Siem Reap to Phnom Penh: USD and riel, temple tickets, tuk-tuk apps, and data that fades once you leave the tourist loop.
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Cambodia is a temple dawn, a city that still runs on tuk-tuks, and a currency situation where the US dollar and the riel share a wallet. Siem Reap is the base for Angkor if you want to see more than one postcard at 9am with a thousand other lenses. Go at opening, hire a driver you like, and treat midday as a nap, not a hero hour.
Phnom Penh is riverside heat, a palace, and a history that is not a light museum afternoon. Eat where the plastic chairs are full. Learn that small riel notes are for the exact change the dollar bill will not make.
The islands and the coast are a second trip. Roads can be slow. A 'four-hour' van is a suggestion. Download maps before you leave the last 4G town.
Esenciales
Consejos de viajeros
Consejos reales de personas que han estado en Cambodia, seleccionados por nuestro equipo con enlaces a las fuentes originales.
The ticket is timed. The heat after 10am is the real queue. Go early, go back late, do not 'do it all' in one martyr day.
Keep small USD. Riel is for the change a $10 bill will otherwise eat as a 'no change' tax.
The 'temple is closed, I know a better one' helper is working. Your ticket and the official map are the authority.
Grab-style pricing beats a negotiation you will lose while jet-lagged.
Cross slowly and predictably, like Vietnam's cousin. Do not dart.
Hello Angkor
Buy at angkorenterprise.gov.kh or the Road 60 ticket office. A QR from a hotel lobby or a tuk-tuk uncle is not the pass. The three-day ticket is any three days inside a longer window, not three mornings in a row — check the current rule on the government page before you plan a rest day. Koh Ker and Phnom Kulen are separate tickets. Temples do not sell the main park pass at the inner gates.
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Cambodia prices the pass and the tuk-tuk day in US dollars. Machines usually dispense dollars; riel arrives as change for anything under a dollar. A creased or ink-marked bill is how a stall “cannot” make change. Keep small clean ones. Stacks of 100-riel notes look like money and buy almost nothing — that is why people still carry both currencies in one pocket.
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A scarf over a vest does not count at Angkor Wat's upper levels. Knee-length cloth and covered shoulders are the ticket past the bakong stairs. The ruin terraces are looser; the active shrine is not.
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The archaeological zone is a day of temples, not one postcard of Angkor Wat. If you land with a suitcase, a car you can lock beats leaving bags in a tuk-tuk. Give it two days or do not pretend you saw it.
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Both. Hotels often quote USD. Markets give riel change. Keep small bills of each.
Only on a regional plan that lists Thailand. The land border is busy and plan-sensitive.
Near the main circuit, usually fine. Outer temples and forest roads dip. Offline map for a full-day pass.
Airport desks work and want paper. An eSIM has Grab up in arrivals.
Drink bottled. Brushing teeth with tap water is a personal risk call; many visitors still bottle it.
Planes eSIM
Temple tickets, Grab and a driver who only messages on Telegram all want data at REP or PNH. A Cambodia eSIM is online before you buy a tourist SIM that needs a photocopy of your passport.
If you are hopping from Bangkok, that is a different country list. Poipet is a border, not a suburb of Thailand.