Christmas in Cambodia
Holiday in Cambodia, beach time in the Gulf of Thailand.
We arrived at our resort in the early afternoon after a short flight from Siem Reap to Sihanoukville. First impressions: Sihanoukville is not so great a town and will most likely end up as garish as the two golden lions that grace the town center's round about. It is more of a jumping off point to get out to the islands, chiefly Koh Rong and Koh Rong Samloen. Sihanoukville itself seemed a dirty beggar asking for your last dollar and I fear that its headed in the wrong direction. There are millions of dollars being poured into Sihanoukville to build what, I heard referred to as the "New Macau". Beyond abandoning the experience of pristine beaches and waters, cool restaurants, guesthouses and eclectic shops for more casinos, the municipality itself does not seem to be able to keep up with the influx of visitors. The end effect is a dirty, poorly planned and dreadfully developed city playing host to Asia's elite and aging sexpat workers posing as masseuses. According to some conversations we had with locals casinos are going up all over the place. It was mentioned that this influx of money seems to be simultaneously providing opportunities for local trades people and leaving them poorer then when it all started because of the inflation taking place, not to mention those that are being left behind all together.
If you are headed to this area I might suggest the islands instead or even going out to Otres II beach area where the development is on a much smaller scale and the pace is still akin to a sand-covered, one-street town where you'll find it much easier to relax.
While I wasn't at all impressed with Sihanoukville the Sokha Beach Resort where we booked our rooms was very nice within its walls as resorts often are. The grounds were well kept, the beach was clean and service was delightful. We spent much of our days either relaxing on the beach or by the pool, the kids loved the pool or on day excursions to the islands and surrounding area. And of course this is where we found ourselves on Christmas Day.
Beach days were fun and if you know me well enough you know I prefer to be in natural bodies of water over a pool. The beaches around this area are white sand and the waters are calm and well suited for families, especially those with youngish children. We had fun splashing, making sand castles and burying daddy in the sand.
On one occasion we hopped onto the ferry and made our way out to Koh Rong, the larger of the two inhabited islands in the area. A word of unsolicited advice, if you plan to do the same catch the morning ferry to be sure you have enough time to explore the island. We slept in and boarded the afternoon ferry which meant we didn't get out to Koh Rong till well into the afternoon. This left us enough time for lunch and a bit of snorkelling of the beach from the place where we found some delicious fish and chips. It would have been nice to be able to walk around town a bit and read a chapter or two on the beach, oh well next time I'm in Cambodia I'll know better.
Now the best part of travelling with babysitters, (ahem *clears throat), I mean your in-laws is that I had the opportunity to leave the kids behind for a day and do a little diving in the gulf of Thailand with Koh Rong Dive Centre. In all honesty this is not the best dive site I have ever visited (caveat: I only have two dozen or so dives in my log book), but any day underwater is a good day and this excursion was no different. I ended up seeing a couple of seahorses, which is always tres cool, the largest cuttlefish I've ever seen, my first puffer and a stingray. Life underwater is always grand!
The highlight though was the simple boat we chartered with Red Shark Charter. Seeing as there were 6 of us, 2 more then our 4 afar on this trip we opted to charter the boat to ourselves and what a treat. Camilla was an exemplary host. She took excellent care of our family at every turn, took us out to stunning snorkelling spots and found us a remote quite beach for lunch. It was a beautiful day. She was such a perfect host she took care of our five year old while we snorkelled. More exactly the waters got shallow at one part of the swim and she held Juliette and kept her from scraping herself on the corals while we enjoyed the swim and the view. We really enjoyed our time with Camilla and would recommend Red Shark Charter to anyone considering it. Do be advised you'll need to bring your own refreshments aboard but Camilla supplies a couple of ice chest with ice to keep the drinks chilled.
We could put it off no longer, finally Christmas was upon us and we had no choice but to sit down as a family and gorge ourselves silly on a buffet large enough to feed half the country.
There were tables of food just about as far as I could see; western food, turkey and mashed potatoes, Indian food, local Khmer dishes and of course seafood and it was all delectable. My taste buds were dancing, but by the end of the evening my tummy would be paying the price of my gastronomical avarice. Maybe I was just eating enough for Jenn and I because sadly this is the evening Jenn decided she would take her turn to come up ill and so she missed the whole affair. The live entertainment was well, asian flair and made for a likely diversion. The one thing missing was dessert. I'm not sure what the issue is but it is super difficult to find an asian dessert that measures up to what the europeans can do with sweets. All in all we had a bunch of fun and in a couple of days we would be flying off to Vietnam to visit both Hanoi and the world renown Ha Long Bay.
See the rest of our photos from Christmas in Cambodia.
If you're into sunsets, this series should be more than enough to satisfy even the greatest of sunset cravings.
As you have become accustomed to and have been reading and waiting so patiently for; the video featuring Our4Afar in Christmas in Cambodia.
The music used in this video is used purely to accompany my vacation video and simply meant to share with family and friends. No copyright infringement is intended. All content belongs and is credited to its respective owners.
