pianomania: SUKA MAKAN: SORA BAR @ VATTANAC CAPITAL TOWER, PHNOM PENH, CAMBODIA

Here's an admission: I've never been to a sky bar before. Ever. Until Now. Saturday evening (26 September 2026) seemed like a good time to change that. Sora Bar is located on the 37th storey of Vattanac Capital Tower, just two blocks away from our hotel. We headed to it at 5 pm as it opened, allowing for the short interval before sunset.

There was an overcast sky over Phnom Penh. This was the monsoon season, and it had drizzled a little earlier but now it was dry. The weather was cool, and it was the perfect time to view dusk even if we could not actually see the sun set.

Looking north along Monivong Boulevard,
the Raffles Hotel le Royal looms
in the foreground. Going there the next day.

Looking south, Monivong Boulevard
bisects Phnom Penh, displaying
the old and the new.

There were cocktails and I had a mocktail. The food was Japanese, and we had wagyu beef skewers and a sushi roll. Nothing fancy, as the reason here was to capture the atmosphere and the view over Phnom Penh, a city that had virtually no tall buildings when we first visited in 2008. Now, parts of it looked like Bangkok. Squint a little, and I thought I saw Manhattan.

Here came the drinks.

The mocktail matched the colour of my shirt!

Soon the sun set, and the view was just as stunning. Heading indoors, we also viewed the east side of the city and the Tonle Sap River before it joined the mighty Mekong.