Phnom Penh Riverside

We weren’t feeling great yesterday, so instead of striding heroically through Phnom Penh like seasoned travellers, we surrendered to the rooftop bar.

Two sniffling, coughing wrecks perched under fairy lights, listening to Ibiza‑chilled beats and pretending we were on a wellness retreat rather than recovering from a bug that felt like it had been brewed in a mop bucket. Between gulps of water and the occasional bark of a cough, we booked our next digs with the optimism of people who have learned absolutely nothing from experience.

Eventually hunger nudged us back onto the street, but our stomachs were in no mood for adventure. After pacing up and down like two indecisive pigeons, we spotted a Domino’s. Not exactly the cultural immersion we’d imagined, but at that point we would have eaten carpet underlay if it came with garlic dip.

Somewhere between the second slice and the booking confirmation, the trip stopped being about where we were going and became about whether we’d make it there upright.

Riel, Dollars, and Mild Mental Collapse

Cambodian currency is one of life’s great puzzles. Five thousand four hundred riel to the pound. A pineapple costs how many thousands? Prices appear in riel and dollars, and change is returned in whatever combination the vendor feels spiritually aligned with.

Craig receives his change with the expression of a man who’s just been handed a Rubik’s cube mid‑transaction.

Cockroaches, Accusations, and a 5am Start

We were up at 5am for the train to Sihanoukville — $10 each, which felt like a bargain until the cockroaches decided to give us a farewell performance. There was screaming, swearing, and a brief but genuine moment where I wondered if I’d been cursed by a Cambodian witch.

We’d paid in advance, so check‑out should have been simple. Instead, the receptionist insisted on running upstairs to “check the room,” as though we might have stuffed the mattress into my sarong. I stood there coughing while he inspected the place for… what? A hidden cow?

A Taxi, But Not a Taxi

Outside, Phnom Penh was only just waking up. A lone tuktuk sat at the end of the street, and I waved him down. The driver approached with the weary confusion of someone who had not planned to be approached by anyone, ever. I suspect we’d interrupted a man who’d spent the night sleeping in a taxi purely for shelter.

He didn’t speak English. We didn’t speak Khmer. Our best train noises and frantic pointing achieved nothing. Even my surprisingly athletic arm‑circle mime failed. We were one interpretive dance away from being institutionalised.

Thankfully Google Maps intervened before we ended up at a fish market.

I sat in the back with the bags, looking like I was relocating permanently, while Craig was wedged up front with the driver like two men sharing a single seatbelt.

Off we go.

Nope. Flat battery.

A bump start with all that weight felt wildly optimistic, but somehow he managed it. Within minutes we were at the station. Charge: $1. I’ve paid more for a bottle of water. We gave him a tip so at least the chap could have some breakfast.

The Royal Train Station (Side Entrance Only)

The Royal Train Station looks grand from the front — columns, arches, the full royal fantasy. This is misleading. The front is locked. We pulled, rattled and knocked on every door like two determined burglars. A guard glared at us with a look that said, honestly, and pointed to the side entrance. We scurried around feeling like we were sneaking into a school disco.

Inside: two tracks, one small platform, and a handful of early‑morning travellers blinking into the dawn.

The train doors sit four feet off the ground, so they wheel over mobile steps that look like they were borrowed from a budget airline. People began to queue.

Craig, being chivalrous, carried both our backpacks, leaving me with the small hand luggage — a division of labour I accepted without hesitation. The ticket master waved me on with a cheerful “sit anywhere,” and in my eagerness to secure a seat, I completely forgot about Craig.

He reappeared several minutes later, chunnering away in that tone he reserves especially for me, having just clambered up a one‑foot‑wide staircase with two enormous bags and an automatic door that closes with all the mercy of a guillotine. He looked like a man who had survived a minor expedition, and I, apparently, was the person he held responsible.

Arctic Air‑Con and the Train That Survived Everything

The carriage was spacious, dated, and spotless — but absolutely freezing. The air‑con was set to “Arctic Expedition.” Coats on. Sarong deployed. Teeth chattering in unison. If we didn’t creak before, we certainly do now.

Cambodia’s passenger trains are a patchwork of eras — a rolling museum of whatever the country could salvage after decades of conflict. Many of the carriages date back to the 1960s and 70s, built during a time when rail travel was meant to modernise the nation. Then came civil war, the Khmer Rouge, and years of neglect.

For decades the trains barely ran at all. Tracks vanished into jungle. Bridges collapsed. Engines rusted into stillness. When the government revived the railway in the 2010s, they refurbished whatever carriages were still standing — sanding, repainting, replacing seats, and coaxing old engines back to life.

So when you sit inside one, you’re sitting in a survivor — a carriage that has lived through coups, monsoons, and more than a few mechanical tantrums. They creak and rattle like they’re telling their life story one bolt at a time.

Then the announcement chimed — a little tune that sounds like a hand‑cranked music box. Utterly charming. Utterly unexpected.

Cambodia at 20 Miles an Hour

The train normally travels at 20 mph — a speed that suggests it is deeply unsure of itself. If the driver gets excited, it creeps up to 22 mph and emits a hopeful squeak. At 25 mph it produces thumps that make you wonder when your backside will land on the tracks.

Takeo: The Great Thawing

A tiny station with vendors selling fruit, grilled chicken feet, and water. People stretched, thawed, and pretended they hadn’t just spent an hour slowly freezing to death.

The Loo of Doom

We’d brought plenty of water. And as anyone over forty knows, with water comes the inevitable pee marathon.

Eventually I gave in and went to the loo, which was exactly as you’d expect: stainless steel, a faint institutional rattle, and a strong whiff of guts that suggested the ventilation system had long since given up hope.

The chap before me had clearly lost a battle with the flush and left behind a generous bowl of swishing piss, enough to thoroughly soak the seat and remove any possibility of sitting. I hovered.

Naturally, the train hit the wobbliest stretch of track in Cambodia.

There are moments in life that test your balance, your dignity, and your faith in modern plumbing. This was all three.

Kampot, Kep, and the French

At Kampot, the queues to get on were somehow bigger than the queues to get off. Two streams of humanity collided politely, like a slow‑motion rugby scrum. The French dominated the platform — elegant, composed, and somehow managing to look philosophical even while boarding a train that sounded like a depressed donkey.

Just after Kampot, it started to rain. Of course it did.

Kep had no vendors, just travellers — mainly Cambodians with a scattering of French tourists — all resigned to whatever temperature the carriage chose next.

Arrival in Sihanoukville

We arrived earlier than planned and walked straight past the tuk‑tuk drivers clustered outside the station. Tuk drivers positioned directly at any departure point are always the same: high‑priced, mildly arrogant, and convinced they’re your only option. A short walk to the main road always gets you a better price and a nicer human being.

The Ferry to Koh Rong — A Shrine, Two Pensioners, and Mild Panic

I’d pre‑booked our speedboat to Koh Rong for $10 per person, but since we were two hours early, I nipped into the GTVC office. They waved us through with a cheerful “no problem.”

We waited at Point 3. One European woman had purchased a three‑foot wooden Cambodian shrine and was carrying it like a woman who had made a terrible decision and was now too proud to admit it.

Then there was the elderly American couple — late seventies, possibly early eighties, possibly lost since 1974. They drifted behind the crowd like two ghosts who had missed their own funeral. He looked permanently baffled. She wandered from person to person clutching her phone asking, “Is this the right boat to Hotel X?”

No one knew.

No one helped.

She simply floated on to the next person like a hopeful balloon.

The speedboat was nothing like the YouTubers promised. No high‑speed Bond chase. No dramatic wave‑jumping. Just calm, sensible travel — which suited us perfectly.

Stopping at various piers meant we got to see most of the island. All idyllic with white sandy beaches, palm‑fringed and blue‑watered. Postcard perfect.

Ours was the last stop. Koh Toch.

Ours was not.

Ours was a small, lived‑in community with half a dozen B&Bs and a charm that was more atmospheric than aesthetic. But by this point we’d survived the cold, the cockroaches, the currency, and the toilet, so we told ourselves we’d always preferred “authenticity.”

Babybong: Tattoos, Rap Music, and Midnight Parties

We strolled up the street and I nearly wet myself laughing. Our digs were called Babybong and doubled as a tattoo parlour and sports bar. Craig had somehow managed to pick the exact opposite of what we normally choose.

Inside, a Freddie Mercury lookalike blasted rap music at a volume that suggested he was angry with the building. He led us up a rusty spiral staircase to our room — thankfully carrying my bag, otherwise I’d have snapped my neck halfway up.

He informed us we were “just in time for the party tonight.”

“It starts around midnight,” he said.

Craig’s face collapsed like a flan in the sun.

The room was small but spotless, with a ceiling fan and air‑con — a blessing, because air‑con makes us cough like Dickensian orphans. We dumped our bags, had a few beers, a stroll, a few more beers, dinner, and were in bed by 7pm. Absolute party animals.

A Remote Island, a Local Community, and Us — Ending on a High

We’d landed on a remote island in the middle of a condensed Cambodian community — brilliant, bizarre, and surreal in equal measure. The kind of place where nothing matches the brochure, everything smells faintly of barbecue and seaweed, and yet somehow it all feels exactly right.

After the day we’d had — the cockroaches, the cold train, the shrine lady, the lost pensioners, the Babybong rave we absolutely would not be attending — we looked at each other and burst out laughing.

Because this is travel.

Not the glossy version.

The real version.

Chaotic, confusing, occasionally questionable — and absolutely unforgettable.

And somehow, standing there on that scruffy little pier, surrounded by noise and life and the smell of someone grilling something unidentifiable, we realised:

We were exactly where we were meant to be.