Around Kampot.

Kampot itself is a nice town to relax for a day or two, here I sat down a full afternoon doing nothing-except drinking draught beer. One dollar for a 1,3 liter, ice cold jar. But there are things worth visiting in the surrounding area. I did a couple of days exploring the surrounding area.

Kep is a resort town, and usually not a place I would spend time. But i found one good reason to go here: Food! In the outskirt of town is the crab market where one have a few choices-barbecued seafood is the most obvious one.....

.....Then there are the crabs which one can buy fresh and alive and have boiled there and then for immediate consumption. They are kept alive in cages out in the sea.

Selecting the best crabs for the occasion. 5 dollars per kilo was the price my driver got me-they were very unwillingly to go below 7 dollars for a white faced customer.

The crabboiler. She had a constant flow of customers. Her service will set you back another 2000 riels. While waiting, I secured a coupe of cans of beer. Then heading down to the beach for a little fiest of crab and beer. Perfect way of lunching. And delicious.

The province is known since colonial times for Kampot pepper, a mild, flavour rich type which was a must on every french restaurant table. There are several plantations reachable from Kampot where one can have a look-and buy pepper directly from the source itself. Cambodian pepper has been produced at least since the 13th century, the modern production only started around 1870.

Still small but growing.

Everybody does it-taking a trip up to the Bokor hill station. Here is a look down on the flat Kampot surroundings from a lookout stop high above the plains.

The Bokor hillstation a 40 kilometers drive from Kampot along a steep, twisting road, was constructed in the early 1920'es as a chilly retreat for the french colonialists. The construction of the road from the lowland, and the station itse4lf went fast-to the cost of some 900 of lives. An average of more than 3 each day. Bokor had a hotel, a casino. A police station and everything needed for a working village. The place was abandoned for good in 1972 when Khmer Rouge arrived and took control over the area. It wasn't until the early 1990'es before they was driven out. The area then battle scarred and infested with mines. Those are now cleared away. Most of the buildings are gone, but a few, iconic buildings still stands. There have been several failed attempts of bringing the place back to life. But the attempt now underway is heading in a more successfull direction. Not such a good thing, since the area is in the middle of a nationalpark. The area is like a huge building place and when everything is finished the nationalpark aspect will be dead and buried. In Cambodia, money talks. Not in the form of corruption as there are none in Cambodia-there are only commissions and gifts....big ones.

Road maintainance. Heating bitumen for crackrepairs.

The former royal resort, now an empty shell surrounded by grass, brush and pretty flowers. The remains of the former garden.

Interior of the royal lodge-with an non-royal graffiti.

A green tree set against a backdrop of incoming fog.

The Lok Yeay Mao monument,  where travellers often sacrifice something for good luck on the journey.

A rock formation beside the monument.

Not my idea of a nationalpark. A huge, modern casino in the hills.

Near the casino, an old pagoda-offering great views over the lowlands directly below us.

Now an empty shell, once somewhere the french had their service. Bokor hillstations catholic church.

The old Bokor Palace Hotel, now cleaned up inside. The building is planned to be used again. But for now it is  an empty, and spooky place said to be haunted. The fog arrived at the same time as we did-making it even spookier. I wouldn't say there is much to see up there. It is very little, actually. Still, in spooky fogginess there is something special about the place.

Many a champagne and Vin Rouge have been enjoyed near this fireplace.

In the Phnom Chhnork cave-having a 7th century Shiva temple in it.

A natural linga inside the temple.

The cow head.

Kampot countryside. Close to town,  yet a world apart.

Time for a break. Bananas fried in a dough with sesame seeds.

In Phnom Sorsia. No temple inside, only statues.

Opening in the roof at Phnom Sorsia. At the same pace there is a big, smelly bat cave.

A small girl crushing sugarcanes for juice. I had pity and crushed my own, she had to hang in the bars of the wheels, her body weight not really being enough to do the trick.

Strolling Kampot.

Kampot is the capital of the-surprise,surprise-Kampot province. It is a laid back town, and one of the prettier that i have seen in Cambodia so far. In the center there are several streets lined with old Chinese style shop houses and french buildings. Sort of a trademark is the roundabouts with monuments standing in the middle. Great for road descriptions. Getting to my dormitory at the Blissfull guesthouse was simple-waling from the Durian to the salt monument and then breaking left, or from the millennium monument up to the salt monument, crossing into my street.

My last sight of the Cambodian capital. A wet one!

I came to town in the afternoon. Getting out of Phnom Penh took its time-in the morning there had been a tremendous rainfall, and many of the streets normally used by buses were more or less impassable for them. Lot of detours was the obvious consequence. That leg of the journey was sort of a nautical experience-the bus making a bow wave which flushed dirty water and trash up to-and even into-street side shops. Not very popular. There were even children swimming in one of the streets. Not to be recommended. It is not at all clean.

The saltmakingmonument in Kampot. In the dry season, saltmaking is important in the area surrounding Kampot.

The millennium memory. 

The big durian. Kampot province is famed for their extra delicious durians.

Psar Samaki, the big market, is worth a stroll. Good for people watching and good for simple, cheap but good food-street type. It is laid out as a grid of narrow passageways and is a pressurized boiler of human activity. And smells. Dried fish and squid and shrimp paste are particularly generous odour contributors. Hidden between fruit mounds, shrimps and clothing is even a jewelelrysection where the jewellery makers hammer tapping stands in great contrast to the food vendors shouting and screaming meters away.

Fried bananas at the market.

A sweet stall. Beans, riceflour and coconutmilk are base ingredients.

Local transport.

A good place for noodlesoup or ricesoup. The coocking is made on a stove made of an empty oilbarrel, and fuelled with wood.

Small sharks destined for the dinnertable.

Like in Norway, there are shops specializing in building materials. Only that the products on offer are different ones. Here you find palmleaf panels, stilts ans bamboo poles.

The old bridge across the river. Smashed during the war, and restored in a variety of styles.

Cosy streets. The french left an attractive mark on the town.

Another french era gem. Now turned into the local-overpopulated prison. I took this shot while sitting eating in a sidewalk shop at the corner. The guards suddenly all left the towers, so i took the opportunity to snap.

The pretty lotus pond.

Time for a sunset cruise. Here is the venue-complete with bar&ice cooled beer plus a toilet to get rid of that  of that beer.

The youngest bartender around. A big time charmer.

Greetings from the bridge. Local Muslim girls.

The 5 O'clock race-fishing vessels hurrying downstream towards the sea.

Along the river. It was a nice trip upstream, but the sunset was hidden behind the mountains. It was the wrong direction. Still it is worth the trip-it is a pretty stretch of river.

Heartcrusher at the evening tivoli near the durianmonument.