Sihanoukville Beach

Sihanoukville is a rather sleepy coastal town

around 230 km southwest of Phnom Penh. Sihanoukville has no past, it was placed on a cleared piece of jungle in the 1950 ties to build Cambodia's only deep water port. Now Sihanoukville has a bright future..the tourist are coming in large quantities.

You will find some useful information on this beach city in Cambodia, a pretty Sihanoukville beach, some Sihanoukville guesthouse and hotel at Sihanoukville. Trips from Sihanoukville to Phnom Penh and Angkor should be on every agenda of a Cambodian travel trip. Also a trip from Sihanoukville to the nearby Bokor National Park is a great experience.

The hotels and beach resort

are not as sophisticated as some hotels at Angkor in particular as a luxury Angkor hotel. The main reason to visit Sihanoukville is probably to have a great time at the beaches around Sihanoukville and the islands in front of the coast of Sihanoukville.

The islands and coastal beaches are not as developed as lets say Patong beach at Phuket and other beaches in Thailand but this is probably nothing negative, rather positive. Check paradise beach, Victoria beach, independence beach, Hawaii beach Ochheuteal beach, nightlife is rather quiet if you like it hot try Phuket nightlife.

There are no major Khmer temples and monuments

around for this you have to travel to Angkor maybe partly on the Mekong would be a great journey. A good bus service out of the capital of Cambodia, Phnom Penh makes it easy to go there quickly.

Sihanoukville downtown

is in central position on this small peninsular which makes it easy to reach every location quick, especially Sihanouk beaches since the streets to the beaches a large boulevards but when the beach area is reached often the last part of the road is a real bad dirt road. Plenty of lower priced hotels and guesthouses are around, shopping centers plus the usual infrastructure such as banks bars and restaurants are also in this area, actually this area is not very large, with a motorbike taxi every location can be reached within a couple of minutes.

Don't rent a motorcycle in Phnom Penh and do it on your own, its similar dangerous as in Thailand since no one cares about any traffic rules and if you have a accident there is no qualified hospital around where you can be moved to. I have seen several smashed "white guys" laying on the road to Phnom Penh after an accident.

A couple of pretty beaches are around the city.

Don't expect a infrastructure like in Thailand, everything is very basic. Only recently has the first upper market beach resort opened the door for business. The whole area is in a state of flux since many people try to do some business on tourism. The normality is, go there and have a look, all what you need is there, internet, restaurants, accommodations from $5 - guesthouse - to $250 - Sokha Beach Resort.

A interesting nightlife is on at Ochheuteal beach

with beach barbeque, bars and lounges where one can find a companion and so on. But exactly this back to basic has its charm. Plenty of sea food is available in countless restaurants and the beach is only a couple of meters away, so what else one needs?

A very good dinner is secured at one of the open air barbeque stalls between the bars and the beach itself, this is all fresh and they handle it in front of you. In the back is modern music, Hip Hop in English and sometimes in Thai language, the Cambodians rather prefer old fashion style, not all, of course.