Krong Kampot is a cool little city close to the border with Vietnam. It's a relaxed and quaint place that makes for a great home base for lots of great scooter trips to the surrounding areas.
I arrived in Kampot after a night in Sihanouk. I'd stayed there after returning to the mainland from Koh Rong. The bus ride wasn't too long. It only took a few hours.
In Kampot I found a hotel room next to the river. It was a nice place and was in a good location for walking to food and beer. The hotel helped organize a scooter rental so I had my own transportation for the time I was there. I had about 8 days to kill before my Vietnamese visa was valid.
It was the first time I'd seen a hotel ban a certain type of fruit. I hadn't yet encountered a durian and I thought the reason was because of ants or other pests. In Vietnam I came across some durian and understood that it was not allowed in the hotel because it smells so bad.
The hotel had a cool, upstairs, open-air, covered lounge area that I spent a lot of time in. It was a nice area for having some beer and reading.
In town, I found a place next to the river and had some beer and watched the people cruising the town's main road.
It seemed like all of the town's teenagers would ride up and down this road and socialize.
Kampot had some good food options and I was happy to find a Turkish doner kebab place. It wasn't the best doner, but in my opinion even a bad doner is a good dinner. And this one wasn't bad, it just wasn't wasn't up to the standard found in Germany.
The next day I took a trip to Kep, the neighboring town.
The ride to Kep was a lot of fun. I loved this little road that ran next to the ocean.
Kep has some cool French colonial homes. I couldn't tell if they were abandoned or just closed for the season.
As I was taking photos, these puppies came out to say hello. Then they started wrestling.
After getting a few photos of the beach, I went inland to check out some trails that went up into the hills.
The paths were well established and my scooter didn't have much trouble climbing them. I'm pretty sure I was the only person on a scooter on the paths, so I'm not sure if scooters are actually allowed on the paths.
There were lots of nice little rest areas with cool vistas.
There was also a little refreshment place on one of the paths. They sold tea, coffee, and other drinks. I'm pretty sure they sold snacks too.
As I was riding, a local stopped me and pointed into the trees. A monkey was hanging out in the forest. I wasn't able to get a photo of it though.
After a couple of hours on the paths, I returned to Kep.
I got a few more photos of Kep. Then returned to Kampot by a different route.
I passed by some salt farms on the outside of Kep.
The next day I took a trip in the opposite direction of Kep. The road was much better, but also much higher in elevation. Next to Kampot is a big national park.
I read that there were tigers in the park, but I didn't see any on my visit.
On top of a mountain is this abandoned French hotel. It's got a really cool style to it. A lot of other tourists were there when I arrived.
Some of the walls are pockmarked from bullets. The hotel was the scene of a long battle between different Cambodian forces when the people overthrew the Khmer Rouge.
The views from the hotel were impressive. It made me wonder what the hotel was like during its heyday.
In this shot, you can barely see a church in the upper left. During the protracted battle, one force was in the church and another force was in the hotel. They spent a lot of time shooting at each other.
The area around the hotel was mostly empty, though there was some development going on.
The vistas of the land and ocean were impressive even though it was cloudy when I visited.
I tried to get a little artistic with some of my photos. Here are a couple of my fancy shots.
I also visited the church on the hill, but there really wasn't much to it.
Over the next few days I took a more trips and explored the surrounding area. Here are some of the photos from those trips.
I checked out some of the areas next to the river.
There were also some cool little villages that seemed really picturesque.
That's most of my Kampot photos. I really enjoyed my time in this town. It was a great place to relax and take short excursions to other cool places. There was a lot to explore in this area.
Eventually my time came and my Vietnamese visa became valid. I got on a bus and headed to Ho Chi Minh City.
I had no idea what to expect from Vietnam. Some bloggers that I'd read had hated their time in Vietnam and swore they would never return. But the comments in those blogs were filled with people who called Vietnam their favorite country.
All I knew was that I wanted to keep riding scooters and by all accounts, Vietnam was the best place to do it. My plan was to buy a scooter in HCMC and ride until I didn't want to ride any more. And that's exactly what I did.
I hope you'll join me next time as I begin my road trip through Vietnam!