Kampot - coastal Cambodia

After our stay in Phnom Penh we caught a bus to Kampot which is a small town about 3 miles inland on the Kampot river where we stayed in basically a beach bums hostel/hangout.

 We had a very salubrious hut:-

With a collection of very sweet fellow residents:-

In the 1900's the French built a hill top resort - to get away from the heat.... we took a trip up there where we found:-

Great views

A butterfly that stood still long enough for me to take it's photo - the first in Asia!

The Old French Hotel - recently sandblasted clean for renovation.

The other buildings have not been restored and look more like these!

We also say a very weird Buddha

The Cambodians are building a massive hotel complex there complete with casino, we walked in and boy was it weird..... It was fully open but with no guests, apparently it's called a soft opening where they just have everyone working but only take guests who walk in off the street. The grand opening is next month.... a couple of pics that show nothing:-

We have found that in both Vietnam and Cambodia if you want to have a celebration then with no issue whatsoever you hold it in the street, you just put up a marquee and let the good times roll, regardless of what this does to the rest of the street, or town. We saw one in Phnomn Penh which had taken over about three quarters of what in the UK would be Park Lane.... This is a wedding reception blocking the entire road one evening in Kampot.

These bins are all over Cambodia and are made from old tyres... I liked them.

We took a boat up the Kampot, went for a swim in the the gentle backwaters and then floated downstream to watch the sunset... Here's some pictures. Including one with Liza in it. We have been getting complaints about not enough pictures with us in them. As neither of us is a) photogenic  and b) I take all the pictures I doubt this is going to radically alter but we'll at least make an effort,

Of course with me being me there was also some geography/history type pictures so...
Here is a fish trap:-

And we also passed the fishing village that every night put about 20 small boats out to sea (4 miles downstream) so here is pictures of the village and the boats.... You'll see if you  look hard a sunken boat. Also these are very small boats for full sea going fishing purposes and they must be very dangerous....

And finally for this post a picture of some beans.... Liza wanted me to take this so she could show her father.... So Paul, this is the size of green bean you get in your breakfast noodle soup over here... and yes we have been eating vegetable noodle soup regularly for breakfast! If Liza can get these home grown in Sussex then vegetable noodles for breakfast will become a regular!