Kampot

After a few days in Phnom Penh, we caught the bus to the small town of Kampot which is a lovely sleepy French colonial town, nestled on the bank of a river. It was here that we spent two lovely days enjoying the local cafes, bars and eateries (all very charming, and all very cheap!), and riding around on a zippy little scooter. $3 of petrol lasted us an entire day (and we were given free cookies when we filled up! Happy days), and we enjoyed tootling around town, visiting bathing spots on the river, and driving through a National Park. 

Me on the moped

The National Park part involved driving 40km up a massive hill through actually some quite nice jungle (the only stretch of which we’ve really seen in our whole time in Cambodia), to what was supposed to be a beautiful viewing site at the top! Cambodia being Cambodia though, apparently some rich people decided it would be a good idea to build a giant casino at the top. Yes, that’s a giant Casino 40km into the middle of a National Park. Apparently no-one ever goes to it though as it’s a) flippin’ expensive and it’s fair to say that Cambodian people are by and large pretty hard up, and b) (did I mention this?!!) It’s 40km into a National Park!!!

Unfortunately we never got to see this monstrosity, or the wonderful views we were promised, as we were about 37km into our drive when the big fat black clouds above us let rip, and a giant lightning bolt flew out of the sky and hit a tree not far in front of us. We’re not stupid and we didn’t fancy a barbequing so we swiftly turned on our heel and fled back down the hillside in the rain.

A fab day though, and a nice little adventure. We'd defnitely recommend Kampot if you're headed that way. 

The beautiful sunset looking across the river from Kampot