Angkor at 5am. Cambodia all day.
Which sunrise run gets you through the gate before the coaches. What a tuk-tuk day should cost. Whether the floating village is the one on stilts or the one on pontoons. Every tour in Cambodia, reviewed.
Angkor sunrise: which run gets you through the gate first.
All 399 Angkor Wat tours →
Gates open at five and the difference between a good sunrise and a coach-park sunrise is which pond your guide walks you to, and whether anyone thought about breakfast. These three carry the most travellers.
Sunrise, then the three great temples
Collected in the dark, in position before the sky turns, and walking into Angkor Wat while most of the crowd is still at the reflecting pond. Bayon and Ta Prohm after breakfast.
Your own guide, your own pace
No minibus roll-call and no fixed turnaround. A guide who will wait while you photograph the same doorway twice, and a driver who moves when you do.
Sunrise and sunset, twice over
One day is a forced march past four hundred years of carving. Two lets you take the Grand Circuit slowly, come back for the evening light, and still get out to Beng Mealea.
What Cambodia is famous for, and how to book each.
The temple dawn, the stilt villages, the tuk-tuk that becomes your whole day, the waterfall on the sacred mountain. Most Cambodia itineraries are built out of these six.
The Tonle Sap runs backwards, and the villages float with it.
Every monsoon the Mekong shoves this river into reverse and the lake swells to five times its size. Kampong Phluk answers by standing on fifteen-foot stilts. Go late in the day, when the light is on the flooded forest and the boats thin out.
Cambodia is cheap. Here is what each price step actually buys.
A tuk-tuk temple day and a private guide are the same country and forty dollars apart. Three steps, and what each one gets you.
Tuk-tuk temple days, circus tickets, the floating-village boat, and a cooking class with the market walk included.
Guided sunrise runs, Kulen waterfall with a picnic lunch, and the long days out to Beng Mealea and Koh Ker.
A private guide and driver for a full day, multi-day temple itineraries, and the haul up to Preah Vihear on the Thai border.
What travellers in Cambodia actually book.
Every review →The tours that carry more people than anything else in the country, and what each one gets right.
1
Angkor Wat Sunrise or Sunset Tour with Guide from Siem Reap
Review of Angkor Wat sunrise or sunset tour from Siem Reap, with four temples, guide, transport, costs, timing, and practical booking advice.
From · $18
Read our review →
2
Angkor Wat: Small-Group Sunrise or Sunset Tour
from $15
3
Kampong Phluk Floating Village Tour by Boat
from $20
4
Sunset tour of Kampong Phluk stilts home village on the Tonle Sap
from $21
5
Angkor Wat 2-Day Tour with Sunrise and Sunset
from $34
6
Kampong Phluk Floating Village Tour with Boat
from $19
7
Full-Day Angkor Wat Guided Tour with Sunset
from $15
8
Angkor Wat Sunrise tour with Small – Group and Guide tours
from $14
Phnom Penh asks for a slow morning and a river evening.
The capital walks well between the Royal Palace and the riverfront and needs a motorbike everywhere else. Give Choeung Ek and S-21 a whole morning on their own. Keep the sunset for the Mekong.
Battambang kept the shophouses, the bats and the bamboo train.
Colonial frontages the colour of weak tea, a rail line rebuilt out of bogies and a bamboo platform, and at dusk a river of bats pouring out of Phnom Sampeau for half an hour without a break in it.
- 1Tuk-Tuk, Bamboo Train, Killing/Bat Caves, Sunsetfrom $9
- 2Battambang Tuk Tuk tour: Bambootrain, Killing & Bat Caves,Sunsetfrom $15
- 3Afternoon tour by tuk tuk to bamboo train,bat cave,killing cave,countryside.from $15
The bat river, the pepper, and the circus that raised itself.
Temples run the length of Southeast Asia. A dusk exodus of two million bats, the world’s most argued-over peppercorn and a circus school built out of a refugee camp belong to Cambodia alone.
The Bat River
At about half past five the mouth of the cave at Phnom Sampeau starts to smoke, and then the smoke turns out to be bats. They leave in a single braided ribbon that keeps going for half an hour or more, out over the paddies to feed. Nobody organises it and nothing announces it. Bring a drink, take the plastic chair, and look up.
- 1Afternoon tour by tuk tuk to bamboo train,bat cave,killing cave,countryside.★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 344 reviews
- 2Bamboo Train, Bat Cave, Killing Cave by Tuk Tuk★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 182 reviews
- 3Full Day tour .City tour.Countryside.Bamboo Train.Secret Bat Cave★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 178 reviews
Kampot Pepper
The peppercorns grown on the red laterite between Kampot and Kep carry a protected origin name, which is why a French kitchen will pay four times the going rate for a jar. The farms will let you chew a green one straight off the vine, which is a different plant entirely from the grey dust at home. Pair it with the salt pans on the road back.
- 1Pepper Farm Tours, Salt, Lake & Phnom Chhngok Temple★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 432 reviews
- 2Full-day Countryside Tour with Pepper Farm and Kep★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 245 reviews
- 3Tuk Tuk Trip to Pepper Farm, Kep, Crab Market & More★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 143 reviews
Phare and the Apsara Stage
Phare started as a drawing class for children in a border refugee camp and now runs its own big top in Siem Reap, with the ticket money going back into the school. Across town, apsara dancers hold the same hand positions carved into the Angkor walls a thousand years ago. Both run nightly, and both sell out in season.
- 1Phare: The Cambodian Circus Show in Siem Reap★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,925 reviews
- 2Phare, the Cambodian Circus Show Tickets★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 1,850 reviews
- 3Apsara Show Including Dinner & Hotel Pickup★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 615 reviews
Siem Reap down to the Gulf, the way most first trips run.
Siem Reap
Battambang
Phnom Penh
Kampot & Kep
The Gulf coastBook these before you land in Cambodia.
Most of this country can be arranged from your guesthouse the night before. These four cannot. They run on a ticket office that shuts, a big top that sells out, and roads that need a whole day and a driver who has done them before.
- 01Angkor Wat Sunrise or Sunset Tour with Guide from Siem ReapThe Angkor pass is bought in person, and the sunrise run leaves before the ticket office opens. Buy the pass the afternoon before you go.
- 02Phare: The Cambodian Circus Show in Siem ReapOne big top, a few hundred seats and one show a night. In high season it is gone days ahead.
- 03Preah Vihear: Full-Day Preah Vihear and Koh Ker Temple TourA full day each way to the Thai border, with a checkpoint at the bottom of the escarpment and a 4x4 up it. This is not a morning-of decision.
- 04Kulen Mountain, Beng Mealea and Tonle Sap TourTwo hours out and two hours back on roads with no lighting. The drivers who run this route are booked in advance, not flagged down at breakfast.
When the rains come, the moat fills and the crowds go home.
From June to October it rains hard for an hour, usually mid-afternoon, and then stops. The moat fills, the flooded forest opens up to boats, Kulen runs at full volume and the temple stone goes dark and photogenic. Book the mornings, pack a poncho, and enjoy having Ta Prohm to yourself.
By region — the temples down to the coast
Siem Reap & Angkor1,264 tours
Phnom Penh292 tours
Battambang62 tours
Kampot & Kep32 tours
Sihanoukville & the coast19 tours- Every tour in Cambodia →
By experience — temples, water, road or table
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