If you haven’t entered any dates, the rate shown is provided directly by the hotel and represents the cheapest double room (including tax) available in the next 60 days.
Prices have been converted from the hotel’s local currency (USD262.39), via openexchangerates.org, using today’s exchange rate.
The Royal Sands Koh Rong resort is an all-out luxury beach retreat on a paradise Cambodian isle, where you’re greeted by coconut palms, immaculate white sands and suspended cane chairs swinging in the breeze. There’s a right royal treatment in store here, whether you’re clinking cocktails by the fire pit, watching the fish dart about beneath you in the spa’s under-floor pond, or Gulf-of-Thailand-gazing from your private villa pool. In the evenings, take a stately stroll down to the beach where the sight of the majestic setting sun will be the crowning glory of your stay.
Smith Extra
Get this when you book through us:
Tropical fruit on arrival, a traditional krama scarf, and a small take-home gift
11am, but with some flexibility to check out at noon if availability allows. Earliest check-in, 2pm
Prices
Double rooms from £252.94 ($315), including tax at 20.05 per cent.
More details
Your room rate includes a buffet breakfast served under the open-air pavilion of the Ocean Restaurant. Choose from a range of Asian and international hot or cold breakfast treats, including fresh juice, tea, coffee, breads, pastries and eggs.
Also
All villa accommodation at the Royal Sands Koh Rong is on the ground floor, apart from one upper-floor bedroom in the three-bedroom pool villa.
At the hotel
Tropical gardens planted with coconut and palm trees; free WiFi; beach football and volleyball equipment; on-site boutique selling clothes, accessories, beach toys and souvenirs; and gym with running machines and weights. In rooms: fruit basket on arrival, smart TV, air-conditioning, minibar and mini fridge, free bottled water, tea-making kit, Lavazza coffee machine, and Royal Sands bath products.
Our favourite rooms
The white walls, neat thatchwork and swish contemporary interiors form a common thread through all of the villa types here. But for maximum romance, we’re getting as close as we can to the water itself with a Beachfront Villa, complete with charming thatched pavilion for two. It’s just the place for a bit of ocean gazing as a twosome, and just a few steps away from your private rippling pool.
Poolside
The communal saltwater pool (open 24 hours a day) looks out onto the beach and has a large sunbathing area with loungers. The pool is lined in black to absorb the sun’s rays and keep the water warm all day long.
Spa
The tranquil Senses Spa offers a range of treatments, including foot massage, deep-tissue pummeling, charcoal facials or mani-pedis. There’s an open-air sala with treatment areas, plus private rooms behind. Couples’ treatments are available on request. Spa practitioners use all-natural products made from southeast Asian ingredients by Cambodian brand, Bodia. There’s also a steam room, Jacuzzi and indoor spa pool. Soothing yoga sessions are available to join in the yoga sala.
Packing tips
Your most elegant sun hat and a copy of Zen: The Art of Simple Living.
Children
Families are very welcome at the resort, where there’s plenty of beach and poolside fun to be had. While there’s no kids’ club, you can book babysitting if required.
Sustainability efforts
A battery-powered car is on hand to transport guests around the resort, if needed, and solar panels are installed on all of the walkways and in the gardens. Staff work hard to reduce energy consumption in the kitchens, where local produce is used to craft guest meals, and bamboo or paper straws are used for drinks. Water-saving taps have been installed, and waste water is conserved to keep the gardens looking lush. In your rooms, you’ll find glass water bottles instead of plastic, along with eco-friendly bath products, which are restocked in refillable bottles. Regular beach cleaning is carried out using a special tractor and trailer to remove any waste washed in by the sea, which is then sorted and sent off to the mainland for processing.
A table on the sands, of course, where you can turn up the romance to the crash of the waves.
Dress Code
Collarless linen and bright printed midi dresses.
Hotel restaurant
Chef Jesus Ordoñez oversees the Ocean Restaurant, so named for its far-ranging ocean vistas, viewable from under the extensive wooden pavilion, the terrace and the beach tables. There’s a large buffet breakfast selection (7am to 10am), plus lunch (11.30am to 5.30pm) and dinner (6pm to 10pm) menus of traditional Asian dishes, as well as international flavours.
Hotel bar
The adjacent Chill Bar & Restaurant is open from 5.30pm to 9pm and serves island-style Asian canapés and light bites in its relaxed beach bar setting near the dreamy main pool. You can perch at the bar, grab a high table facing the water, or a beach table under a white parasol among the palms. Or you can take your Halfmoon Sunset (the house cocktail mixed with tequila, Malibu and Amaretto) over to the half-moon seating around the fire pit, where you’ll see the best of the sunset.
Last orders
Get your dinner orders in by 10pm.
Room service
You can order meals to your villa from the main restaurant menu between 7am and 9.30pm.
The Royal Sands Koh Rong sits on Sok San Beach on the Cambodian island of Koh Rong.
Planes
It takes around 40 minutes to get from Sihanoukville International Airport on Cambodia’s mainland to Sihanoukville port, where you can take a dedicated ferry (around an hour’s journey) over to the Royal Sands Koh Rong. Airport transfers to and from the port by car are available starting at US$70 for two to seven people.
Trains
If you arrive into the Royal Railways train station in Phnom Penh, you can book a transfer by car to the port at Sihanoukville for US$35 for one person and US$60 for three to five people, then take the dedicated ferry from here.
Automobiles
There’s no guest parking at the resort itself, and you’re unlikely to need a private car during your stay on Koh Rong. If you’re making your way by car from Phnom Penh, take the expressway to Sihanoukville port, which will take about two-and-a-half hours, then catch the once-daily boat over to Koh Rong.
Other
A boat service runs once a day from the port at Sihanoukville to the hotel resort, and takes about an hour. There’s a Royal Sands lounge at the port from which the resort operates its own ferry service to and from Koh Rong. Contact [email protected] for the latest boat schedule. There’s also a helicopter transfer service from Phnom Penh-Resort helipad for US$5,550 each way, or from Siem Reap-Resort helipad for US$10,385 each way (both are for up to five people).
Worth getting out of bed for
At the Royal Sands Koh Rong you can do as much or as little as you fancy. A daily rotation between beach, pool and spa might be enough for your stay. But if you want to exert yourself a little more, try island cycles, snorkelling tours, island-hopping excursions, mangrove kayaking expeditions, local village tours, sunset fishing trips, beach volleyball and football, scuba diving, waterskiing or a high-octane bounce on a banana boat.
Local restaurants
A little up the coast to the north, you can explore some more tasty seafood with Khmer and international influences at La Terrasse Restaurant, part of the Sok San beach resort. Here you’ll also find the more casual Coco Beach Bar and Grill, serving meat and seafood skewers, pizzas and fruit platters, plus beers, smoothies and cocktails.
Every hotel featured is visited personally by members of our team, given the Smith seal of approval, and then anonymously reviewed. As soon as our reviewers have returned from this queenly beach hotel on Koh Rong island and unpacked their locally woven scarves and miniature Buddha statues, a full account of their beachfront break will be with you. In the meantime, to whet your wanderlust, here's a quick peek inside the Royal Sands Koh Rong Resort in Cambodia…
Set on Cambodia’s largest island, the Royal Sands Koh Rong is a luxurious, west-facing resort that sits on a white sandy beach looking out over the sparkling Gulf of Thailand. The lobby is a simple white-and-wood affair, with playful hanging chairs, swirling ceiling fans and a large, rough-hewn reception desk, all beneath a large wooden pavilion. In the spa, yet more soothing features await, with a choice of treatment spaces and the added tranquillity bonus of a fish pond beneath the glass floor to entertain you throughout your massage. Walkways peppered with tropical plants lead to individual thatched villas, generously sized even at the smaller end, with all the comforts you’d expect, and, for some, a private pool with an ocean view. More views abound on the terrace of the onsite restaurant and at the half moon of beach seating, where you’re encouraged to sit at sundown hour.
