Top 5 Attractions in Phnom Penh
Phnom Penh, located in the south-central part of Cambodia, adjacent to the Mekong River, is the capital of Cambodia and the largest and busiest city. Phnom Penh is like his name. The whole city is wrapped in gold. It is called “Asian Pearl” and “Oriental Little Paris” by Westerners. National Museum, Royal Palace, Silver Pagoda, Wat Phnom, Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, Cheung Ek Killing Fields are top 5 tourist attractions in Phnom Penh.
No.1 Attraction in Phnom Penh - Royal Palace & Silver Pagoda
- Location：Sothearos, between Street 240 & 184, Phnom Penh, Cambodia
- Opening time: 8:00-11:00, 14:00-17:00
- Attention: When entering the Royal Palace, the clothes can't be sleeveless, and the skirt or pants can't be shorter than the knees.
Royal Palace
The Royal Palace of Phnom Penh, also known as the Four Arms Grand Palace, is named after the confluence of the Mekong River, Tonlé Sap River, Mekong River and the Basa River. It is the royal palace of the King of Cambodia. The Royal Palace is a magnificent square building with a length of 435 meters and a width of 402 meters. It is surrounded by yellow walls and contains more than 20 large and small palaces such as the Coronation Palace, Silver Pagoda , the Napoleon III Pavilion and the Reviewing Desk. The most famous is the Silver Pagoda.
The palace's architecture has Khmer traditional architectural style and religious color. The palace has spires that represent prosperity. The temple is painted in yellow and white. Yellow represents Buddhism and white represents Brahmanism.
Silver Pagoda
The Silver Pagoda was built between 1892 and 1920 and was rebuilt in 1962 in accordance with traditional Cambodian architecture. Because the floor is made of 5329 pieces of silver bricks weighing 1.125 kg each, which weighs 5 tons, so it is called the Silver Pagoda. There are hundreds of national treasures of gold and silver in the temple, so it is also known as the Gold Pagoda.
Because the temple is dedicated to the Jade Buddha, it is also known as the Jade Buddha Temple. In the center of the temple is a statue of 18k gold, weighing 90kg. The Buddha is set with 9584 diamonds. The largest one is set on the chest of the Buddha and weighs 25 carats. This statue was built to commemorate the King of Sova.
No.2 Attraction in Phnom Penh - National Museum
- Location：13th St., Between 178th and 184th Sts., Phnom Penh, Cambodia
- Opening time: 8:00-17:00
The National Museum was built in 1913. The museum now houses handicrafts and sculptures from the 4th to 10th centuries and the Angkor dynasty, several photographs of Angkor photographed by French photographers, and many authentic Angkor Wat sculptures. There is a small pavilion in the center of the museum, which is dedicated to a statue of the gods. There are four artificial lotus ponds surrounded by grasshoppers and benches.
No.3 Attraction in Phnom Penh - Wat Phnom
- Location：Sothearos Boulevard, Phnom Penh, Cambodia
- Opening time: 06:00-18:00, not open at noon.
It is the largest and oldest temple in Phnom Penh, with the largest pagoda in Phnom Penh. Ounalom means "eyebrows". The tower enshrines the Buddha relics that were welcomed from Ceylon in 1890. Therefore, many officials like to build an ashes tower in the temple, so that the ashes of the ancestors can be placed beside the Buddha, and the towers are gradually formed. Now it is the headquarters of the Cambodian Buddhist organization. You can see the scenes of the monks reading and discussing.
No.4 Attraction in Phnom Penh - Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum
- Location：Street 113, Boeng Keng Kang, Phnom Penh, 3, Cambodia
- Opening time: 7:30-17:30
The Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum is a museum in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh, also known as the S-21 prison. In 1979, the concentration camp was exposed in the attack of Vietnamese soldiers. In 1980, the concentration camp was reopened to the public, with an average of about 500 visits per day. In 2009, the museum was included in the “Memory of the World” by UNESCO.
No.5 Attraction in Phnom Penh - Killing Fields of Cahoeung EK
- Location：15km southwest of the city, Phnom Penh, Cambodia
- Opening time: 7:30-17:30
Killing Fields of Cahoeung EK is located in the southern suburbs of Phnom Penh, 15 km from the urban area, it used to be a concentration camp of the Khmer Rouge. In 1975, the Khmer Rouge led by Pol Pot captured the regime in Phnom Penh. In the following three years, Cambodia lost nearly one-third of her population, and most of them were intellectuals. Most of the people who died here were prisoners from the S-21 prison, including men, women and children, and babies.
So far, there are more than 9,000 bodies excavated in the killings, so it is also called mass graves here. In 1988, the government built a pagoda to house the skulls excavated from the tombs in order to commemorate the innocent souls.
