Beaches in Siem Reap & Angkor Wat
A visual guide from the Siem Reap and Angkor Wat travel guide — see all posters in Visual Guides.
Siem Reap sits a long way from any coastline, so the beach here is freshwater and eleventh-century. The West Baray, a vast rectangular reservoir dug in the Angkorian period and still holding water, has a shallow sandy southern shore lined with thatched picnic platforms. On Sunday afternoons Khmer families take over the whole strip, wading out with inner tubes and crates of ice while grilled fish arrives from the huts behind. It is genuinely pleasant, entirely unglamorous, and about twenty minutes from the centre. For anything with salt in it, you need the Gulf coast.
Swimming close to town
The West Baray lies roughly 10 km west of the centre, with access off the Airport Road; shoreline huts rent by the afternoon for a small fee and food and drink are brought out to you. Phnom Kulen National Park, about 50 km north, has two waterfalls with deep plunge pools and a shallow river run above them — busiest at weekends and best during and just after the rains. In town, several hotels sell pool day passes, which is the reliable answer in April heat. The moats and barays inside the Angkor park, Sras Srang included, are not for swimming.
If you want the real coast
Cambodia's beaches are on the Gulf, well to the south. The quickest route is a domestic flight from Siem Reap Angkor International Airport to Sihanoukville when one is running — usually around an hour — followed by a ferry of roughly 45 minutes to Koh Rong or Koh Rong Sanloem, where the sand is white and the water genuinely clear. Overland takes the best part of a day by bus. Kep and Kampot, further east, are quieter and better for crab and river swimming than for sand. Timing matters: the islands are at their best between roughly November and April, when the sea is calm and visibility is good.