Here's what I gathered from a few days' stay in Siem Reap, Cambodia recently. If you choose to visit Siem Reap - and you should - I hope these tips on getting the most out of it make your visit more fruitful and rewarding!

Here's my gay Phnom Penh report: any-other-country-f15/phnom-penh-cambodia-trip-report-t20485.html

Why visit Siem Reap?

Siem Reap is Cambodia's second largest city and offers the opportunity to explore one of the great wonders of the world and a great chilled-out atmosphere with fantastic eating and drinking.

Angkor Wat is one of the most spectacular ancient ruins in the world. Over two million visitors a year visit Siem Reap to explore the breathtaking ruins towering out of the jungle. Angkor was the centre of the Khmer Empire and was the largest preindustrial urban centre in the world, housing up to one million people at its peak. After its population abandoned it (for reasons uncertain), the ruins lay largely hidden and unheard of in the jungle until they were discovered a few decades ago.

A large percentage of visitors to Cambodia come via Thailand so when Thailand's tourism sneezes, Cambodian tourism catches a cold. They've had a pretty rough year this year, so head over and spend some money there if you can. It has a lot to offer. Plus, it seems gay entrepreneurs have opened dozens of very creative and chic businesses in Siem Reap, from spas to boutique hotels and bars, all well designed.

Where to Stay

Within the Old Market Area, Pub Street is the restaurant and nightlife centre of Siem Reap with dozens of great eateries, pubs and bars. Try to stay as close to this street as possible.

Siem Reap has some of the nicest boutique hotels around. Most of them are fairly new and many of them have very nice touches like outdoor rain showers and baths and chic, sensual design. Avoid staying in any of the hotels lining the road to the airport. This is where a lot of tour agencies dump their hordes of sheep. You'll be a long way from the centre of town and probably won't get to enjoy it as much.

Golden Banana Resort: I recommend this place hands down. It's fantastic.

There are three establishments in this group: (1) Golden Banana Resort (recommended) http://www.goldenbanana.info/html/resort.php (2) Golden Banana Hotel (ok, but resort is better): http://www.goldenbanana.info/html/hotel.php and (3) Golden Banana B&B (cheap, no frills): http://www.golden-banana.com/

I recommend staying in the resort: http://www.goldenbanana.info/html/resort.php

- Rates are USD$65 to $100 depending on the time of the year
- Suites/villas are fantastic, sun-drenched in natural light from windows on 2-3 sides (interesting how they've managed to achieve this), good WiFi internet connection, a balcony with an open-air shower, stone bathtub (sexy LOL) and lounger, sturdy desk, and a nice bathroom.
- Service is incredibly genuine and warm. You really feel welcome at the place and the staff are terrific. The place is gay-owned but attracts an equal number of straight people. It's staffed entirely by cute, smiling young Cambodian men (got the feeling all or a lot of them are gay but there's a strict policy prohibiting sexual relations with guests) who continually look to do anything they can to help you. This is probably the biggest upside of the place. It's incredibly friendly and warm. Loved it.
- Delicious breakfast served until 12-midday included. One of the best breakfasts I've had in any mid-tier hotel in Asia. Well done on this.
- The restaurant/bar is also fantastic. Great food and drinks menu and service.
- Nice pool for lounging around. Not real big though.
- The location was probably the only slight downside. It's not right in the middle of town, but the Pub Street centre of town is only a 2 min tuk tuk ride or 10-15 min walk away. The resort is a really nice compound to come back to so I didn't mind the location being a slightly out of the way at all.

MENS Resort http://www.mens-resort.com is a newly-opened men-only gay resort. Rates are $49 to $90/night. This place is great in so many ways except one - location.

Its location is a big let down. It really is out in the middle of no where, smack bang in a residential neighbourhood with absolutely nothing in the surrounding streets. It takes 10 to 15 mins to get to Pub Street (centre of town) in a tuk tuk. Going back to the resort, your tuk tuk or bike will need to go up a rough, 200-300 metre unsealed road. I don't know what they were thinking building it here.

However, it has a few pluses. Rooms are fairly nice and facilities are excellent. It has a big pool and a very nice sun deck. There's a well-equipped gym and the place is actually a gay sauna, so outsiders can pay to come in and use the facilities. There's also a good on-site massage service, which is quite good. Internally, it's fantastic. You just have to put up with the nuisance of a 10-15 min drive anytime you want to go anywhere.

If you want to stay right in the centre of town on or near Pub Street, try these two places: http://www.ei8htrooms.com (budget but ok) and http://www.hotelbeangkor.com (rates $100-$200/night but located right on Pub Street and very nice rooms!).

Some other places, which look really nice but are slightly out of the way are http://www.viroth-hotel.com, http://www.residencedangkor.com, http://www.hoteldelapaixangkor.com and http://www.fcccambodia.com/angkor/boutique-hotel.php

There are tonnes of nice boutique hotels in Siem Reap so look around.

Cambodian Cuisine

Few places in the world offer Cambodian cuisine so this may be the first time you taste it. It's absolutely delicious. I was blown away how nice their food is - right up there with Thai, Malay and Vietnamese cooking. Make sure you try a dish called, "Amok". They say it's the food the Kings used to eat. It's a tasty mild yellow curry you can have with fish or chicken and wrapped in leaves. Really delicious. Other dishes you should try are beef lok lak and green mango beef salad.

Dining is incredibly cheap in Siem Reap. Casual fine dining restaurants are $2.50 to $4 for mains and casual/pub style dining tend to charge $1 to $2 for mains. Go to Pub Street for a huge selection of places. Have a glass of wine or a cocktail with every meal - it's cheap.

Khmer Noodle Restaurant (serves a lot more than noodles) is in an alley running parallel to Pub St on its South Side, same alley as Linga Bar. Food and wine are top notch and it has an air conditioned section upstairs. Temple Bar is a nice place to sit for lunch.

Nightlife

I didn't check out the nightlife in Siem Reap every night and wasn't looking out for gay nightlife so much, but here's what I gathered:

Linga Bar is the main "gay bar" in Siem Reap. It has a lot of moneyboys there every night. I only dropped by for a quick drink as it wasn't very busy, only 4-5 patrons and about 8 hopeful moneyboys LOL. I'm guessing you can find paid company here if no where else.

Miss Wong is a fantastic little cocktail bar near Pub Street. It's gay-owned and attracts some straight and a lot of gay patrons. You probably won't find any Cambodian boys here but it's really worth having a drink here. I had some interesting conversations with some of the expats. They make, probably some of the best martinis I've had anywhere in the word. Highly recommend it. I wish there were places like this elsewhere. There's a nice review here: http://travel.nytimes.com//2010/03/21/t ... ext-1.html

Temple Bar on Pub Street is a mixed bar with mainly straights but some gays too. The crowd is mainly backpackers and locals and I had a lot of fun here. There's a dance floor and pool tables. If you want to join in a game, pick and table and write your name on the wall beside the table to be next in line.

I've heard a lot of the gay boys go to Pyramid Disco and there's a show. Didn't get there myself.

Cambodian Moneyboys

There's a dance club opposite Miss Wongs. I forget the name now. I think it was either called "MIA" (Missing in Action) or "Heart Rock". Anyway, I went in there one night and the crowd was almost entirely Cambodian. There was a dance floor. The music was kind of strange. But there was a distinctly gay corner (lots of same-sex couples).

A boy invited me to his table for a drink. Soon as he spoke, I knew he was a money boy but I thought I'd have a chat with him to learn something anyway. Here's what you need to know about Cambodian moneyboys. They're not subtle! About 10 minutes into the conversation he was talking about how he came from a good family, had never done manual labour work ("look at my hands very soft") and was a good boy and went to university. At 15 minutes he proclaimed he wanted to come to Australia with me. And at 20 minutes I made my excuses and fled LOL.

Visiting the ruins

Spend a minimum of two days and ideally three to four days exploring the Angkor Ruins. There's heaps of info on Wikitravel about this so I won't go into detail but will offer a few good tips:

1. Visit the Angkor National Museum before you go to the ruins. This is a world-class museum, which tells the history of the area in an impressively concise and vivid way. For $5, a tuk tuk driver will take you there, wait for you and then take you back to your hotel. I spent 1 hr there but you may want to spend 2-3 hrs.

2. Don't take a coach tour or group tour. These tour guides herd their masses of tourists straight in through the front gate of every attraction with little care and often little flexibility. You'll get so much out of it if you hire your own guide. A guide means you can go as quick or as slow as you want. You can tackle the more precarious ruins if you want or give them a miss. I tended to go a lot quicker and covered a lot more places. You start/finish each ruin at your own pace. You don't wait for others or need to hurry up. You don't spend time stopping listening to group lectures. They'll tell you as much or as little as you want to know. They'll help you avoid the crowds and take you through the best entrances where you can avoid anything unappealing like the restoration work being done on the front of the main temple.

3. Get your hotel to recommend a good guide. They'll only recommend good guides who've serviced their customers well. Guides are usually USD$25/day. Tip, $5 or $10.

4. You'll probably need a car and driver too. I recommend a car over getting a tuk tuk. You'll get to places a lot faster. Most roads are unsealed so you'll be more comfortable. After clambering over the enormous ruins under the hot sun you'll be glad to get back in an air-conditioned vehicle. In some ruins you'll enter on one end and your guide will get the car to meet you both on the other side. Cars/driver is usually $25-$30 for in and around the main Angkor Wat ruins. To go further out to the more remote ruins like Beng Melea you pay $55.

5. It's worth checking out Beng Melea. This is a more remote and overgrown ruin about 1 hr North of Siem Reap. You could spend hours clambering over this badly deteriorated structure Tomb Raider style.

Get a massage

I had a massage at MENS Resort and it was very good. I highly recommend it. Having the pool and sauna facilities there was also great.

I had a body scrub and massage at Linga Spa opposite Linga Bar near Pub Street. This was ok. The skill of the therapist was good but not fantastic.

Getting around

Tuk tuks are everywhere. Short rides across town should only be $1. Apparently they usually charge tourists $2 but if you're a local or look like a savvy foreigner they'll give it to you for $1 so be sure to bargain with them. I didn't know about this double pricing until a local got in a tuk tuk with me and was surprised to hear I wasn't paying the tourist price LOL. For much longer rides, like coming from MENS Resort, you'll need to pay $2.

Getting in and out

Lots of info on getting in and out in my Phnom Penh Report: any-other-country-f15/phnom-penh-cambodia-trip-report-t20485.html

There are direct flights from Siem Reap, Bangkok (expensive route), KL, Singapore, Vietnam and more.

Gay Map of Siem Reap

Hope this helps! Siem Reap is just a fantastic, little chilled out town, but with plenty of life. It felt a bit like Chiang Mai but smaller. The food and dining there were a big highlight for me. Even though I've seen the ruins, I think I'll drop by there again for a few days just to chill out.

There's heaps of info on gay Siem Reap here: http://www.utopia-asia.com/camsiem.htm

There's a great Google Map with a lot of these places marked out here: http://www.utopia-asia.com/map/siem.htm

Enjoy!

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