Flying to Phnom Penh

11th August 2012

Flying in to Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia from Kuala Lumpur, I took some shots of Phnom Penh and the mighty Mekong River from the plane window.  Makes the Brisbane River look like a bit of a trickle.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Phnom Penh is built on the intersection of four rivers – the Upper and Lower Mekong, and the Tonle Sap and Tonle Bassac.

 

Chroy Changvar Bridge was originally built in 1966. The bridge was damaged during the Pol Pot regime, and the citizens of Phnom Penh were expelled from the city by Khmer Rouge forces in 1975.

The provincial and municipal population came back to live in Phnom Penh after the liberation on 7th January 1979, and the government began to repair the infrastructures in Phnom Penh that had been damaged by the war and desertions.  In 1995, the Cambodian government received a contribution from the Japanese government to repair the Chroy Changvar Bridge, and Japanese engineers supervised the renovations.

The bridge is now also known as the Cambodia-Japan Friendship Bridge.