RTW Trip Day #33: Leaving Malaysia and Halloween in Phnom Penh, Cambodia

31 October 2025

Steps: 6,286

As today was a travel day, we had a relatively lazy morning, before catching our 3.50pm flight to Cambodia. I was a little nervous about another Air Asia flight after the Langkawi flight debacle, but there were no delays this time. The girls even had a bit of time to do some home schooling in the airline lounge.

Arriving in Phnom Penh

Cambodia is the country I’ve been most nervous about visiting on this trip, but it’s also one of the ones I’ve been most excited about.

I feel like I’ve read a lot and seen countless photos of Siem Reap and its famous temples, but I haven’t done anywhere near as much research on Phnom Penh as I would have liked.

I don’t know much about the city apart from its tragic history and the genocide. I don’t even really know much about the food, which is very unlike me. I guess that’s part of why we travel - to learn more about the people, history, and culture.

The drive to the hotel took almost 90 minutes, quite a bit longer than the 45-minute estimate, as we hit rush hour traffic.

First impressions of Cambodia from the drive were really good. There seems to be plenty of modern malls (including another AEON Mall that we seem to see everywhere in Asia) and some great-looking coffee shops.

Halloween in Phnom Penh

The Courtyard by Marriott Phnom Penh that we are staying in is really nice and it seems to be in a great location. Since the rooftop restaurant at the hotel was offering 50% off all food and drinks for Halloween, we decided to keep things simple and eat there, using the evening to plan for the next day.

The kids were happy because the restaurant was filled with Halloween decorations. The music was a bit livelier than we’d usually go for, but the girls seemed to enjoy it. I had the beef lok lak and Susie went for the fish amok curry - both were really good. There were even some Halloween costumes that the girls could dress up in which made their day.

The girls were a little sad to miss out on trick-or-treating with their friends back home, but we reminded them that this is probably the only time they’ll get to experience Halloween in Phnom Penh! To make up for it, we let them trick-or-treat us by knocking on our hotel room door, and we handed out Push Pops as their treats.

Previous Day #32: Batu Caves in Kuala Lumpur

Next Day #34: Phnom Penh Markets and S21 Genocide Museum

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