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Published: February 6th 2009
Temples and temples and temples
The trip to Siem Reap really corrected some preconceptions we had of Cambodia. We thought we'd go along a dirt road, through a desert with the occasional poverty-stricken village the only dot on the map for miles but what we actually saw was a green countryside, and a mix of affluent and basic villages.
Siem Reap was a nice resort-like town and made a great base from which to explore the grand Temples of Angkor. The multitude of plush restaurants and alleys of nice bars (one street, amazingly called 'Bar Street' you couldn't make it up) was a good reflection of how much money the Temples must me bringing in to the area, it seemed that it wasn't just the backpacker scene that was here visiting the temples. The Temples themselves were obviously amazing. We only had time for one day around the site but we definitely got our moneys worth and managed to cram in a real good full day and covering quite a large section of the massive area without rushing it at all.
A highlight of the trip
The first temple we saw looked like it was being slowly consumed by the forest, apparently being conserved to a state in between being swamped in completely by the engulfing trees and fully restored to give it an impression of how all of the temples must have been like when they were re-discovered a century or so again, it really left a lasting impression of how awesome the natural environment must be to completely engulf an entire city of temples and relics.
As we moved on the temples got bigger and more emphatic and impressive, one of which we climbed had almost vertical steps and definitely wouldn't have passed a health and safety inspection back home. One of the temples was almost completely deserted of tourists and gave us the opportunity to view the detail of the carvings and decorations through its labyrinth of tunnels and semi-hidden rooms in a really calm atmosphere. But it was the final two temples that really were the highlight our South East Asian part of our trip. The Bayon temple was collosal and had beautiful intricate decoration throughout the whole of the temple and its surroundings and had hundreds of strange faces on the giant boulders that encompassed it. Angkor Wat, the real star
of the show was amazing, its size and symmetry were breathtaking and we spent a good hour just wandering around the outside of it and marvelling at the art that covered the outer walls. With the sun coming down we headed back into town for another excellent meal, and even bizarelly caught up with M-Dog who we happened to see as we were riding on the back of a richshaw through the town one day. Needless to say we had a decent catch-up, no karaoke though which was a disappointment.
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