Happy TravellerSiem Reap, the second-largest city of Cambodia, is a popular tourist destination known for its rich history, stunning architecture, and vibrant culture. The city is located in northwestern Cambodia and is the capital and largest city of Siem Reap Province. Siem Reap has a unique blend of French colonial and Chinese-style architecture in the Old French Quarter and around the Old Market. The city is home to museums, traditional Apsara dance performances, a Cambodian cultural village, souvenir and handicraft shops, silk farms, rice paddies in the countryside, fishing villages, and a bird sanctuary near Tonlé Sap. Siem Reap is also known for its cosmopolitan drinking and dining scene. In 2020, Siem Reap was crowned the ASEAN City of Culture for the period 2021–2022 at the 9th Meeting of the ASEAN Ministers Responsible for Culture and Arts (AMCA).
Siem Reap owes much of its popularity to its proximity to the Angkor Wat temples, Cambodia’s most popular tourist attraction. Angkor Wat is the central feature of the Angkor UNESCO World Heritage Site containing the magnificent remains of the Khmer civilization. Angkor Wat’s rising series of five towers culminates in an impressive central tower that symbolizes mythical Mount Meru. Thousands of feet of wall space are covered with intricate carvings depicting scenes from Hindu mythology. Other notable sites in the Angkor Archaeological Park include Angkor Thom, Ta Prohm, Preah Khan, Banteay Kdei, Phnom Bakheng, Ta Keo, Ta Som, East Mebon, Pre Rup, and Neak Pean. These temples may be visited along the grand circuit or the small circuit routes. Other sites are the Roluos group of temples located to the east of Siem Reap.
Siem Reap is a cluster of small villages along the Siem Reap River. These villages were originally developed around Buddhist pagodas (wats) which are almost evenly spaced along the river from Wat Preah En Kau Sei in the north to Wat Phnom Krom in the south, where the Siem Reap River meets the great Tonlé Sap Lake. The town center is concentrated around Sivutha Street and the Psar Chas area (Old Market area) where there are old colonial buildings, shopping, and commercial districts. The Wat Bo area is now full of guesthouses and restaurants while the Psar Leu area is often crowded with jewelry and handicraft shops, selling such items as rubies and woodcarving. Other fast-developing areas are the airport road and main road to Angkor where a number of large hotels and resorts can be found.
Tourism is a very important aspect of the economy of Siem Reap. It was estimated in 2010 that over 50% of jobs in the town were related to the tourism industry. The city has seen a massive increase in tourist exchange in the couple of decades after the end of the Khmer Rouge era, and businesses centered on tourism have flourished due to the tourism boom. Visitor numbers were negligible in the mid-1990s, but by 2004, over half a million foreign visitors had arrived in Siem Reap Province that year, approximately 50% of all foreign tourists in Cambodia. By 2012, tourist numbers had reached over two million.
Apart from the temples, Siem Reap has many other attractions. The Cambodia Landmine Museum and Relief Center offers tourists and Cambodians the chance to see (safe) landmines up close, understand how they work, and what they can do to help rid Cambodia and the world of their continuing threat. The War Museum Cambodia covers the last three decades of the 20th century when the Khmer Rouge was active in Cambodia. There is a vast array of vehicles, artillery, weaponry, landmines, and equipment on display. The Angkor National Museum offers visitors a better understanding of the area’s archaeological treasures. The Golden Era of the Khmer Kingdom is presented, including the use of state-of-the-art multimedia technology. The museum covers Khmer history, civilization, and cultural heritage in eight galleries. The Old Market or Psah Chas offers a mixture of souvenirs for tourists and a variety of food produce and other items meant for the locals. Other markets in Siem Reap include the Angkor Night Market, Phsar Kandal (the Central Market), and Phsar Leu (the Upper Market). The Made in Cambodia Market is a night market for tourists in Siem Reap where all the products sold are made in Cambodia. The market hosts daily shows and other events in Kings Road. Artisans Angkor is a semi-public company founded in 1992 which aims to revive traditional Khmer craftsmanship and provide employment for rural artisans. It is also associated with a silk farm where visitors may learn about sericulture
