Where it sits
Prey Veng lies east of the Mekong between Phnom Penh and the Vietnamese border, and is one of the most densely populated and intensively farmed provinces in the country. The name means “long forest”, which the landscape has not resembled for a very long time.
What to see
Ba Phnom is the province’s historical heart — a low hill associated with the Funan period, among the oldest continuously venerated sites in Cambodia, with pre-Angkorian remains and shrines still in active use.
Neak Loeung, on the Mekong, was for decades the ferry bottleneck on the road to Vietnam until the Tsubasa Bridge opened in 2015 and removed the queues entirely.
This is a province for people interested in ordinary rural Cambodia rather than monuments — rice, prahok, lotus ponds and market towns.
Practicalities
Easily reached from Phnom Penh in about two hours, and passed through by everyone travelling overland to Ho Chi Minh City.