The Rikitikitavi guesthouse is an old rice barn converted to 5 guestrooms, with an open air bar and restaurant deck area at the front, upstairs. Great breezes all day and even a day of rain gave us the coolest temperatures we had experienced since early January in Australia’s high country. It was still low 30’s every day but not too still and sticky.
The room had a TV with DVD player so Molly caught up with her favourite episodes of Glee (and converted me to being a Gleek) and did a lot of dancing and singing whilst we were upstairs blogging and writing.
The evening offered a few choices in the town but we found the food at Rikitikitavi was superb and the setting by far the best in town so we sat and watched sunset after sunset from the restaurant.
Kampot itself is a curious place. In the first 3 days we saw more westerners in Kampot then we would see in Johor Bahru in 1 month, yet it is just a very old town, mostly run down with a pretty river (that you can’t swim in). Sure the old colonial French architecture is interesting but rarely in good condition and there are some local tours to mostly interesting activities, but there seems to be no single reason for the towns popularity.
There are quite a few expatriates in Kampot and unlike many parts of Asia, the female side of relationships is also expat. The local tourist magazines are also very comprehensive and give Kampot a lot os space and a lot of praise so perhaps that draws people. For us we can’t complain, it was a very relaxing 6 days to catch up on everything and do nothing.
As we were around the guesthouse all day every day we met other guests and found that most were very well traveled – perhaps that is why they were in Kampot, they had already been everywhere else in the region!?? Reuedi, from Germany, arrived on the same day as us and left one day earlier so we spoent most evenings talking to him over a few drinks, eventually bringing him into a few hands of UNO and letting him win the 2010 Kampot UNO Championship.
We also managed to have our 10th wedding anniversary in Kampot. After a few cocktails with sunset we were treated to a bottle of wine on the house and then settled into a lovely dinner, with Reuedi also joining the three of us. After dinner was more drinks and we encouraged Walt (English spelling) and Addei (correct spelling I hope) from the Netherlands to join us. They had traveled extensively and had some very interesting stories and cool perspectives from different trips – as an un-cultured Australian I could only teach them the meaning of the Dutch Oven and the Dutch Hand-Grenade so I feel a little embarrassed. We had a great anniversary.