Sihanoukville, Cambodia

It was the nice weather this past week in Chicago that, by default, got me thinking of the beach. Last year at around this time I had just left Cambodia’s amazing Siem Reap region replete with World Heritage eye candy- the Angkor Complex of temples. After hanging out a few days in Phnom Phen where I landed, I took a bus north (about 6 hours, bus tickets bought at the hotel), where from which the boy and I had to figure out  going back down South to the beach. I have the full horror story on this situation that you can read fully here on Trip Advisor. So getting from Siem Reap to Sihanoukville, my advice goes (as always), be careful NOT TO GET RIPPED off. Make sure you plan a day or two ahead to figure out how to get on a sleeper bus back south. If you’re like me and want to squeeze the maximum out of every holiday minute, do your homework, and plan ahead. You can make the trip down to the beach on an overnight sleeper bus for $20 (the max, and no matter what anyone says, you can always haggle this price down). If you snooze on this, you will be sold a sleeper (beds where you can actually lay on overnight), but given a regular coach bus ticket, with no sleeper, and no lavatories even! This bus takes about 12 hours, which is best done overnight.
When you finally make it to the good life of sand and sea, I suggest you stay on the beach. If you want to have your choice of bars, beaches, and food, and are traveling alone and want to meet fellow fun people- it’s the best way to go. I actually stayed at the only gay bar in Sihanoukville, where I was unwittingly suckered into a drag show and pricey drinks at the hotel bar. Not a fun experience unless you are a gay guy looking to play. Not only this, but also, in order to save just one more dollar (regular tuk tuk costs $3 instead of $2 for a motor bike), I almost died- twice. I’m not kidding. One time I jumped on the back of a reluctant motorbike taxi taking $1 instead of $2, who had clearly been drinking. More like pounding em’ down, which at about minute two of riding on his motorbike I realized, when he was swerving into oncoming traffic! This drunk buffoon did it a few more times, while I kept shrieking at him, asking if he was drunk. Silly Addie, what a dumb question, there was no intelligible way the pseudo-taxi driver could have answered that. When finally close enough to the beach, I threw the dollar at him, ran toward the beach, and decided to stop being so tight with my cab fare. Your life should not be decided on the difference of a measly dollar. The main lesson being, avoid all the hoopla and additional costs of local travel expenses by staying right where all the mayhem happens, and you’ll never worry about staying out too late since you can just walk to and from where you spend your day and where you lay your head at night.

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