Phnom Penh
Since we did not stay at the Raffles in Siem Reap we decided to in Phnom Penh. I booked through the Capital One portal for $651 for two nights. There have seemingly been more luxury hotels opening in Phnom Penh but we liked the old money nature of the Raffles.
We had a welcome drink and cold towel as we were being checked in. There was a weird quirk where everything except the last name was wrong under my personal information, but the duty manager told us it was an error on their side.
The lovely hotel aesthetic.
And the hallway to our room.
We were assigned a pool view room on the first floor.
The bathroom was small but nice.
And the main room area was also on the smaller side.
There was a curtain in the bathroom so it wasn’t always in your line of sight from the bedroom.
And our pool view.
There was a festival going on so we headed out to explore and walked along the water. There was a fun buzz to the city.
Before heading out to dinner we enjoyed a drink at The Elephant bar.
The Raffles had a free electric TukTuk service which we used to go to dinner.
I booked us a table at Cuisine Wat Damnak which has a branch in Siem Reap and Phnom Penh.
This course we ended up ordering one vegetarian version of because we weren’t sure if it would actually have a local version of the dish with a fertilized duck egg. Our fears were for not because it was delicious western style braised duck.
The vegetarian alternative.
A good prawn dish
Scallops with a good clam jus
Delicious beef dumpling dish
The fish was good, but the smoked pork bites were amazing.
And the delicious dessert
Finally a second dessert course.
Our bill came with fresh fruit and mango salt. The bill came to $130 including drinks which felt like great value by US standards.
The lobby of the Raffles was stunning at night.
Our rate did not include breakfast but it was only $25 a person.
There was no buffet, but a menu you could order as much as you want from.
And we were given a unprompted bread basket.
All the food was fine and we went with a more western selection.
After breakfast, we went to the Choeung Ek Genocidal museum which was heavy, but important to see. We then checked out the Grand Palace.
Before heading back to the hotel for a poolside snack.
From there, we had another Lost Plate food tour which started with a Khmer noodle dish.
Then Stop 2 for some more Khmer dishes. We noticed at least 3 other food tours from other companies at similar spots.
A sightseeing interlude.
Before more food!
And finally our choice of meats.
Which we took to a cool rooftop bar to enjoy.
A much needed refreshment.
with great people watching.
The next morning our trend of departing on rainy days continued as we said goodbye to the Raffles.
We splurged and paid $100 for the hotel BMW to take us to the new airport which is about an hour away. A grab would have been $30 but the car was a fun way to depart in luxury.
The airport only opened a month ago and is stunning.
The way it was designed made it feel nice and open.
We checked our bags through to San Francisco as we had a 20 hour layover in Singapore. This contained all our Emirates haul so precious cargo!
There was a long boat display in the airport for some local flair.
The plaza premium lounge was celebrating its grand opening the day we were there which was funny.
The lounge was nice and well designed.
There was an à la carte menu I ordered some congee from
And some dim sum
The lounge starter to fill up with visitors for the opening ceremony so we left to explore.
And saw our SQ 737 pull in to the gate.
Up next, Singapore!