After 2 nights in Phnom Penh, we parted ways with Ben and Sarah and Brett and I headed North to set our eyes on some of the world's most famous and largest religious temples. We took another grueling 7 hour bus ride. Still feeling the weighting affects of Phnom Penh and only to make matters worse they played Rambo on the bus, just what I needed, to see more horrific killing in the jungles of Asia! I couldn't get away!!!
We finally arrived at our hotel, New Angkorland, which was a nice hotel for the price. We were looking forward to seeing the downtown "pub" street of Siem Reap, something a little more back in reality than the "hooker" nightlife of Phnom Penh. The downtown was awesome, lots of restaraunts and bars all lit up on small streets where cars couldn't drive. We settled for some Indian food and then headed back for an early sleep preparing for the big day ahead of us.
The next day we found a tuk tuk, settled on a price for the temples we wanted to visit, arranged a private tour guide and were on our way to the glorious Angkor Wat, Angkor Thom, and Ta Prohm. Our guide was incredibly knowledgeable, spoke great english, and gave us a plethora of information on the symbols, relgious relics, and history of each temple.
Angkor Wat, built in the 12th century, means "City Temple." It is the largest religous temple and has been the most preserved so visitors can see exactly what the temple looked like centuries ago. Stunning in its massive structure, levels, and various carvings that visualized various battles between the Gods and demons.
The next temple was located in the "Great City" of Angkor Thom. The temple we visited inside of Angkor Thom is called Bayon. Some of you may recongnize the entrance of Angkor Thom from the movie "Tomb Raider" with Angelina Jolie (Brett and I rented this movie and as the movie is pretty stupid it was cool to recongnize the places it was filmed). Now the city is inhabited only by monks when it used to be a place for the common person to live and worship. The Bayon temple's towers have four huge stone faces, with one facing out and keeping watch at each compass point. This temple was still under major preservation. Most of the ceilings had all collapased so there was a lot of stone rubble that you had to walk over.
The last temple was the "jungle temple" called Ta Prohm which is located within the gates of Angkor Thom (also in Tomb Raider). This temple has been the least bit conserved in order to visualize what the temple looked like when it was found. Tree roots miraculously wind around the walls, doors, and windows creating a snake like effect. As Angkor Wat was amazing in its monstrosity this temple was just as incredible entangled in the jungle. This temple was built for the King's mother so there were no detailed inscriptions or sculputures, just areas of worship and prayer.
After our long day at the temples we went to dinner and headed to bed early. We had yet another 8 hour bus ride ahead of us the next day back to Bangkok. Cambodia was amazing, a place I am very happy to have visited and would go back to.
https://picasaweb.google.com/109084938812843609271/SiemReap?authuser=0&feat=directlink
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