Cambodia 6-Day Itinerary: Angkor Wat and Phnom Penh

About 15 minutes on foot from downtown, the Old Market is the first stop because it sits right in the area where most Siem Reap hotels cluster: set aside an hour to walk past stalls of silk, spices and crafts, with a food court in the back serving genuine Cambodian food at local prices.

Open since the French colonial era, it is the city’s oldest market and runs daily into the late evening. Haggling is normal, but in moderation: prices here already run lower than at the night markets nearby.

Five minutes on foot from the market, on the Siem Reap riverbank, Wat Preah Prom Rath is a 20 to 30-minute stop: an active temple, half Buddhist and half Hindu in origin, with ox and horse statues in the courtyard and a monk school running next door.

Leave the hotel before 5am if you want to catch the sun rising behind the five towers, Cambodia’s most repeated postcard shot: set aside two to three hours for the temple itself, and arrive with your Angkor Pass already bought, since the check line at the entrance backs up fast at sunrise.

Built in the early 12th century by King Suryavarman II as a Hindu temple dedicated to Vishnu, later converted to Buddhism, it is the largest religious monument in the world by built area. The first-level galleries hold 800 meters of carved bas-reliefs, including the Battle of Kurukshetra and the Churning of the Sea of Milk.

A twenty-minute drive from Angkor Wat, inside the old walled city of Angkor Thom, the Bayon temple calls for one to two hours: 216 smiling stone faces carved into 54 towers, said to be the face of King Jayavarman VII or the bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara, depending on who tells the story.

Angkor Thom was the last capital of the Khmer Empire, founded in the late 12th century, and still holds the Terrace of the Elephants and the Terrace of the Leper King a few minutes’ walk from the Bayon, easy to fold into the same stop at no extra ticket cost.

About an hour’s drive from Siem Reap, Banteay Srei takes up half a day once you count the trip, but it is worth it: set aside an hour at the temple, ideally early morning, when low light brings out the pink tone of the stone.

Built in 967 and dedicated to Shiva, it is the only Angkor temple carved in pink sandstone, harder and more weather-resistant than the grey stone used at Angkor Wat and Bayon: the carvings here, over a thousand years old, are better preserved than many reliefs on the main circuit that are far younger.

On the way back from Banteay Srei to Siem Reap, Ta Prohm is the afternoon stop: set aside an hour, and expect to share the space with other visitors, since it is the most photographed temple on the circuit after Angkor Wat.

Built in the late 12th century as a Buddhist monastery, it was deliberately left as French archaeologists found it: the roots of the spung tree (Tetrameles nudiflora) swallowing the stone corridors became the temple’s symbol, and the scenery gained worldwide fame after appearing in the 2001 film Tomb Raider.

About 40 minutes by car plus a stretch by boat from Siem Reap, Kampong Phluk takes up two to three hours: wooden houses raised on six to seven-meter stilts, which look like they are floating in the dry season and sit nearly submerged during the flood, between September and November.

The village lives off fishing on Tonle Sap, Southeast Asia’s largest freshwater lake, which expands up to five times in size at the peak of the rainy season. The boat ride between the houses usually includes a stop at the flooded mangrove forest.

Back in Siem Reap, the Angkor National Museum takes up an hour and a half: eight themed galleries explain the rise and fall of the Khmer Empire, with over 1,300 original pieces, including a room holding a thousand Buddha statues alone.

It is the ideal complement after two days of temples, since it explains the religious and historical context the stones alone do not. Admission costs US$12 for adults.

Still the official residence of Cambodia’s king, the Royal Palace takes up an hour: the Chanchhaya Pavilion, with its tiered golden roof, and the Silver Throne are the highlights of the section open to visitors, since the king’s private quarters stay closed to the public.

Built starting in 1866, when the capital moved from Oudong to Phnom Penh, the complex follows the canons of classical Khmer architecture, with tiered roofs and naga-shaped finials. Covered shoulders and knees are required to enter.

Inside the same Royal Palace grounds, the Silver Pagoda takes up 45 minutes: the floor is covered with over 5,000 solid silver tiles, each weighing about a kilogram, most of it kept under carpet to protect the metal from wear.

The temple holds the Emerald Buddha, made of Baccarat crystal, and a 90-kilogram solid gold Buddha studded with over 9,000 diamonds, donated by King Sisowath in 1906.

Fifteen minutes on foot from the Royal Palace, the Central Market is a 45-minute stop: the yellow art deco dome, built in 1937, is one of Phnom Penh’s most recognizable landmarks, with four cross-shaped wings selling everything from gold and watches to street snacks.

Atop a 27-meter artificial hill, the only natural elevation in this flat city, Wat Phnom is a 30-minute stop: the temple gives Phnom Penh its own name, and local legend has it that a woman named Penh found four Buddha statues floating in the river and built the temple to house them, in the 14th century.

Ten minutes on foot from the Royal Palace, the National Museum of Cambodia takes up an hour and a half: the terracotta-red 1920 building, in traditional Khmer style, holds the world’s largest collection of Khmer sculpture, with pieces taken directly from the Angkor temples.

The inner courtyard, with its enclosed tropical garden, is as much part of the visit as the galleries: a good spot to sit in the shade before the heavier museums of the afternoon.

Set aside an hour and a half, and come prepared emotionally: this former secondary school became the Khmer Rouge’s detention and torture center between 1975 and 1979, known as S-21, through which around 20,000 prisoners passed. Only a handful survived.

The classrooms, with improvised cells and prisoner ID photos, remain as they were found in 1979. The audio guide, included in the US$5 ticket, helps make sense of it without needing a human guide.

A 40-minute drive from downtown, Choeung Ek takes up an hour and a half: it is the best known of more than 300 killing fields used by the Khmer Rouge regime, where prisoners brought from S-21 were executed and buried in mass graves.

A glass memorial stupa, built in 1988, holds more than 5,000 skulls as a permanent testimony. The audio guide, included in the US$6 ticket, is the recommended way to visit: walking in silence, at your own pace, with no group narration.