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Published: July 11th 2016
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Made sure I made as much noise as I could when I got up at 6am as a sign of appreciation for being woken by a rowdy French bunch at 4am. Then it was off in a tuktuk to discover the sights of rural Kampot and seaside Kep. The first stop was a cave at Phnom Chhngok which was 20km away over potholed, muddy dirt roads running through rice fields. The cave has a Hindu shrine, a few stalactites and stalacmites and bats harbouring within. There were 250 odd steps to the entrance. There's generally a couple of hundred steps to any of the religious sites despite most of the country being as flat as a pancake. From there the roads deteriorated to rutted ox cart tracks that gave the suspension on the tuktuk a workout but we eventually bounced to a stop at a place called the secret lake. I don't know what secret it harbours but it was built during the years of the Pol Pot regime so I can hazard a guess. Next on the list of sites was La Plantation, a pepper plantation overlooking the secret lake. The plantation was created in 2013 and is French owned
but Khmer run. It is the largest plantation in the district, currently having 2623 posts in place with each post havingone pepper vine wrapped around it. The vines grow to around 4 metres tall in the first year and are then kept at that height. The flowers are all picked from the plants the first two years to give them a chance to grow without fruiting. At year 3 they expect about 1 kilo of pepper per vine and thereafter between 2 and 4 kg's. Around 80% of the harvest is green peppercorns which are then boiled and turn black. White pepper is created when you peel the outer husk from the black pepper. The remaining 20% is red pepper, highly prized because it is slightly sweeter. La Plantation covers 40ha with some planted in turmeric and some in peanuts with a lot of posts going in to host further pepper vines. Another bumpy ride and we eventually hit the main road to Kep. About 4km of it is four lane highway, the remainder is in the process of becoming four lane highway, read roadworks, and apparently has been for years. Kep is a pleasant seaside town famous for its
crab. A quick look through the fish market confirmed that crab, along with prawns and squid seem to make up the bulk of the catch. When in Rome they say, so I found a quaint little restaurant on the waterfront called Holy Crab and had a delicious Crab Green Curry. It has to be said that the restaurants are cheek by jowl there so I suspect finding a good one might be a bit hit and miss but I can recommend Holy Crab. A little further down was the beach, nice white sand, but covered in litter. A lot of people picnicking and swimming. Stopped for a quick look at the formers Queen's bullet riddled seaside Palace then headed back to Kampot stopping at a fishing village on the way and a community salt making area. Until 1930 Cambodia imported all its salt from China but a Vietnamese guy showed the Cambodians how to let salt water evaporate on terraces like rice fields to form salt crystals and today Cambodia is self-sufficient in salt and pepper. Everything you need really.
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