Advertisement
Published: February 26th 2006
Edit Blog Post
Angkorwat
Sunrise at Angkorwat Before I start journaling about my short trip to Cambodia, my mum has been officially “banned” from this blog. Not that this contains any gross pictures or disgusting narrations, it is just that in her mind (and no thanks to my neighbours’ added untruth flavours of Cambodia), she has visualized this country with lots of landmines and hundreds of hungry children who will turn up in hordes begging any tourists they see for money. So she is not particularly happy that only my friend Deborah and I are making this trip alone and she probably freaked out if she knows that we had only air tickets on hand without any accommodation/package booking when we flew to Siem Reap.
By the way, before getting any protestations from fans and friends of Cambodia, I did show my mum all my pictures in Cambodia and have also given her vivid account of my trip. I must have done quite a good job because she seems to be talking a lot about Angkorwat with her friends and has read one of the Chinese stories about Angkorwat. Of course, to prevent any "heart attack" on her, I have missed out telling her the minor tuk-tuk
Chong Khneas
Floating village accident that we had. So friends….please keep our tiny secret from her. 😊 My mum is right about the landmines (Cambodia has probably the worst landmines problem in the world) but wrong about Siem Reap because this town has become so commercialize and touristy. The only thing that reminds us about the problem are a group of landmines victims playing musical instruments along Pub Street. Also, we do get stalked by some children and landmines victims begging for money.
I must admit that I have not done any read up on Angkor/Siem Reap before setting off for the trip and all I know that I will be going to see Angkorwat. What is Angkorwat really? Without knowing much about the history, I armed myself with a hat, sunglasses and sun block lotion to explore this World Heritage Site - Angkor Archaeological Park.
On our 6am flight to Siem Reap, we have met another colleague Chuan Yen and his girlfriend, Fiona. Since they have booked a night stay at Molly Malone, they have free airport transfer to the hotel, so Deb and I hitched a ride in their cab to town. The cab driver recommended us a US$20 per
Police post
Floating police post night stay hotel located very near to Old Market Area. Still feeling sleepy, Deb and I slept until noontime before we explored around the town like Phsar Chas (Old Market) and Phsar Kandal (Central Market).
In the late afternoon, we got a tuk tuk to drive us to Chong Khneas, a floating fishing village in one of the largest freshwater lake, Tonle Sap Lake in the world. It is not recommended to take tuk tuk, as the road leading to the village is very bumpy and dusty. Our tuk tuk had slided off the road when trying to avoid a large stone and landed in the paddy field on our return trip back to the town. Luckily there were helpful passerby and tourists who were willing to pull up their pants and pulled out the tuk tuk from the paddy field and pushed it back onto the road. It is good thing that nobody is hurt during this roller coaster ride. Although the driver looked a bit shaken up, I can tell he is quite glad that his bike is still in good condition.
The next day is a full day of touring around the Angkor Archaeological Park
Church
Floating church with a guide. Our first stop was at Angkorwat to catch the sunrise, as it is the only temple that is west facing. After taking shots of the sunrise, we proceed to south gate of Angkor Thom (Big Angkor) and visited Bayon. It has interesting wall carvings of every day life scenes and giant stone faces that oriented toward the cardinal points. The guide then brought us to Baphuon; unfortunately we were not able to enter the site except the entrance walkway because the temple is currently undergoing restoration. Next, we walked to Phimeanakas and climbed all the way up to have a nice view around the area. Not far from Phimeanakas, we explored around Terrace of the Elephants before we took a long lunch break, partly to avoid the hottest noon sun. After the break, we were taken to Ta Prohm where massive fig and silk cotton trees have grown into the temple. The last stop of our trip is back to Angkorwat. The guide has started us off with explanation of the carving on he exterior walls depicting stories and characters from Hindu mythology. We then climbed up the vertical challenge central tower where we get bird’s eye
Sunset at the lake
Sunset at the largest freshwater lake view of the Angkorwat area. It is also up on the central tower that I have coincidently met my ex-colleague, Cheryl from Hong Kong.
On our last full day in Siem Reap, we tried to do a bit of shopping. Unfortunately I must say there is nothing much to buy here and it is so difficult to find nice T-shirt designs to bring home. We then went to Angkorwat again because Deb needs to take a few more pictures. We then proceed to visit Preah Khan (Sacred sword). The cylindrical columns in the building are something different from the other temples.
Favourite food: Chicken cooked with basil leaves, sweet and sour fish (these are very Chinese style of cooking)
Favourite drink: Nothing in particular as long as it is cold to quench my thirst.
Favourite food places: Blue Pumpkin (love the unique couch that looks so inviting to get away the scorching sun and it also provide free wifi for those with laptops) and Dead Fish Plaza (the unique décor/structure and live band is a plus)
Favourite street: Pub street; it is probably the busiest street in town and will temporarily close to traffic in the evening (I
think the street will be open after 11pm, tourists have to be more careful when walking along the street as the tuk tuk drivers seems to be more rowdy at this time of the night.)
Essential things to bring: Hat, sunglasses, sun block lotion, water, extra battery for camera, lots of films/memory card and of course US dollars to pay for the entrance fee to the temples!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.084s; Tpl: 0.018s; cc: 5; qc: 45; dbt: 0.0507s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb