Phnom Penh City Tour: Where we Bought Postage Stamps in Cambodia on a Sunday

On our second day in Phnom Penh, we're expecting to visit alot of the places indicated in our itinerary, we also had a different guide for the day named Mr. Sean. But first things first, breakfast!

Our first dip out in the morning sun was the Independence Monument, which was located near this really huge park where people could enjoy some early morning exercise. It was nice that they still had places like these in the city, 'cuz back in Manila, we were too congested to even have simple privileges like this.

For our next stop, which I really wanted to see in person because all the picture I saw online were really beautiful, was the Royal Palace!

Gates to the Royal Palace

It was magnificent seeing it up close! Everything just seemed to glimmer under the sun (as you can see in the pictures). It was too bad though that you couldn't take pictures of some of the inside places, but I understand their need for privacy (and protection), although we did get to take pictures inside the palace museum and imagine my surprise when I saw this:

Lucky colors for the day, starting from Sunday [leftmost] to Saturday [rightmost]

That's the museum on the right

There was more to see inside the royal complex, so we were next headed to the Silver Pagoda, taking pictures along the way:

Mr. Sean insisted we pose near this gateway...

The hallways surrounding the Silver Pagoda were painted in what looked to be like a storybook with a couple of stupas (where they housed the ashes of loved ones long passed) placed around the quad. But what really got me curious was that the Silver Pagoda wasn't really silver at all (not on the outside anyway)...

We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, but it turns out the pagoda got its name since the floor inside was made out of silver! After getting a glimpse of the old coins that Cambodia used to have, we rounded the pagoda outside and found a miniature version of the Angkor Wat:

Getting excited for our Angkor Wat tour in a couple of days!

Nearing the end of our tour in the Royal Palace, we still got to take more pictures of the smaller exhibits near the exit:

Talk about being the elephant in the room...

Free water by the exit gate! #souvenir

Passing along the Tonle Sap Rivers, we next had a short but meaningful stop at Wat Unalom Pagoda, where we even got blessed by a monk just before they took a short break for lunch. Curiously, Mr. Sean even introduced to us what looked like their form of fortune-telling:

See that "pendulum" at the end of the red string? You have to like insert it between the cards while it's on your head

The National Museum was next, but Mr. Sean left us on our own then, saying that the museum had guides of their own and we could rent them. Fascinatingly, the guides he was talking about were audio headsets that you could rent for $5/pax. We didn't quite have those back in the Philippines yet, but we also didn't get our own here, since I personally preferred not having a voice talking in my head while I roamed around new places; Still I found it entertaining to see people staring intensely at a piece of art, probably thinking it had all the answers to their questions (and maybe, the audio did)..

Picture-taking wasn't exactly allowed (even though some of the other tourists did just that), so I wasn't able to document how this lady inside the museum handed us a couple of flowers to offer to Buddha, and if you give her a dollar (or two in our case) in return, she would also do this chanting stuff and tie a red string around your wrist:

I still have it with me, even though I didn't exactly know what it was she said that time...

All the walking we've been doing since that morning caught up with us, so we opted to sit down near the museum's gardens (where picture-taking was allowed), and bought coke and well, a couple of Angkor Beers (which we later consumed back in our hotel room).

Just before we left, we noticed that aside from postcards, the museum was also selling postage stamps! Mom wanted to send one out from each city we'd be passing, but worried that the Phnom Penh Post Office would be closed since we arrived during the weekends. Luckily, Mr. Sean was kind enough to assist us in dropping off mom's postcard.

That is not where you drop off your mail...

This is where!

No Posts on Sundays

And that was just the morning half of our day before we made the drive for lunch near the place of our next itinerary. P.S. my next post may not be for the weak of hearts.

Getting Around Phnom Penh - Strolling Around Street 240

I read in an article that Street 240 was some of the nice places to shop at, and it just so happens that I researched a couple of stores that I wanted to go to in that area, so here I am!

Turns out, Pass App was really reliable and I think the fare price was practical for that distance too. Keep in mind that the app shows the fare in Cambodian Riel, but you can still pay in US Dollars (which is more commonly used in this country), though be prepared to be given change in the form of Riel. And since all that on-the-spot conversion got me hungry, it was time to stop by for lunch first!

In all honesty, I slightly had to use Google Maps in order to find the exact place where the Artillery was located, since we had to go inside this little alleyway in order to find it nestled just around the corner, but all totally worth it!

You gotta love these street arts!

I'm not much of a vegetarian, but I'm currently in the process of eating less pork in my diet, and their Tofu Sandwich was delish! And I also didn't pass up the chance to have some ice cream on this fine, hot afternoon.

I think this was the Thai Quinoa Crunch??? (mom's order)

Sizzling Tofu (I loved it!!!)

And let's not forget dessert! (Coconut + Choco Chunks = Bounty Island)

Having satisfied our hunger, we set off to find some of the stores I was curious about.

I adored the interior of Mekong Quilts' store when I saw it on Google Maps and I just had to see it for myself, and I also couldn't help but make a purchase too:

Meet, Mr. Pig! (I know, not really an original name so...)

And since my mom still had a little hangover from buying postcards, I suggested stopping by D's Books:

Can you spot my mom?

Gotta save up for my next "pages"!

You could say that the exhaustion of the day started catching with us, so we decided to head back to the hotel by then. Although we did have to make a stop at a Kiwi Mart (convenience store) along the way to buy some much needed water. But we got back just in time to see the sunset from the Sky Bar!

By this point, we were well and truly "Poofed!", so we had room service deliver our dinner (just a couple of clubhouse sandwiches) to our room instead:

Stay tuned for my next post on what's on our 2nd day itinerary in the city of Phnom Penh!

Our First Day in Cambodia: Arrival at Phnom Penh

Upon arrival at the Phnom Penh International Airport, we were then met at the Arrivals Area by Mr. Kim, our designated tour guide for the day. We were then transferred to our car, in which we drove to the nearest restaurant to have breakfast!

Our first meal in the Kingdom of Cambodia!

Being in a plane for most of the night can really affect your sense of things, so at this point I was still taking in my surroundings and before I knew it, we were officially starting our itinerary for the day. First stop, Phsar Thmei, Phnom Penh's Central Market!

Souvenir shopping on the first day was overwhelming for my senses; it was a good thing I already had a list of things to buy, the problem was finding where it was located in a huge place like the Central Market! (and yeah, our guide kinda just gave us basic instructions on where to meet and at what time, so this part of the tour was just done on our own...)

Postcards added to my mom's collection

In the end, our shopping hunt proved to be a success! So vaguely I remember once you enter from the central entrance and head towards the right side of the area, you'll see the artsy finds (like paintings, stained-glass bowls and postcards). The leftmost side was where the food stuff was located, and if you passed through the wet market, you'll find this little treasure trove at the end:

Local goodies! (Palm sugar and jack fruit chips)

Our second stop was Wat Phnom Pagoda, which was a temple built on top of a hill. After climbing a couple set of stairs, you'll be greeted by the serenity of the place. We strolled around the place for a good hour or so taking pictures, and mostly for me to just absorb the fact that I'm really here in this new and mystical place!

Yes, the giant clock works. (Batteries come from China, so says our tour guide)

Turns out, Wat Phnom was our last place for that day and we would be heading to our hotel, Samnang Laor, to rest and maybe catch up on some Zzzs (yeah right)...

Lobby area...

... and that's Mr. Kim at the Reception Area

Loved the floor tiles in the bathroom!

Sky Bar / Restaurant

Indoor swimming pools + jacuzzi

Our hotel room was a lot bigger than I expected (lots of floor space), the hotel restaurant was more like a Sky Bar (which had a nice view of the city), and they also had an indoor pool and jacuzzi! (we tried it out on our last night in Phnom Penh, water smelled kinda weird though...) All these pros had a little con to our seemingly quiet hotel. It was too quiet. Samnang Laor was not located along the busier streets of Phnom Penh! Which means we had to venture out, and I sure as hell wouldn't be spending most of the afternoon stuck in my hotel room. And so here is how we found our way around the city:

Find out next week what other places we discovered as we headed to Street 240!

Travelling in the Time of Corona - To Go or Not to Go?

Although at that certain point in time, the only dilemma we were facing was finding a tour around Cambodia that didn't just offer Siem Reap (and even if they did have a Phnom Penh package, they just didn't combine tours).

Coming to this travel fair should have given us at least a dozen, if not a couple of options...

...but none of them got back to us. And yes, I waited at least a week (or two) before I decided to rethink my options. Insert my mom, who's been going on about this travel agency she'd seen a local celebrity promote, on how they were biking along the Temples of Angkor Wat and it got me into research mode, again.

Their answer? You don’t just to go out to see the world – you meet it.

So Pros & Cons time: My main Con at that time was what if Access Travels proved to be too expensive out of reach for my budget? It was overwhelming enough to see that it was mostly our local celebrities who promoted them, so can an ordinary person like me really afford their services??? Well I'd have to inquire to find out.

The Pros was that it was smooth transacting with them. Like, I just sent this itinerary from another travel agency, (who also didn't get back to me) Access said it was possible, we got down to business, and the rest was history. So everything was all laid down and set for our February trip (I contacted them last November 2019), but then fast forward to just a few weeks before our departure, another dilemma arose...

Just like that, flights from China, Hong Kong, Macau were being cancelled. A co-worker of mine didn't even get to enjoy her vacation to Taiwan after they made a travel ban there too, just a week before her intended departure. So now all I had to do was hope against hope.

Turns out we made it! There's still quite a number of people in the airport though who still prefer to wear face masks, which is a good thing in itself 'cuz one can never be too careful... 

Find out more next week how our first day in the city of Phnom Penh went! See yah!