Cambodia: Oldest part of Phnom Penh

Below is a photo from one of the oldest villages within Phnom Penh.

Cambodia: Tone Sap Lake

At the end of the Tonle Sap River, which flows through the Floating Village, is the Tonle Sap Lake.  Most of the boat trips time it so that they arrive to the lake just before sunset to watch the sunset, which is where the below photos are both from.

Cambodia: People along Tonle Sap

Below are two kids floating in the Tonle Sap River.  The top photo is of a young girl on her own paddling through the water.  The bottom photo is of a teen boy who is working to collect the grass and weeds from the side of the river.  Everyone seems to need to know how to travel along the river in this village, since their life is water-based.

Cambodia: Along the Tonle Sap River

Along the Tonle Sap River stands a village on stilts.  Below are some photos from the dry season, where you can see the stilts that the village is built on.  In the wet season, water rises up to the top of stilts to make the stilts invisible and the homes appear to be floating on water.  The village is called the "Floating Village".

Cambodia: Monkey at the Royal Palace stole my juice!

While waiting in the queue to go into the Royal Palace, I spotted a group of monkeys hiding underneath a bench.  I instantly put down my wonderful Lychee and Mint juice from Nom to grab my camera to take a photo of the quiet monkeys, since this was the first time I had seen monkeys on the trip.  To my surprise, one of the monkeys instantly jumped and grabbed my juice and leapt to a spot where he knew I wouldn't grab it back!  So, below is the photo of the monkey with my juice.

Cambodia: Water Buffalo in Siem Reap

Below are two Water Buffalo that I spotted in the rural area around Siem Reap.  Surprisingly, the animals let me walk right up to them without even flinching or trying to intimidate me.  They are commonly used to help rice farmers throughout Cambodia.

Cambodia: Outside Angkor Thom

Below is a photo from outside Angkor Thom, where a Tuk-Tuk driver is waiting in the shade of his passenger seat for his passengers to return from their visits to the temple.  I love the colors of this photo - the deep brown of the sand next to the green of the grass and the blue sky.  Cambodia had very vibrant colors!

Cambodia: Bayon Temple

Below are three photos from another exquisite temple in Angkor Thom, called Bayon.  In addition to being an outstanding temple, the most distinguishing feature is the carved faces along the top of the temple, which you can see in the photos below.  The bottom photo depicts a group of monks walking through the temple.

Cambodia: Monkeys in Angkor Wat

Throughout the Angkor Wat area, there are packs of monkeys that sit on the side of the road, hoping to get food from tourists who stop and look at them.  This tourist asked her Tuk-Tuk driver to stop so she could snap a few photos.  Unfortunately, these monkeys were quite aggressive and came running at us in the Tuk-Tuk so we had to speed away quite quickly for fear that they would run up us!  Fiesty monkeys!

Cambodia: Phnom Penh's Russian Market

The Russian market is one of Phnom Penh's main markets.  I heard the Russian market sold some of Cambodia's garment factories Western products, which is what drew me to make the trip, despite being warned of how hot and steamy the market can get.  Although I didn't find any Western clothes that were locally produced, I did find a very unique market selling all sorts of interesting items.  And, the warning about the heat was correct.  It was incredibly warm!

Below are photos of some photos of the vendors at the Russian market.

Cambodia: Koh Pich's Lucky Rabbit

Koh Pich, also known as "Diamond Island" is a reclaimed small island adjacent to downtown Phnom Penh and facing Nagaworld Casino.  Developers are building out this island with modern apartment complexes and high end luxury.  On the island though, next to City Hall, is the below statue of "Lucky Rabbit", which I find to be one of the oddest statues that I have seen while traveling.  Below you can see the large rabbit and money bag statue that sits outside the luxury island's city hall.

More information on Diamond Island can be found here.

Cambodia: Horse outside Angkor Wat

A quiet horse was enjoying the shade while tied to a large tree, outside the Angkor Wat temple.

Cambodia: Angkor Wat

Angkor Wat was at first Hindi and then later Buddhist and is the largest religious monument in the world.  In the Angkor Wat area, there are hundreds of temples, but below are photos from The Angkor Wat Temple, which shares its name with the area.

Angkor Wat is often visited during sunrise, but this tourist did not like the idea of a 4AM start on her holidays.  So instead, I visited during the middle of the day, which although very hot, also has very few tourists because not many people want to explore during the mid-day-heat.

Cambodia: Gates in Angkor

Below are three photos from some of the impressive gates that surround the temples in Angkor.  In the second photo, a Tuk Tuk driver has just come through the gate.

Cambodia: Swampy lands in Angkor

Below is a photo of a wooden bridge that runs across the swampy lands in Angkor.

Cambodia: Temples in Angkor

Angkor Archaeological Park, which most famously holds Angkor Wat, includes hundreds of temples from the 9th to 15th century Khmer Empire.  Below are photos of some of the more obscure and less famous temples in Angkor, which are still all incredibly impressive.  

In the below photo, you can see a green slim snake slivering through the face of the ruins:

Cambodia: Kids selling postcards

The two boys below were chasing our group asking us to buy their postcards for $1.  Their postcards were definitely not worth $1, but a photo of the two cute kids definitely was.  Unfortunately, once other kids in the distance saw the dollar, they came running and literally followed us asking for a dollar for thirty minutes.  Be warned about giving kids money in Cambodia!

Cambodia: Monks in Phnom Penh

Monks in their orange clothes, are one of the most respected members of the Cambodian community.  You can see them regularly walking around Phnom Penh.

Cambodia: Within the Royal Palace

The Royal Palace is one of the main tourist attractions to see in Phnom Penh.  Inside its gates are immaculate grounds and beautiful yellow palaces and the silver pagoda.  The Palace is only open limited hours so the royal family can use it undisturbed without tourists wandering throughout.  From the calm of being inside, you would never know of the chaos that goes on outside the walls.

Cambodia: Phnom Penh's rivers

The Riverfront area in Phnom Penh is the center of restaurants and nightlife in the city.  Phnom Penh is known to be a city of rivers, as below is just above the point where the Tonle Sap River merges with the Mekong River.