The glorious reign of Angkor

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After an amazing stay at Don Det, we headed back up towards Pakse with the intention of crossing into Thailand again in order to drop down into Cambodia and Siem Riep.

On the way mind you is Chamapasak, a one street village that was once an ancient Khmer centre leaving today an ancient temple perched on a hill top. To reach Champasak, you take a ferry (read, three boats now tied together and a wooden platform attached to accomodate the transportation of people, livestock and buses) across the Mekong. On board are some of the hardest selling kids we've met yet who are waiting to pout, plead and stomp their foot at you in order for you to buy chewing gum, cigarettes or water, meanwhile mum is selling freshly rolled (right in front of your eyes) spring rolls and noodle soup.

We were met by the wonderfully happy guesthouse owner (his real name escapes me now) but who will forever be known has Mr Happy Buddha, derived not only from his happiness but from his massive Buddha belly also that he would proudly display in the Laos style of walking around with your t-shirt up around your nipples. We've never met such a wonderful smiling, laughing character who gave the impression that nothing was too hard, life was a joy, and the best way to attempt anything was to laugh your way through it. So it was with great pleasure that we stayed at his establishment along with the kiwi Mark from Don Det, and through him took a tuk tuk out to the temple itself.

Chumpasak was the first Angkor style temple we've seen, and we both thought it was great, though experienced Angkor Wat travellers asure us taht we've seen nothing yet.

The temple consists of a series of terraces that are interconnected by long galleries or walkways. These galleries were lined with stone pedestals that were crowned with Lotus Flower heads, and were once apparantly sheltered by a wooden ceiling.

The lower terrace starts off with a mirrored palace on either side, one presuming to be for males, the other for females, then a number of smaller temple like structures gathered around them.

Climbing upwards, you hit the middle stage where you turn to look out over the surrounding plains before continuing upwards to the final level with the inner sancturay hosting a number of buddha statues, and a small irrigation system that collects the sacred water from the cliff behind and runs it into the temple for blessing the Buddha icons.

The whole area is beautiful and green with massive trees sheltered by the cool sandstone cliff behind. Along one section of the cliff was "Buddha's Footprint"and further along amongst what could loosely be described as a boulder garden, you find a number of broken stone tablets, hindu images, the "elephant rock" and the "Crocodile Rock" that some archeologists believe was used for human sacrifice.....ooohhh... spooky. Check out the photo of it, you can see how a man could possible lie in it, while his blood would be collected at the bottom in the crocodile's head.

Definitely glad we decided to come back up this way rather than drop down over the Cambodian Border through the Mekong. After all we never would have seen Mr Happy Buddha ride his bicycle down the main street to try and catch us on the back of an open bus before we reached the ferry to return to Pakse and Thailand with our room key still in Andrew's pocket.

Needless to say he was laughing the whole way.

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Photos

Champasak
The view from the top of Wat Champasak

Champasak
Ricko sits and contemplates his life in the temple

Champasak
Anyone for a human sacrifice? The crocodile stone.

Champasak
The elephant rock. Whats with the long face?

Champasak
Nunny and Mark getting hassled by the touts with pouts on the ferry. You want chewing gum?