Travelogue
Neak Loeung and the Tsubasa Bridge - 25 October 2025
Neak Loeung is a sleepy, dusty town in Cambodia on the main road between Phnom Penh and the Vietnam border. Once upon a time the highway at Neak Loeung crossed the Mekong River by ferry as you moved between Kandal and Svay Rieng provinces about an hour’s drive south of the Cambodian capital in a country where transport still moves relatively slowly. Today the town has taken a back seat as the once bustling ferries are now gone replaced by a most spectacular sight, the Tsubasa Bridge, an engineering marvel. The opening of the Tsubasa Bridge in April 2015 made it possible to drive across the Mekong River on this route for the first time all day every day, and removed the bottleneck of the river crossing. Building the bridge has been hyped as the star development project in all of Cambodia and showcased the high-quality infrastructure capabilities of Japan.Neak Loeung isn’t so much a town with a bridge as bridge with a town, though the town came well before the bridge was built. The town has a population of a few thousand, is a regional service centre, and serves as the base for NGOs working in the area. Before the bridge was built all traffic using the main road and crossing the river on the ferries went straight through the town. With that transport function came employment and economic activity with communities built around those. The ferries carried everything across the river. Squeezed on board were every manner of wheeled transport. Saffron-robed monks on
Gym Etiquette in Cambodia - 31 August 2025
Gyms can play an important part in recreation for Cambodians as outdoor facilities are few and far between and there is a shortage of parks and sports grounds generally. There’s the Olympic Stadium built in the 1960s which never hosted any Olympic event, Phnom Penh’s Old Stadium in the city’s north and the brand new Morodok Techo National
Working Out in the Kingdom of Wonder - 31 July 2025
One of the things about travel is the chance to experience what’s different about a place: it’s people, customs, their behaviours, and habits. Some of the different approaches people take are interesting. Some can make you think, and some others can be a little irritating and exercise gyms are no different. But let’s face it, if everyone and
Ayutthaya by Train - 29 June 2025
I’ve been to Phra Nakhon Si Ayutthaya (or just Ayutthaya) before by road on a tour booked out of Bangkok’s less than salubrious Khao San Road, the backpacker mecca (or ghetto as some refer to it), the area that made a living out of the “little yellow bible”, Lonely Planet’s guide to Southeast Asia, the original budget guidebook. This time I went
Jomtien Beach - The Quiet Neighbour - 15 May 2025
Jomtien is the quiet junior partner of its noisier more crowded neighbour, Pattaya. It caters to those not wanting the nightlife, the traffic, flashing lights, pumping music, and the crowds. It’s a second home for affluent Thais wanting to escape Bangkok 100kms away for holidays and at weekends. It’s home to expats who retire for the warmth, the
Trat - The City of Half-a-Hundred Islands - 14 April 2025
The road from the Cambodian border to the eastern Thai city of Trat is a great drive. Vehicles in Thailand drive on the other side of the road (the UK side) from Cambodia where I’d come from, so closest to you on the left (the passenger side) are the turquoise waters of the Gulf of Thailand and to the right, the hills and jungle of the Cardamom
Phnom Penh to Koh Kong - 8 March 2025
Roads in Cambodia have come a long way since my first visit in 2004. The main land entry point from Thailand at Poipet for example, was along a dirt road badly rutted, virtually impassable in the wet with rudimentary one-lane bridges comprised of bare metal frames laid roughly across waterways. Vehicles inched on to them one wheel at a time
The Road from Koh Kong in 2006 - 22 January 2025
I’ve traveled the road between Koh Kong and Phnom Penh several times over the years in both directions starting in 2006. The first time was from the Thai border to Phnom Penh in a Cambodian taxi the durability of which was testament to Toyota’s engineering skills. Last month I made that journey again in the opposite direction starting in
Kampot and Kep - Salt ‘N’ Pepper - 20 December 2024
I’ve been to Kampot in southern Cambodia a few times over the years but this was my first trip back there since the pandemic. I was interested to see what had changed and more to the point what had not, because Kampot has historical charm that you wouldn’t want to see gone. What you would want is that charm maintained and hopefully restored in
