June 13, Wednesday = Cambodia

June 13,  Wednesday

Mekong Express bus from Saigon to the Cambodian Border, and onward to Phnom Penh.  Our bus driver was very good.  At one point he spotted 2 huge tourist buses ahead of us and managed to pass them before we got to the border, so that we would not be behind approximately 80 people in line for the immigration offices.

Scenery on the drive from Saigon to the Cambodian border.  Fields, cattle and forests.

 Some houses are palacial

Some houses are not !   Most of the houses in the country side are built on stilts.  Helps with air circulation, keeping critters out, and in case of flooding.

After crossing the border we reach Neak Loeung where we must take a ferry to cross the Mekong one last time.

 Monument in the Neak Loeung plaza

Motor cycles are used to carry the entire family.

  It's a busy place since there is a market area for those waiting for ferries.  
Fresh chicken and bugs anyone?

 We walk down to the ferry and catch up with our bus which is already on board.

 Crossing the mighty Mekong one last time.

 We meet a ferry, just like ours, returning to the side we just left.

We land on the Kampong Phnum side. and are now only 61 km south east of Phnom Penh.

Cambodia,  or Kampuchea, officially known as the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. With a total landmass of 181,035 square kilometres (69,898 sq mi), it is bordered by Thailand to the northwest, Laos to the northeast, Vietnam to the east, and the Gulf of Thailand to the southwest.  The language spoken here is Khmer.  

The kingdoms that ruled the Khmer Empire for over 600 years date back to 802 AD.  Cambodia was a protectorate of France from 1863 to 1953, administered as part of the colony of French Indochina, though occupied by the Japanese empire from 1941 to 1945. Between 1969 and 1973, Republic of Vietnam forces and U.S. forces bombed and briefly invaded Cambodia in an effort to disrupt the Viet Cong and Khmer Rouge. 
The Khmer Rouge reached Phnom Penh and took power in 1975. The regime, led by Pol Pot, changed the official name of the country to Democratic Kampuchea. The regime modelled itself on Maoist China during the Great Leap Forward. The regime immediately evacuated the cities and sent the entire population on forced marches to rural work projects. They attempted to rebuild the country's agriculture on the model of the 11th century, discarded Western medicine, and destroyed temples, libraries, and anything considered Western. At least a million Cambodians, out of a total population of 8 million, died from executions, overwork, starvation and disease.   Estimates as to how many people were killed by the Khmer Rouge regime range from approximately one to three million; the most commonly cited figure is two million (about one-third of the population). This era gave rise to the term Killing Fields, and the prison Tuol Sleng became notorious for its history of mass killing. Hundreds of thousands fled across the border into neighbouring Thailand.

From 1978 to 1989, the Vietnamese occupied Cambodia.   Throughout the 1980s the Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea (CGDK), supplied by China, Thailand, the United States and the United Kingdom controlled parts of the country and attacked some of the territory not under their dominance.  In October 1991 a comprehensive peace settlement was  finally reached.

Houses along the way are again of all types and sizes.

  The poor ones,

 the rich ones have modern new ones in huge projects, just like in Canada.

 When we reach Phnom Penh, we have apartment buildings.  These have a very interesting balconies with little houses on them.

Modern gas stations
We are staying at the Cardamom Hotel in Phnom Penh and I’m sharing with Lindsey. (Funny, I always thought it was cardamon, like cinnamon!)

 Photo from a brochure in the room

 Our room, very nice, spacious and clean

The view from our room

Phnom Penh is a beautiful city.  It was designed by the French and has huge gardens throughout the city with wide boulevards and tall trees. 

It is the capital and largest city of Cambodia. Located on the banks of the Mekong River, Phnom Penh has been the national capital since the French colonized Cambodia.  Once known as the “Pearl of Asia”, it was considered one of the loveliest French-built cities in Indochina in the 1920s. Situated on the banks of the Tonlé Sap, Mekong and Bassac rivers, the Phnom Penh metropolitan area is home to more than 2 million of Cambodia’s population of over 14 million. The city is the wealthiest and most populous city in Cambodia and is home to the country’s political hub
By the 1920s, Phnom Penh was known as the Pearl of Asia, and over the next four decades Phnom Penh continued to experience rapid growth. During the Vietnam War, Cambodia was used as a base by the North Vietnamese Army and the Viet Cong, and thousands of refugees from across the country flooded the city to escape the fighting between their own government troops, the NVA/NLF, the South Vietnamese and its allies, and the Khmer Rouge. By 1975, the population was 3 million, the bulk of whom were refugees from the fighting. The city fell to the Khmer Rouge on April 17, 1975.
The Khmer Rouge were driven out of Phnom Penh by the Vietnamese in 1979 and people began to return to the city. Vietnam is historically a state with which Cambodia has had many conflicts, therefore this "liberation" was and is viewed with mixed emotions by the Cambodians. A period of reconstruction began, spurred by the continuing stability of government, attracting new foreign investment and aid by countries including France, Australia, and Japan. Loans were made from the Asian Development Bank and the World Bank to reinstate a clean water supply, roads and other infrastructure.

This has to be my favourite city during this entire Indo-China Loop.It is already a big tourist destination with lots of restaurants, cafés, bars and hotels.We get about a one hour tour of the main city sites.


As soon as we settle in we take off again in 2 tuk-tuks (4 passenger ones called “remorque moto”).

We pass the Central Market

We continue only a short distance and read Wat Phnom (Temple Hill, "Temple of the Mountains" or "Mountain Pagoda") is a Buddhist temple (wat) built in 1373.  It stands 27 metres above the ground. It is the tallest religious structure in the city and most important temple in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh. The temple, first constructed in 1373, was erected on a manmade, 88-foot-tall mound overlooking the city.

 A beautiful Naga built of woven bamboo wicker

Wat Phnom Temple

There are wide boulevards and monuments everywhere as well as French colonial mansions. 

 We rode past the National Museum and then past the Royal Palace.

 The plaza and boulevard in front of the Royal Palace Complex

  The Chan Chhaya, or Moonlight Pavilion   

 The official gates into the Royal Palace Complex.  Visitors don't use this one !

and we could see this beautiful spire with the 4 faced head of Brahma

 And then along the Mekong River waterfront, recently been“re-done” with Japanese funding (probably in exchange for some prime property for Hotels… but I’m just guessing.

We continue our ride to view the Independence Monument (which is still under construction) but it will be quite nice from what we could see under the construction protector.

 Beautiful monuments scattered all over the city

and photos of the Royal Family absolutely everywhere.

From there, we headed back to the waterfront where the FCC (Foreign Correspondence Club) was located and go in to a bar across the street to have some cocktails before dinner.

 The FCC, across the way from the roof top bar and restaurant we were in along Sisowath Quay

 This has been a familiar sight all through our Indochina Loop:  a mess of electrical cables on every street corner.

 As soon as the lights came out, so did the geckos.

Our group at the restaurant table with our pre-dinner drinks.

Many, many cocktails later (and there was much laughter and stories being told) we decide that we should probably stay put and have dinner at the bar/restaurant rather than try to walk anywhere else.  The food was delicious !  The company was great ! The evening was a success.  As usual, Violet and I were the first to call it a night, leaving the “young folk” to continue celebrating.  We hired a remorque-moto for the ride back, not wanting to risk walking in the dark.