Escape to Kampot

Kampot is a city on the Preaek Tuek Chhu River in Southern Cambodia. It’s known for its pepper plantations and salt fields. When we first came many years ago it was very quiet, almost deserted, so much so we turned around and left. In the last few years it has become a very hip and trendy spot. It now has hundreds of restaurants and hotels and a mix of nationalities. It’s buzzing.

We booked into a guest house called ‘Magic Sponge’ a lovely house just 5 minutes from the centre. It’s owner William, from Alaska, welcomed us with a beer and a very friendly disposition.

We hired a motorbike and our first trip out was to Kep on the coast an hours drive away.

Again as all over Cambodia, major building work is happening and we couldn’t believe how the once sleepy hamlet has blossomed. There were only 4 tiny guesthouses in the square 15 years ago and now there are hundreds and some very upmarket places to stay and eat.

Even the beach has grown…it has fabulous seafood and a small fleet of fishing boats.

Bokor National Park borders Kampot and has a mountain in the middle of it. We left early.

Monkeys sitting on the steel barriers on the road up like sentry’s equally spaced, eyebrows lifting hopeful for a snack. It got cooler the higher we got, it’s 1000 m (like Snowdon) and the Cambodians had jackets , woolly hats, gloves. We relished the coolness and the goosebumps, it’s been very hot in the mid 30’s.

There is an abandoned palace which was built in the 1930’s for King Sihanouk overlooking his lands below. We met a guide who told us he often had 100 women, and just the King at his party’s which were legendary. It was now full of graffiti and rubbish.

Right at the top there is an enormous new Chinese built Hotel and casino and a car park for thousands of cars, one car was there.

A Catholic Church built in the 1920’s, a hill station and a reservoir were used by the French community perhaps to escape the searing heat of a Cambodian summer. Most of the buildings are derelict, it’s a strange place. There is always a big statue.

There is no infrastructure but again we passed maybe a thousand new houses being built. It’s miles from anywhere.

There are 2 markets in Kampot, a day and a night market.

Kampot has a long boulevard alongside the river just like Phnom Penh. If you head towards the sea along the river there is a small clean river beach with a few beach bars.

It has been fun coming back. We’ve met some interesting folk, you always do when there’s cheap beer, cheap accomodation and long hot nights. It’s a mix of older single men, lots of French tourists, backpackers and young couples opening businesses. There are lots of ‘full on’ travellers. One guy on his bike had just cycled from Saigon and last year rode from Paris to Oman, he was 75 from Colorado. Not everyone here is crazy but it does seem to help!

It’s different to Thailand because, as a foreigner, you can actually buy land and property here. Can’t imagine what it will be like in another 15 years.

We’re off next to Phu Quoc a Vietnamese island just off the coast of Cambodia.