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10.01.2013

Kambodscha: Im Süden

Cambodia: In the South

From Phnom Penh, we travel south with Julia and Tim, to the region where pepper is grown: the small town of Kampot is located about 20 km from the sea and is an ideal place for a few cozy days.

The drive from Phnom Penh to Kampot is a bit dusty at first, then it turns out to be beautiful: a pleasant road leads through brown-green fields (dry season) with many palm trees. We can not take our eyes from the beautiful wooden houses: Similar to Laos, they are built on stilts, but the roofs are decorated with filigree figures and beams with beautiful carvings decorate their lower part. Sometimes dove blue, sometimes fir green or rusty red, they stand out in the barren landscape.

The cozy terrace right by the river is a good place to spend hours reading, listening to music or chatting.

A simple bamboo bungalow becomes our temporary home in Kampot. It stands on stilts, the floor plan is hardly bigger than the bed and the pleasantly cool wind blows through all the cracks. At night you can hear the cicadas chirping and the geckos cackling, unless there’s a wedding taking place in the neighboring village, which makes us an involuntarily audience for a well meant but poorly carried out karaoke concert. All sorts of exciting animals visit us here: large geckos, spiders, even a small, harmless snake. The cozy terrace right by the river is a good place to spend hours reading, listening to music or chatting. Together with Julia and Tim we also stroll through the town with its many charming corners from colonial times, drink coffee or take a small tour upriver with rented kayaks.

The fact that Kampot is the center of the finest pepper gives a clue why we are never hungry these days: the food is simply delicious!

When we talk about driving further South to the sea for a few more days, the owner of our bungalow advises us to visit Rabbit Island instead. This small island is located about 5 km from the coast of Kep and is usually only visited by day tourists. The very next day a small boat brings us to the island, where we spend a peaceful two days. The island can be circled by foot within 2.5 hours, a few fishermen's houses and some bungalows offer space for the few visitors and residents, electricity is only available between 7 p.m. and 10 p.m., of course there is no internet. Nature is diverse: on our tour of the island we discover beautiful butterflies, dense jungles and a small mangrove forest. On the top of the hill, an old war bunker is remniscent of the Khmer Rouge. From here, the surrounding islands can be observed.

Many hammocks invite us to be lazy and the two days fly by, we feel timeless and it is nice to go with the rhythm of nature and the chickens and roosters that wake us up in the morning with their cackling. Rabbit Island - we'll take some of your peace with us as we visit Angkor Wat's busy temples in the very near future!

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