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| cambodia |
| siem reap and angkor wat |
| I took the high speed ferry up the Tonle Sap lake from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap. The trip took about 5 hours and we sped through some beautiful coastline. There were many small fishing communities along the way, almost completely isolated from the rest of the world and doing things the same way for hundreds of years. Oh course, I was in Siem Ream to see the temples at Angkor, Angkor Wat is just one of hundreds of temples scattered over 65 kilometres and built between 700 and 1200 AD. There are two main temple sites, the oldest, called the Roluos group is about 20 km southeast of Siem Reap and the second site, called the City of Angkor, is where the majority of the Khmer era temples are located and is only a few km from Siem Reap. I bought a 3-day temple pass for $40 US. |
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| My personal chauffeur, Noing, hired for three days of shuttling me from temple to temple for the amazing low price of $15 US dollars. He was a good friend, I'd buy him lunch and teach him English and he'd let me know where we were and the histroy of the temple I was visiting. |
| Day One - Angkor Thom South Gate, the Bayon, the Terrace of the Leper King and the Terrace of Elephants, the Baphuon, Angkor Wat and sunset at Phnom Bakheng. Day Two - Prasat Kravan, Banteay Kdei, Srah Srang, Ta Prohm, the Victory Gate, the Thommanon, Chau Say Thevoda, the Pre Rup, the Eastern Mebon, Ta Som, Prasat Neak Pean, Preah Khan and Ta Keo. Day Three - Kbal Spean, Banteay Srei, Bantay Samre and the Roluos group. |
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| Demon guardians along the side of the South Gate to Angkor Thom. |
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| The Bayon temple built between 1181 and 1220 AD. This was one of my favourite temples with huge stone faces looking out in every direction. |
| Me in front of the Bayon. |
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| Angkor Wat built between 1113 and 1150 AD. |
| One of the halls in Angkor Wat catching the light of the afternoon sun. |
| The central towers of Angkor Wat. The steps leading up were very steep and only a few cm wide at some parts. They were purposely designed that way because reaching the land of the gods is supposed to be difficult. On the left is a tour group carefully making their way down. People have been killed before. |
| A portion of one of the huge and intricate bas-relief carvings surrounding the outer walls of Angkor Wat. A small piece has been removed in the middle, as that portion of the carving was believed to be magical and somebody cut it out hundreds of years ago when the temple was deserted in the jungle. There are pieces missing up and down many of the carvings. |
| The columns and long passageways around the outer rim of Angkor Wat. |
| A carving from the Terrace of the Leper King. |
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| The sunset from Phnom Bakheng, set high on a mountaintop between Angkor Wat and the Bayon temple. |
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| Cambodia is littered with millions of landmines, some just metres off the paths around Angkor, so it was very important to watch where I was stepping. The band, above, are all landmine victims, and they were playing traditional Cambodian music for donations just outside the entrance to Ta Prohm. |
| Another of my favourite temples was Ta Prohm built in the late 12th century. Much of the temple has been left to nature, the jungle and massive trees are creeping in on all sides. Roots of some of the trees have torn apart walls and are now holding up much of what is still standing. |
| The huge stones of the roof, some weighing over 1 tonne have collapsed in many parts of the temple. |
| Trees holding together the temple walls and doorways. |
| An ancient stupa within Ta Prohm. |
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| A fountain head at Prasat Neak Pean constructed near the end of the 12th century. Neak Pean is actually not a temple but a series of pools, once used for drinking and bathing and once in the centre of a giant resevoir, the Eastern Mebon. |
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| More temple-choking trees at Ta Keo built between 968 and 1001 AD. |
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| Poor children begging in the Roluos temple group. They would hide round corners and jump out or charge for taking their photo. This one cost me 20 cents. |
| Human hair, left as an offering at the Roluos temples. |
| Banteay Samre, from the end of the 10th century. |
| Guardian elephants at Banteay Samre. |
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| Kbal Spean, or the Rivers of a Thousand Lingas, is a series of ancient rock carvings in the jungle almost 3 hours by motorbike from Siem Reap and carved in the early 11th century. We followed dirt roads and then I hike about 40 minutes up a mountain side. There are several carvings in the rocks around the river. It was believed that the carvings would bless the water which would make it more fertile for growing food. |
| It took us all morning to get to Kbal Spean and we stopped for lunch at a small roadside hut, where this lady cooked us fried rice in her hut. |
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