October 28th, 2009 by Jeff

Pub Street ~ (Rating: 3/5 )
Two rolls of pubs and restaurants facing each other along Pub Street, reminds me of the shop houses we see in Malaysia and Singapore. The streets are filled with tourists, a nice chilled up place. The pubs ain’t as noisy as what i expected, but when u walked passed it you would be able to hear drum beats to the music.

Police blocked all vehicles from going through the street in the evening. Food served from restaurants along Pub Street is slightly more expensive compared to the local stalls. A course meal for one person cost between USD3 to USD 5 with some restaurants offering one FREE mug of draft beer to go along with your meal! You can get An Angkor draft beer for only USD0.50 during happy hour which starts at 6pm! Most of the restaurants are equipped with free WiFi and big TVs to keep the customer entertained and some even have pool tables as well! Good stuffs!!

Old Market ~ (Rating: 3/5 )
We paid USD2 for the Tuk Tuk from our guesthouse to old market area, the place where we first shopped in Siem Reap. Most of the items sold in Old Market are similar, t-shirt ranging from USD2 to USD5. Prices given initially was always marked high, but most of the time the shopkeeper will give us a discount if the price offered is reasonable. It’s time to test your “Bargaining” power, but no over bargaining cos the shopkeeper will simply ignore you.

Shops at Old market

Quick tips: Do prepare some smaller notes with you! Most of the sellers/drivers normally do not have small change especially for Tuk Tuk ride.

Travel to Cambodia [Part-1 – Summary]

October 27th, 2009 by Jeff

Kampong Phluk floating village ~ (Rating: 3/5 )
With the wind blowing through our hair across the faces, the cool sensation cooled us down from the hot and humid weather. I could smell the fresh air from the mangrove forest as our boat approached nearer to our destination – floating forest. We thoroughly enjoyed the view during our one hour ride. Kampong Phluk floating village is only accessible by boat and it’s located approximately 25km from Chhong Kneas. The villagers are primarily Khmer, only 10% out of the 400 families can afford to buy a motor boat like what we had chartered. Besides that, Sam (our guide) also told us that most of the kids living here suffered from malnutrition due to the bacteria filled water environment and the lack of medical aid resulted by transportation constraints.

Flooded mangrove forest surrounds the area and is home to a wide variety of wildlife including crab-eating macaques. As one might expect, Kampong Phluk’s economy is based on fishing, primary in shrimp harvesting.

Travel to Cambodia [Part-1 – Summary]

October 22nd, 2009 by Jeff

The Villa Siem Reap (guesthouse) ~ (Rating: 3/5 )
It took us approximately 25 minutes of Tuk Tuk ride from the airport to our accommodation – The Villa Siem Reap. The dusty atmosphere got worst as we entered Siem Reap town area. Some of us have to cover our mouth and nose as we were not used to this type of environment.

The Villa Siem Reap is located just about 15 minutes walking distance from the old market. It is a 3 storey high building painted in purple and it is not easily sighted due to the overgrown trees infront of the guesthouse. Nevertheless, we were greeted by their friendly staff once we stepped into the lobby to register ourselves.

The Villa Siem Reap Guesthouse

Our rooms rate:

1 x Standard Double room – USD18 per night (queen sized bed)
1 x Superior Triple room – USD35 per night (queen sized bed + a single bed)

Standard double room & Superior triple room

The room was clean and value for money. But for the Triple room, we found that the air conditioning was not strong enough to keep the whole room cool.

Our airport transfer was provided by The Villa.  You may need to pay USD10 for a van (7-8 pax) to the hotel/guesthouse if your hotel is not providing you with free transfer service. A cheaper way will be taking the Tuk Tuk  (max 4 pax) to your hotel/guesthouse at only USD5 (a good starter to get use to the dusty road of Siem Reap!).

We took Tuk Tuk to Pub Street, which is the town of Siem Reap from our guesthouse at only USD2 per trip for 4 pax.

Our rooms doesn’t include breakfast, but we did maneged to try the breakfast served by The Villa before our ATV ride on our last day trip. It cost us about USD3 for a main dish. Personally, I thought the food served was good!

Breakfast by The Villa

The Villa Siem Reap website: http://www.thevillasiemreap.com/

 

Temple Guide ~ (Rating: 4/5 )

Sam is a Khmer and a firm believer in Buddhism. In his 50 years of life experience, he went through several regimes that took place in Cambodia including the Infamous Pol Pot Regime. Personally, I feel that Sam is a tour guide with great knowledge in the Angkorian history.

In terms of communication, he is well-versed with his english, so communicating with him was really easy and relaxing.

Beside educating us into the Angkorian period, he also introduced us to good Khmer food that are reasonable priced. In other word, he is  a tour guide with ethnic as most tour guides will bring tourist to expensive place to eat so they will be able to earn some commissions from the restaurant.

He is passionate in his job as I remembered seeing a bandage over his knee but yet he never complain about any pain even though we’ve been walking and climbing for the whole day. Overall, I feel great to have a tour guide like Sam. If you guys are interested in Pol Pot regime and what he have went through during the regime, he will be the right person to go to and he is ever willing to share everything.

Temple guide – Sam & our 3 days transport

Five of us shared the total amount of USD40 for a van and USD25 for the guide fees per day to explore the Angkor temples. It will be cheaper if we choose to take Tuk Tuk travelling around Siem Reap (about USD15). But honestly, it is really up to individual which one you prefer. An air-con van giving us more comfort and safer compared to a Tuk Tuk.

Sam’s contact
Blog: http://angkortouring.wordpress.com
Cell phone number: +855 12 763 462
Email: kao_samreth@hotmail.com  

Travel to Cambodia [Part-1 – Summary]

October 21st, 2009 by Jeff

Bayon temple "smile of Cambodia"

We made it back to Singapore, with 5 fruitfull days in Cambodia. Covered most of the temples in Siem Reap as per our planned itinerary, got to know the people, their cultures, rich and powerful history of Cambodia. I’d call it a pretty successful trip.

We missed out on the SGD196 hotdeals from Silk Air and had to pay SGD254 each for the two-way tickets + insurance (excluding the Siem Reap departure tax USD25/pax). Flight from Singapore to Siem Reap is about two and a half hours. I knocked out after the meal and a bottle of wine served by Silk Air. I was woken up by the reflection of the sunlight from the paddy field shone into my eyes.  Through the window of the jet, I realized we had entered into the boundary of Cambodia!

Siem Reap/Angkor International Airport unlike other airports that I had been to, the resort style lookalike felt like unparalleled comforts and amenities. We passed through the check point without much hassle.

Quick tips: Entry VISA can be apply upon arrival. Except for the citizen of Laos, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Vietnam, all visitor need a visa to enter Cambodia. For those who required a VISA, you need to have USD25 in cash and one passport photo to accompany the VISA application.

Siem Reap International Airport

Climbing up and down the stairs, walking and hopping on and off the streets became our daily routine in Cambodia, but no worries… Khmer masseuses are very well known to rub off the tiredness away from us.

Beside the enriching tours to the temples, we went to a village where houses were built on the river – Kampong Phluk. On the last day of our trip, we had the chance to laze in bed a little longer before starting off for our paddy fields ATV ride.

There are a lot of restaurants along the Pub Street area, I personally like the food at Khmer Kitchen Restaurant best, which explained why we have been there twice out of 5 dinners in Siem Reap. After this trip, seeing the people in Cambodia (especially children), I believe, most of us have a new perspective of life…

October 19th, 2009 by Jeff

Kuta is a favorite tourist destination in Bali. Beside surfing, we enjoyed the beautiful sunset there…

Quick link to: Our Bali trip details & itinerary