Siem Reap, the base to explore Angkor Wat.

We flew from the little brand new Sihanoukville airport to Siem Reap on an MA60 aircraft, a Chinese made turbopropeller, a small airplane which happened to have had many crashes in the past; the flight was flawless though, although I couldn't help feeling like a guinea pig when I found out later on.
Siem Reap is something like a grand city, with wider avenues and many nice grand hotels.It's not a big town though, although there are loads of tourists, in all kinds: backpackers, older wealthier tourists, culture travelers, ... If you've been previously in Phnom Penh or Sihanoukville it feels like a nice place to hang out for a while. And it is. There are enough things to see and do to escape the ubiquitous backpackers.
We were not lucky with the weather since it was cloudy for the first five days, of which one we visited the South East Rolous site: Preah Ko, Bakong and Lolei. Amazing site, even if there were badly ransacked. I felt like when I visited the Pyramids in Cairo. They are the oldest of the Khmer buildings and were built in the 9th century ad.
We tried our luck the day before and went to see Angkor Wat at sunset, although with a grey sky we could not get a fair view. I prepared myself for the big day when the sun is out.
Cambodia is infested with NGO's. They are everywhere and I have never met so many Western guys "working" in the charity sector in a country. Phnom Penh is full of them, and many go to the coast - Kep, the islands - to make the most of their luck. They eat Western food in expensive restaurants and some have SUV's. I guess not all of them make a profit of the charity industry - although I have not found any information to confirm this as yet -.and some do invest money in schools, hospitality business. But they do get their piece. Siem Reap is very international and many basic goods are imported, in fact most of them, and not from China or Thailand, but from far away countries such as Germany, UK or US. There is a price Cambodia has to pay to keep up his tourism industry.
We saw a fantastic show, The Cambodia Circus, where some young kids from disadvantaged families and some abandoned played amazing acrobats to represent the story of a young girl who suffered the Khmer times to become eventually a teacher for traumatised children. And what a show, in an hour and a half I laughed, I cried and couldn't stop clapping my hands. It was possibly the best show I've ever seen, such a display of creativity, emotions and colourfulness that make me feel I was inside a Disney movie..

Koh Rong Samloem, a paradise island off the coast of Cambodia.

On the journey from Phu Quoc back to Cambodia, we had our last deliciously healthy lunch in Ha Tien, a town near the border, and also our last Lotus tea and Vietnamese coffee - I will miss it so much -. Bye bye Vietnam, you will always be in my mind and heart. Then I started noticing culture differences between both countries. Our Cambodian driver was moody and surprisingly unfriendly even though he brought his girlfriend with him in the bus, and after a few signs he asked me to put my bagged durian into my backpack - I then understood people in this region hate its smell, which I don't find that bad -. We arrived at Sihanoukville as a stopover to get to the Cambodian islands. Sihanoukville is very rundown and local people didn't seem particularly happy to deal with foreigners; plus there were party  bars - run and staffed  by expats, not a good sign - all around. And the food was seriously poor. However the beach area was broad enough and there was no building invading it, unlike Vietnam.
Cambodia is extremely different to Vietnam. People are less communicating, not as loving and don't seem to understand customer service; laidback is a kind way to describe it, it shocked me at first, then I startedt reading about its history and specially the atrocities and culture wipe-out caused by the Khmer Rouge and had another perspective, but it hinders its tourism perspectives. It is a very poor country, and an attitude change is vital. On the positive, nature seem to have been preserved much more than in its neighbor, where there's not much space left for nature parks. That different approach to nature I thought positive.
Next day we took the long boat transfer somehow to Koh Rong Samloem. We managed to walk from the pier to our room asking people due to lack of directions. The main beach was amazing, fine powdery white sand on an almost unspoiled beach resort, despite some plastic garbage. But then we walked the path to Lazy Beach, a truly spectacular beach, completely unspoilt despite the very low key resort. Yellow sand and a golden green water color on a perfect setting made it one of the best beaches I have visited, honestly. I also hiked and climbed to access Sunset Beach, another beach with same yellow sand and same golden green waters, although the beauty of Lazy Beach was hard to match. It amazed me how come these islands have so far escaped the construction projects taking place in Sihanoukville. These yellow sand beaches deserved much more publicity. But then again Cambodia is a country of contrasts, the main one to me is the one between the amazingly well preserved nature (yet) and the people strange attitude; this is not rude, but a bit dettached from foreigners, they are not lazy but laidback, they want to improve and serve tourists however they seem at times not bothered. Of course it has to do with the genocide. To me is that they want to deliver Western standards but in such an exotic and unique country that is like betrayal. The abundance of NGO's in the country has imposed these standards, unfortunately, and is seriously damaging local culture. There are way too many white foreigners living here a Western life, and this is seriously affecting the country.

Phu Quoc, is it too late to visit?

And then we took the bus to the border with Vietnam, where for one dollar a fixer arranged our crossing - I did not think we would have needed it but I am happy to create mini jobs -, had the shortest and cheapest medical examination (another dollar) and got us to Ha Tien in Vietnam, where we had lunch and waited to board on the ferry.
Arriving to Phu Quoc is an adventure. There is so much fuss and expectation about the island. The mountains in the interior are indeed lushy green and surprisingly untouched, but the island is no tropical paradise. And it must have been, judging by the yellow sanded, turquoise and serene waters of Long Beach, a 10 miles never ending beach that goes from south all the way to Duong Dong, the main city in the island. But this patch of coast has been heavily built and developed in the South East Asian way (see Boracay). Construction is everywhere in the island, so much so that locals wear a face musk so they don't have to breathe the dust and gravel caused by the ubiquitous construction trucks; and construction works twentyfourseven, day and night, at a breakneck speed. Many hotels have been opened without roads to drive through and, okey, maybe it is just the Vietnamese fast-paced way, however it is such a fragile balance that it is hard to be optimistic. We will have to wait and see what Phu Quoc turns into. Given the whole of unchecked trash which abounds in Vietnam, and specially the sewage pipes popping from everywhere in the beaches I get the impression that Phu Quoc has its days numbered, or at least the paradise beaches that must have been Long Beach and definitely Bai Sao.
Bai Sao is for some the best beach; it has white powdery sands, tall palm trees, crystal clear water - away from the sewage pipes - and no hotels built right into the beach, apart from the restaurant area in the middle which actually makes for a nice spot to hang out on a chair or have lunch. I absolutely loved Bai Sao, although the sunsets and calm waters at Long Beach are hard to beat.
Being part of Vietnam, Phu Quoc is another foodie paradise. Seafood is unbelievable, and many restaurants have fish in aquariums ready to be cooked at the Night Market. Vietnamese food is one of the healthiest in the planet, as well as tasty and delicious, so just visiting Vietnam for its food makes it a good enough reason for coming over. Then add these beaches and the sweetest people and anyone will forgive the destruction of its coast. Or maybe some not. I am torn between both.
Because of the rapid transformation of the island - despite the mountains being green and still undeveloped - the coast has given way to an endless ring of hotels, houses and other developments, and there many people who moved from the mainland, and even from neighbor countries as I checked with my hotel staff. I was surprised when the receptionist told me he worked a shift of only  one day off every two weeks. In fact most of the locals come from the mainland, rushing to take a bit of the tourism rush. I really hope this island, which is still a paradise in a way. manages to find a way to survive in a sustainable way, because the real wealth is its people.

Kep, a quiet part in the coast of Cambodia.

We took the bus to Kep. Phnom Penh city seemed to never end and it took more than an hour to leave the city, but then it was a non-stop string of settlements, and only after two and half hours in the bus we start seeing green landscapes. We arrived to Kep after four hours by bus. Our hotel at the feet of a green mountain was state of the art and modest enough. It was extremely different from the blast of the capital.

We hired a scooter for four days and headed straight to the local beach, which is the best and the only beach in Kep. A beautiful white sand beach in a rather murky water due to water streams around. One of the things that one can see everywhere - like in Vietnam - is the amount of trash everywhere you lay your eyes on, specially plastic. It has got to a point where people just don't see the plastic, and nature now has to share its space with mounting amounts of plastic. So it was shocking seeing recent plastic disposal at the seashore. Eventually one gets used to it and, like locals, starts not seeing it. Sunset was beautiful though, and we would continue coming every day to watch it.

Next day we drove to the Bokor Mountain Park, to see the old French colonial buildings which were used during the Vietnamese war with the Khmers in 1979, completely derelicted. These old French colonial buildings abound around Cambodia and can be seen in various towns. We found no pepper plantations in Bokor, so we drove back to Kampot, looking for that beautiful riverside town where, according to guidebooks, one wants to linger around the colonial houses turned into guesthouses and restaurants. I found Kampot rather unatractive, with a not very desirable backpacker crowd hanging around and lots of locals with street business trying to make a living. Yes, there were old buildings, but the trashy signs catering for backpackers did kill any appeal, and the rest of the city was very neglected and unpretty. So we headed back to Kep for the crab market, and there we had delicious seafood. 

People in this part of the coast are delightfuly sweet, joyful, laidback and polite, and the tourists and expats seem to be well behaved at least behave in a more upmarket way, so we felt like Kep was a great place to spend some time.

Cambodia food doesn't rival that of its neighbors, but then they have amok. Fish amok, crab amok, it is really delicious, and can have different flavors, as sometimes it's cooked on coconut, or pineapple.

So we decided to stay in Kep for the rest of our stay and enjoy the tranquil atmosphere of this gem of a town, and also to enjoy our great bungalow after a non-stop itinerary.
We went on a day trip to "rabbit island", a very quiet island with no amazing beaches but a very relaxed atmosphere that somehow made you want to linger. And on our last day in Kep we visited a pepper plantation, where I realized pepper is actually a vine not a tree, and had our last sunset at Kep beach.

Phnom Penh, a questionable city of contrasts.

We arrived at Cambodia, or we arrived at Phnom Penh. What a evoking name, and the city lives up to it. Coming on the boat through the Mekong from Vietnam, one can see the changes from the populous country. Once in Cambodia there are not many houses by the river, although and unlike in the neighbor there are stunning golden pagodas every now and then. There is much more vegetation and much less people. Phnom Penh changes that. Its riverside has been face washed with nice buildings and stunning pagodas, one gets an idea that it is a relatively wealthier city. However, once passed the riverfront I got to the inner streets full of markets, people, garbage, tuk-tuks and the like, And many pagodas, some of them very well kept and clean, but naked children and not much order on the streets. I felt it closer to India than China - Vietnam feels inevitably like China -. And then we walked down some vice streets, where ugly and undesirable old Westerners - white and black - look desperately for young and sadly beautiful poor Cambodian girls: not a nice sight.
A Cambodian man at a travel shop, when I told him how much richer I felt it seemed than Vietnam, according to the riverfront, assured me that Cambodia was actually very poor, and it literally imported everything. I could witness that when we went to a local upmarket restaurant for lunch and we were served... Italian sparkling water - Pellegrino -. I can't help getting angry when I see how unfairly multinationals are ruining local industries, and cannot understand why the local government doesn't tax their products, as Western economies do with developing nations' goods.
Phnom Penh is suffering a massive construction boom, fueled by apparently no-strings attached Chinese investment. Even some buildings have its signs in Chinese only. Some of these modern buildings are actually nice, others are just plain functional ugly Western style. The issue is that no infrastructure has gone with it, so the streets are decaying, unsafe, there is no sidewalk in some parts to walk. There is a state of the art brand new Chinese casino, neon-screens, but loads of poor people making a living selling overripe fruit or useless things. The imbalance in this other time stunning city - there are some old colonial French buildings which unfortunately are not being repaired and most of the times end up demolish for brash new sky scrappers - is hard to digest, and leaves you questioning if the future is bleak or somewhat hopeful for Cambodia's capital. Lots of people are moving in from the countryside, most of them are illiterate and have many children, which they cannot feed. I saw some monks looking after abandoned children. It seems government corruption is ubiquitous. I hope I am wrong.
We visited the impressive Royal Palace and the incredibly interesting National Museum, with an impressive exhibition of Khmer statues that I dare say rivals the Louvre, Vatican and British museums. I ate grilled crickets and silk worms, crunchy and not bad and also tried the fish amok, the delicious surprise of Cambodian food.
As I was to check later, Cambodian people are really sweet and loving, and naive - once again the sad reference to sex tourism from undesirable Westerners -, laid back though not entrepreneurial and hard working as Vietnamese.

An activities-packed Mekong Delta tour.

On we went on a two night/three day Mekong Delta tour, which was an action-packed tour, non-stop activities and just enough time to sleep. As travel agencies and pretty much everything in Vietnam, the guide was extremely professional, knowledgeable and funny. Such an efficient and well organised country, I really wish them to overcome all obstacles to achieve a better quality of life.
Tours in Vietnam work on a hop-on/hop-off basis, so they are constantly connected with other tourists and even tour guides. We kept the same guide for the three days.
On the first day we had lovely meals, went on small boat around a small Mekong affluent, saw a few other sights and at night arrived at massive Can Tho, a huge city of a million and a half people. The heat was close to overwhelming, I couldn't have thought it would get this hot at the Delta, with water all around. I got to bed exhausted.
On the second one we visit the floating market, where we purchased fruits and coffee from river boats and visited a small village on bicycle, where I tasted for the very first time barbecued field rat and snake. The rat tasted juicy, but the snake tasted like bad fish. I just tasted a piece, and I wouldn't have minded tasting more of the rat. We ended the day at the Tra Su Sanctuary, where we went again on a canoe to see storks and herons on a lake covered in a carpet of greenery, just before sunset. We arrived at Chau Doc and had frogs' legs as dinner: this time I did had at least four of them, and they tasted like chicken, tasty. Tony, our guide, came with us for dinner and eventually confessed to us the issues with corruption in Vietnam. It was sad to hear, as Vietnamese people are so lovely but hard working people who don't get deterred by anything.
On the last day, after another rushed sleep, we visited early a fish sauce production farm, then went on to the boat for our five hours fast-speed boat trip to Phnom Penh. It was a great trip, we talked to the young members of our tour and I recovered my beliefs that the world could become a better place, despite the news.

Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City)

Ho Chi Minh City, which is how Saigon was renamed after the reunification of Vietnam -yes, I prefer the old name-, is the big city, the metropolis of Vietnam. Not that Vietnam does not have big cities, as I would realize later, but HCMC is massive, fast-paced, and sprawled around.
Unlike Hanoi, Saigon feels like a modern city, not because it's been recently built (although there are a lot of new construction), but because the center was city planned so there are big avenues, boulevards and parks. Here we have to thank again the French for their heritage. It is definitely one of the big Asian capitals, fast, brash, with lots of high-rise and skyscrapers on the move,
We spent two days walking around the city, its majestic buildings, and eating great pho at the markets. I must say the food here is the closest to the one I had at the Vietnamese restaurants in Seattle. On the second day we visited the Botanical Gardens where there was one of the strangest zoos I've ever visited: next to the animals' sites there were fairground attractions with music blasting, however the animals seemed quite healthy and alive. I am against keeping animals in zoos for display though, even if they look healthy (I've visited unfortunately other city zoos, like the ones in Asuncion (Paraguay) and Georgetown (Guyana) and it was sad seeing the animals die). After lunch I went to the HCM Museum, which unfortunately was not the HCMC Museum, the one I was after. After a long day walking by the river we eventually had dinner at a fancy restaurant. What a better thing to do in Vietnam than eating!