Southeast Asia Travel News

The rarely visited Angkorian temple site of Prasat Kuk Roka forms a regular break on our overland trip from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap. It’s a small, albeit intact, sandstone tower – probably dating to the 11th century – and a minnow compares to what awaits at Angkor. However, it does illustrate a lot of features which will be seen…

What follows is a brief account and selection of photos of our Cambodia boat trip from Siem Reap to Battambang.   I think we first ran this Cambodia boat trip way back in 2000. It was a very different country in those days and the journey across the Tonle Sap and up the Sangkar River to Battambang was an adventurous…

A few images of some of the hard-working women in Phsa Prahok, Battambang’s fish market, taken over the course of several recent visits, To point out that topping and tailing fish all day long, every day, is extremely laborious, dirty and tiring would be rather stating the obvious and certainly a very tough way of earning a living. We can…

Costing the Apopo organisation around 6,000 Euros each, including training and importation, these are certainly the world’s most expensive rodents yet when you see the giant African rats – or Gambian pouched rats to be precise, Cricetomys gambianus – in action, you’ll understand why. Easier to maintain and handle than trained dogs (and much lighter so less likely to set…

A few photos from our recent Cambodia Overland tour: good trip, great bunch of travellers and we think, (hope), much fun had by all! First up a colourful collection of hats on the fried spider and grub vendors in Kompong Cham Province’s Skuon Town – on route for Siem Reap. The rainy season weather held out well for us too…

A new addition to our Cambodia itinerary, this half-day tour to discover some of the local ‘cottage industries’ in one of the villages outside of Battambang has proved very popular.  Also very practical since it can just as easily be done by bicycle or by tuk-tuk for the less energetic and the 3 or 4 hour round tour then leaves…

Traditionally teh kingdom’s 2nd largest city, the western town of Battambang Cambodia has surely been overtaken by now by booming Siem Reap and although still relatively prosperous from the Province’s fine farming land, (indeed it’s sometimes known as ‘Cambodia’s rice bowl’), it has been largely bypassed by the country’s tourism boom. Well until recently that is but these days Battambang’s…

The famous floating villages and fishing communities around Cambodia’s Tonle Sap Lake are well known with the more easily accessible ones such as Chong Kneas and Kompong Phleuk now firmly on tourist itineraries. Far less known are these river nomads of western Cambodia – people who spend the whole year travelling up and down the rivers leading into the huge…

An isolated and very rarely visited ruined Angkor period temple site, Prasart Kok Roka in Cambodia’s Kompong Thom Province is famous, well locally at least, for being the area’s very own leaning tower. According to some locals, the depression in the ground in front of the temple is rumoured to be a bomb crater which supposedly tilted the tower to…

A few photos of Phnom Penh street-life taken within the space of just a 10 minutes, 500 m or so stroll from 178 St to Psa Kandal, (Kandal Market). Starting at Wat Sarawan on the corner of 19th and 178 streets we came across this nicely restored French period colonial villa – now tapas bar of all things! Some vital…

Once again perfect weather for this ‘rainy season’ tour of Cambodia – clear blue, dust-free skies providing some great landscape views, enough fluffy white clouds about for pretty photos and the occasional evening shower to cool things down. As with our recent Burma tour, the relative lack of crowds was also a big plus – particularly at popular sites such…

Our boat journey through Cambodia from Siem Reap, across the Tonle Sap Lake and down the Sangkar River to Western Cambodia’s Battambang Town, was a particularly tricky one this month due to the combination of low water levels on the lake and a slow current on the river itself which had lead to a serious build-up of the pestilent water…

We’d have thought it was fairly obvious that dawn – whether sunrise at Angkor Wat, The Taj Mahal or anywhere else you can think of vary enormously. Some – spectacular explosions of vibrant colours whilst others – just plain, grey, overcast and however fantastic the setting is for the dawn is it has no influence at all over how dramatic…

Cambodia – much more than Angkor Wat! Sure, Angkor Wat, Bayon and the temples of Siem Reap are the highlights for most visitors to Cambodia but there’s plenty of other fascinating sights architecture-wise to be seen in the kingdom. The country’s rich architectural heritage indeed covers everything from the recent and French period to Funanese and pre-Angkor sites. Here are…

Siem Reap’s Psa Chas, or Old Market, with its souvenir stalls, packaged herbs and spices and tourist-friendly cafes is well known amongst visitors to Cambodia yet the similarly named Psa Chas Phnom Penh is rarely included on anyone’s city itineraries even though it’s centrally and conveniently located on 13th Street close to both the riverfront and Wat Phnom. There are…

Phnom Penh totally wired – one of the Cambodian capital’s more unusual holiday photo subjects. Views such as the below never cease to amaze visitors to Phnom Penh, Cambodia and indeed not surprisingly end up as the subject matter of a fair amount of holiday photos. What for Western visitors is, to say the least, pretty odd cabling and wiring…

Prasart Ta Prom, at UNESCO World Heritage-listed Angkor. Cambodia’s famous, so-called, ‘Tomb Raider Temple’ with its giant trees and sprawling roots is certainly one of the vast Angkor complex’s most famous and photogenic sites and so consequently, it does see a lot of visitors and in the high season particularly can get rather busy. A regular, classic itinerary would have…

Kompong Chhnang, Cambodia, a provincial capital lying on the bank of the Tonle Sap River some 2 hours north of Phnom Penh and without a doubt one of Cambodia’s most interesting and photogenic regional towns. (Yes we’ve already posted a couple of articles about Kompong Chnang but we reckon it’s so good a few more photos won’t hurt!) For much…

Can’t go wrong really with giant roots and towering trees, mysterious carvings and jungle-clad ruins so here’s another selection of photos of Preah Khan and Ta Prom temples in Cambodia’s World Heritage Angkor temple complex, taken on our recent Cambodia Overland small group tour. Preah Khan, as with the more high profile Ta Prom, is a late 12th-century Buddhist temple…

Prior to the construction of Angkor Wat Baphuon  – the 11th-century royal temple of King Udayadityavarman II (trying saying that after a couple of Angkor beers) – was the largest temple of the Angkor empire. With a main tower surmounting the massive sandstone pyramid  – said to have originally been clad in bronze – and it’s spectacular, raised, entrance causeway…