Siem Reap, the town, not the temples
A town of a quarter of a million people that exists in its modern form because of the temples next door, and which is a good deal more interesting than the street the guidebooks name.
What Siem Reap actually is
A provincial capital of around a quarter of a million people, six kilometres south of the Angkor park boundary. It was a small town until the 1990s; almost everything visitors see was built after 1998, when the security situation stabilised and the temples reopened properly.
The reputation problem is Pub Street, which is two blocks of bars and identical restaurants and is what a lot of people mean when they say Siem Reap is a tourist town. It is not the town. The French quarter along the river, the old market, the Artisans Angkor workshops where stone and lacquer are actually being made, and the residential streets north of the river are all within twenty minutes on foot and none of them looks like that.
The town also carries the whole tourism economy of the province. That has consequences worth knowing about, including a well-documented orphanage-visiting industry that we will not go near for any reason.
How many nights
Three at minimum, four if you want an evening that is not spent recovering from a temple day. The three-day Angkor pass is the reason: three days in the park plus an arrival and departure means four nights in practice for most itineraries.
Two nights is a one-and-a-half-day Angkor trip, which is the compromise almost every ten-day multi-country itinerary makes, including ours. It works and it is a compromise.
The new airport changes the arithmetic slightly: Siem Reap Angkor International opened in 2023 and is 45 kilometres east of town, about 55 minutes. The old airport six kilometres out is closed. That is nearly two hours of transfer across an arrival and a departure, and it catches people with tight connections.
What to do in the evenings
- Phare, the Cambodian Circus. A performance company that grew out of an arts school for young people from difficult backgrounds. It is genuinely good, it is not a folklore show, and the money goes where it says it does.
- Artisans Angkor. A workshop and school teaching stone carving, wood carving, lacquer and silk. Free to walk through, and you watch apprentices work.
- The old market and the river at dusk. Twenty minutes on foot from most hotels and nothing like Pub Street.
- Kampong Phluk on the Tonle Sap. A half day rather than an evening — a stilted village on the flood plain, forty minutes further out than the nearer floating village and without the boat-touting that has ruined it. In the dry season the houses stand ten metres in the air on their poles.
Any visit to an orphanage or residential care home for children, and the nearer floating village at Chong Kneas, which has been comprehensively organised around extracting money from visitors and where the orphanage trade is most visible. Roughly 80 per cent of children in Cambodian “orphanages” have a living parent. Visiting sustains the industry. See travelling responsibly.
When to go
| Months | What it is like |
|---|---|
| November to February | The best window. Dry, 22 to 32 degrees, low humidity. Also the busiest and most expensive. |
| March to May | Hot. 36 to 40 degrees at Angkor in April, and the stone radiates it back. |
| June to August | Wet season. Heavy rain in bursts, everything green, the moats full, and fewer people. |
| September to October | The wettest months and the best photography. The Tonle Sap is at its highest and Kampong Phluk is genuinely floating. |
Hotel rates in Siem Reap move sharply. A room that costs USD 70 in September costs USD 130 in December.
What things cost
| Simple hotel, double | USD 25 - 45 |
| Comfortable hotel with a pool, double | USD 60 - 110 |
| The best hotels in town | USD 190 - 450 |
| Khmer meal in a local restaurant | USD 4 - 8 |
| Dinner for two, good restaurant | USD 30 - 60 |
| Tuk-tuk across town | USD 2 - 3 |
| Phare circus ticket | USD 18 - 38 |
| Kampong Phluk boat, per person | USD 20 - 25 |
| Airport transfer, 45 km | USD 20 - 30 |
Photographs
When to skip Siem Reap
- If you are not going to Angkor. There is no other reason to be here.
- April and May, if heat is a real problem for you.
- If you have only two nights and Angkor is the point. Better to add a night than to run the temples at speed.
- If you dislike a town whose economy is entirely tourism. Siem Reap does not pretend otherwise.
- If you are relying on the Thai land border to reach it. It has been closed since June 2025 and there is no reopening date.
Tours that include Siem Reap
Four nights in the seven-day Cambodia route, three in the twelve-day Vietnam and Cambodia route, the eighteen-day classic and the twenty-four-day route, and three in the ten-day express.
Questions travellers ask most
How far is the new airport really?
Forty-five kilometres, about 55 minutes in normal traffic. Siem Reap Angkor International opened in 2023 and the old airport is closed.
Build the hour into both your arrival and your departure. People miss connections over this.
How do I get here now the Thai border is shut?
By air. Bangkok to Siem Reap is about an hour and runs several times a day. Overland from Vietnam via Bavet–Moc Bai and Phnom Penh is open and ordinary.
Every Thailand–Cambodia land crossing has been closed since late June 2025 with no announced reopening.
Is Pub Street unavoidable?
Entirely avoidable. It is two blocks. The river, the French quarter and the streets north of the water are ten minutes away and are a different town.
Why will you not arrange an orphanage visit?
Because roughly four in five children in Cambodian residential care institutions have at least one living parent, and the visitor trade is a large part of what keeps those institutions full.
It is one of the clearest cases in travel where good intentions cause harm, and no operator should be selling it.
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