We couldn’t help but be excited for the next chapter of our trip, Cambodia! I was ready to say goodbye to Vietnam and Hello to Cambodia. Our plan was to stay for one month traveling from the South to the North and to have as many true Cambodian experiences as possible.
We crossed the border from Vietnam and decided to check out Kampot. We didn’t know what to expect of Kampot expect from a few good reviews from some travelers we met along the way. By the time we checked the guest houses in the area, most of them were already booked but we were able to find a reasonable place and ready for some dinner. We ended up meeting another couple on our travels, David and Berit. I got a message from them to meet at a place on the river called Rikitikitavi. It is a beautiful restaurant above a cool boutique hotel. We sat looking out from the river and enjoyed great drinks and fish Amok, I it will turn out to be the best Amok we had the entire month in Cambodia. Amok is a traditional Cambodian dish with a lemongrass curry sauce and is cooked inside a banana leaf. Not all Amok is created equal but this was by far my favorite. After dinner it was time for us to head to sleep so we could plan for our morning adventures.
Kampot is known for having many pepper farms. The three types are black pepper, red pepper and white pepper. Honestly as a “city slicker,” I don’t know very much about pepper but I can tell you Kampot pepper is really tasty. We had stayed on a pepper farm for a few days in Phu Quoc, Vietnam so I am familiar with what a pepper tree looks like. We rented a bike and headed to check out the market where we purchased pepper to bring back home with us. Garrett and I have become local market aficionados. We can walk into a market and tell you within 30 seconds to a minute whether the market will be great or about as entertaining as brushing your teeth.
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| Rowan and Lu |
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| Bokor Palace Hotel |
This mountain community was developed by the French in the early 1920’s and was first abandoned in the late 1940’s during the Indochina War and then abandoned for good in the 1970’s when the Khmer Rouge took control. We were racing our scooter up the mountain when we noticed an other couple on individual automatic scooters racing up on us. The four of us glide or scooters on the curvy road heading to the top of the mountain when we see what appears to be a gigantic female buddha statue.
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| Female Buddha |
We hopped (not literally) back on our scooters and away we went up to the old casino. On the way up there were signs everywhere the kept saying, “It not permitted to eat here.”
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| old church |
On our way back down the hill we decided to stop and check out the new casino. This new casino was huge. We made a quick stop into the table room and play a quick game of roulette. I won some money and left the table as soon as I hit on 28, the day of my birthday and a number I ALWAYS play. We left the casino headed back to Kampot and got cleaned up for dinner.
About 30 kilometers from Kampot is a town called Kep. Kep is on the ocean is is fairly well known for it’s crabs. We headed to Kep in the late morning and the first thing we hit was the beach. Garrett decided to go for a quick swim and I sat on the beach. I think it’s no surprise to most of you who know Garrett that it was only a matter of minutes until I was being dragged through the sand into the water by my ankles and all I could do was laugh. We got back on the bike and headed down the road when we came across a beautiful, old gated home. We learned that home belonged to the queen and she used it as her beach home.
We were not allowed into it as they converted it to a private flower/plant nursery. Garrett and I couldn’t help but notice the incredible size of these cows tied up all over a family’s property so Garrett pulled the bike over and we went to meet the owner. Force of habit caused Garrett to take the bag of bananas off the bike with us and as we talked to the owner of the bulls in broken english, one of the bulls was nudging Garrett. These bulls were the largest and cleanest I have ever seen and I actually thought they were horses when we first drove by. The owner told us that they want our bananas and gave us permission to feed the bulls our bananas. We fed them and got the ok to pet them. They were the sweetest bulls ever!! They were nudging us to pat them in the correct spot and licking the back of our calves. I’m not sure how familiar you are with a bull’s tongue but it is huge and feels like high grit sand paper.
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| quees's beach house |
Ok so I know I’ve explained this before but I think it’s important to revisit the pun factor. Garrett loves puns! From the very start of this trip he has been using puns every chance he gets. This is why when we happened upon a restaurant called Kep a Cabana. Kep a Cabana?! Is this a mirage? We have to stop! It was a small restaurant and we only had a snack as we had crab on the brain and already had a plan for lunch. We met a really cool guy working there from Singapore and he had a very intricate sleeve tattoo. He told us it was made using bamboo and he got it in Japan and it took 3 months to complete. It was quite an impressive piece of art work. He also told us the owner of Kep a Cabana owned a really cool guest house called Kep Man Doo. Another pun and another place we would be sure not to skip. We went to Kep Man Doo and checked it out. It looked like an enormous tree house and was pretty interesting.
Now is probably the highlight of the day. Garrett and I went to the market and made our way to the dock where the women were selling crabs. The woman we negotiated with grabbed the rope to the crab trap and pulled it up from the ocean to give us the freshest selection of crabs she could find. We bought a kilo of crabs and literally turned around to where women were lined up against a wall of giant pots on top of wood stoves and for an extra $1 would steam your seafood on site. We gathered our kilo of crabs grabbed a can of beer each and headed to the dock where we sat on the edge with our feet dangling over the water and devoured our crabs in the warm sun. It was one of my favorite moments of this trip and I will never forget this day.
On the way back to Kampot from Kep, Garrett and I see a tuk tuk screaming down the road. This tuk tuk driver had a mohawk and was wearing turquoise Ray Bans. In the back of the tuk tuk was a girl drinking rum and cokes. Garrett dared me to high five the girl in the tuk tuk as we passed by and of course I did. They then invited us to a party on a locals beach. We followed them to the beach to catch some of the sunset. We introduced ourselves to the Cambodian guy who drives the tuk tuk and he told us his name is, Mr. Dara International Tiku Tivu and the woman in the back is his girl friend Ellie from the UK. We decided to go back and clean up and then meet them later with our friends for a little fire on the beach.
That evening we met back on the beach and it was a full moon. We invited Lu and Rowan and had a nice fire on the beach. Garrett met some local fisherman who were spear fishing shrimp with flash lights. They taught him how to spear them and they were having a blast spearing them and eating them raw.
The next day we had breakfast at our favorite local soup place and checked out more of what Kampot had to offer. I know it seams like I talk a lot about food but that is because I have had some of the best dishes of my life on this trip, which now leads me to hand made Chinese noodles. We heard there was a movie house in town that also served hand stretched Chinese noodles. 2 orders of pork dumplings and noodle soup certainly did the trick. We didn’t have time to see a movie but maybe next time.
We said goodbye to Kampot and decided to head to the crazy, bustling city of Sinhoukville. Sinhoukvillle is something out of a movie. It’s dusty and over populated with tourists and bars. We rented a scooter and headed to Otres beach 1 to see if we could meet up with a friend we met in Laos. We found a place to stay called Mushroom Beach and this place was hysterical. Our bungalow was actually shaped like a mushroom. They all were and every light, lamp, or decoration in this place was shaped like a mushroom. It was a bit ridiculous but also funny and charming. The next day we went to Otres beach 2 because we were told we could grab a boat to an island off the coast called Koh Ta Kiev. A fun guy from the Netherlands we met on the slow boat down the Mekong named George (pronounced Shorge) recommended that we go to Coral Beach on Koh Ta Kiev and stay at the resort for a few days. The boat to Coral Beach came in and Tomas jumped off the boat loaded us up and off we went. Coral Beach Resort is one of my very favorite places on this trip. There is not a whole lot to do. There are trails that run through the island and bring you to secluded beaches where you can swim and see miles of sea urchins and sand dollars. Naked beach, not named because of the people who visit but probably due to the emptiness of the beach, was my favorite to visit. The sand is white and the ocean is clear and there are maybe 5 people on the beach at a time including yourself. Naked beach is a serine place on a little slice of paradise.
Coral Beach Resort is a special place. The owners are a French couple named Pricilla and Mica. They are cool and laid back and Mica is an amazing chef. Breakfast, lunch and dinner were at set times and if you wanted to eat in the communal dining space you would wait impatiently for Pricilla to write the options on the board each meal so you could order before your favorite choice ran out. Garrett and I met great staff members who work there and joke about how they seem to all look like pirates. We were only supposed to spend 2-3 days there and we ended up staying almost a week. We also had such a great time meeting new friends and making connections with the other like minded travelers at the resort. Despite the fact that there was very little electricity, no wifi, a shared bathroom with a bucket to dump over your head as a shower and a critter hear and there, Garrett joked that he didn’t think I would get on the boat when it was time to leave. The end of our week there, I was on the boat with Garrett because there was still more Cambodia to experience. Thank you to the staff of Coral Beach Resort for helping make Koh Ta Kiev one of the highlights of my trip. I had many more photos before my phone was stolen but here are some great photos of coral beach taken by Garrett.
