Southeast Asia
The temples of Angkor, warm smiles, and a haunting recent history.
Cambodia is home to one of the wonders of the world — the vast temple-city of Angkor, the crowning glory of the mighty Khmer empire — set in a warm, welcoming, deeply Buddhist country of rice paddies, stilted villages and slow rivers. It carries the scars of a terrible recent history, faced with remarkable grace, and rewards travellers with some of the friendliest people in Asia and superb value. Siem Reap, the gateway to Angkor, is its buzzing, easy-going tourist heart.
What things cost: Cambodia is excellent value — meals, rooms, tuk-tuks and massages all cost a fraction of Western prices, and the US dollar is used everywhere alongside the riel (carry small bills). The Angkor pass is the one big fixed cost. When a zone below says 'low', that means genuinely low.
Sometimes the event picks the city for you.
The biggest festival of the Cambodian year, when the country celebrates the New Year with temple offerings, traditional games, music and water-and-powder blessings. Siem Reap hosts the huge Angkor Sankranta festivities at the temples themselves — folk games, dancing and food among the ruins. Joyful and deeply local, though very hot; a special, festive time to be here.
Siem Reap · Angkor & across town
One of the most important religious festivals in Cambodia — a fortnight culminating in days when families gather at pagodas to make offerings of food and rice to honour and feed the spirits of their ancestors. Solemn, moving and deeply Buddhist; the pagodas fill with white-clad worshippers and chanting monks, a fascinating and respectful time to witness Khmer devotion.
Siem Reap · Pagodas across Siem Reap
A three-day festival marking the reversal of the Tonlé Sap's flow, celebrated with colourful long-boat races, illuminated floats, fireworks and feasting along the rivers. Grander in Phnom Penh, but atmospheric in Siem Reap too, with races and celebrations by the water; a vivid, joyful window into Cambodian tradition, and a lively time to visit.
Siem Reap · Riverside, Siem Reap
