Angkor

The area of Angkor has a plethora of temples and ancient cities. Angkor Wat is but one of these, built in the 12th century. Some of the sites date as far back as the 8th century.

I was lucky to stumble upon two new friends on the taxi ride into Siem Reap from the border. I wandered for three days with Laura from Massachusetts, and Pedro/Kim from South Korea, and our tuk tuk driver, Pip. My ambitious idea of bike riding solo around the temples was quashed pretty quickly, as I saw the traffic. I managed to discern two road rules: keep right when you can, and bigger vehicles have right-of-way and win in all one-on-one encounters. There was a crash near our hostel the first evening I stayed there that resulted in a fatality. Definitely one of the more dangerous systems I've seen, what with the interactions between buses, cars, tuk tuks, motorbikes, bicycles, pedestrians, and livestock. Also, the people seem to be able to load their vehicles up with more than you'd ever think. So far we've seen three live pigs strapped upside down to a motorcycle (sorry, PETA) and two women with three babies and four big bags of produce on a single motorcycle--no helmets to be seen.

This was our first view of the entrance to the main temple area.

Sometimes it was a little overwhelming choosing where to go and what to look at.

 The carvings throughout the Angkor complex were beautiful.

I like how the lichen grew politically correct on these Apsara dancer reliefs.

Bees are alive and well! They were a little scary to walk under.

Poverty was pretty desperate and sad around Siem Reap and Angkor. Some of the kids trying to sell things to us were only a little older than this wee one. I was happy to see that from Sunday to Monday there were many fewer kids, hopefully meaning that they were in school.

 Laura and me, struggling up the steep steps of a temple. We look a little hot and tired, I think.

Introducing Laura and Pedro.

At the end of our first day wandering through Angkor, Pip took us to a local street carnival for a beer. It was the one place in Siem Reap we weren't hassled to buy things, as it was all locals. We didn't stay for long, because after a day at the temples we were pretty dusty and tired, but the ferris wheel looked like it was spinning quite quickly. Could have been an interesting experience. Apparently everyone turns up just after the sun goes down, so as to be a bit cooler.

Elephants were present in carvings, sculptures, and as part of the tourist experience.

Like many, Ta Prohm was one of my favourites. I took as many pictures of the different trees and buttressed roots as my camera would allow. I just love how it looks when nature takes back the land.

The second day we got up early for the sunrise. Not a great one, but nice to be up in the cool of the day, and the view from the top once we climbed into and up Angkor Wat was beautiful.

Sometimes we took a break and just sat in the temples/buildings, as they retained their coolness throughout the day. Good thing D.C. prepared me slightly for this heat and humidity!

On our last evening in the temples, we went up to a temple on the top of a hill, and waited for the sunset (as recommended to us) . . . but as the climb was quite harrowing (standardly harrowing) we wondered what everyone was going to do to get back down in the dark. But, we were kicked out before dark, which makes me wonder how someone is supposed to see a sunset, yet come down before dark? Seems like the "sunset tour" might be a bit of a misnomer? As with the sunrise, it was very cloudy, so I'm not sure our sunset would have been anything to write home about anyways, so we weren't too disappointed (and perhaps slightly relieved, as I was the only one with a headtorch--thanks, Janet!).

 There were monks at the top, I think trying to practice their English. I haven't quite figured out the rules of monkdom in this part of the world, but it's definitely not what I expected.

Today I have to decide where I'm going next. I'm thinking to an island called Russei off of Sihanoukville. I got some insider's info from a Mr. Ken Ryan that Sihanoukville itself can get pretty sleazy, so I'm attempting to find a nice place elsewhere (yet still beachside) to relax before going on to visit Phnom Penh and make my way to India. So far, so good.