

Treehouse Bungalows

Snorkelling

Another great place to get horizontal and fatten up is Paradise Bungalow restaurant. Apparently these guys were the first to set up bungalows on the island and their hillside, rustic, breezy, solid wood decked restaurant is the perfect place to read a book, play with a puppy and drink fruit shakes while you gaze over the blue sea and lose jaw control. There is also a walk you can do to the other side of the island over the hill, to a 7km untouched stretch of beach but it got so sweltering hot by 9am each morning that we couldn’t do anything other than dash into the water and then onto a comfy mat under cover. Also, a very important factor, there are SANDFLIES! Yes, the devil in the form of a 1mm insect, if you are prone to their attacks (like me) when you lie on the beach for three seconds you will be covered in bites, unless you lace yourself in Deet. Three days and two nights was definitely enough for me on Koh Rong... it’s a beautiful quiet island, but the diving and snorkelling isn’t quite there and so really other than walking (but too hot for this in May) there is nothing else to do but relax. This place will be teeming with travellers and bars and all that comes with them in a year or less, I can guarantee it, so close to Sihanoukville and now its properly on the tourist radar. Get there while it still looks like this...

Paradise restaurant

On returning to Sihanoukville on the morning boat we did a little more exploring around town, and then had a bit of a night out as a final farewell to the place. Well, it’s rude not to at $50c a beer! There was such a strange mix of people about, including some Cambodian lady-boys who were in dresses but then looked like they could beat you up in a blink if you messed with their pool table. The beach front was a bit nuts, with loads of Western guys and ladies of the night pounding the same SE Asia 2008 playlist so we didn’t stick around for long, although I met a really nice guy who was half South African half Zimbabwean and we reminisced for a while before we made a swift escape from the place and into the pool of Utopia backpackers for a late night swim because well, it was hot and we could. And that was Sihanoukville for me and my first taste of Cambodia. I was itching to get to Angkor Wat, and so we got the early bus out of there in the morning.