Temples of Angkor

We got up at 4:30 today to meet Net, our tuk-tuk driver from yesterday.  He was outside the hotel waiting for us at 5:00 just like he said.  From there, it was about a 30-minute ride to the Temples of Angkor (Net is slow and safe, so it took a little longer).  I had been looking at pictures before I left Japan, so when I saw the 3 spiraled pyres jetting into the sky, I knew we were there.  After paying a hefty $20 entrance fee, we went in to wait for the sunrise.

It's very strange actually being in these ancient ruins.  When you watch TV or read magazines or look at pictures, you get an image of undisturbed, quiet solitude.  But then you get out here, and it's full of tourists, shops, touts, and construction.  The atmosphere was much better here than Indonesia though because the touts aren't grabbing you to get you to buy their stuff.  Camodians will leave you alone if you say no.  

We grabbed our spot among hundreds of tourists to wait for the sunrise.  It was a little cloudy, so after about an hour and a hundred pictures later, we couldn't wait anymore and started exploring the temple.  Three things come to mind when I'm here.  1) Indiana Jones 2) Disneyland's Jungle Cruise and 3) Nickelodeon's Legend if the Hidden Temple.  No history, no ancient culture references, nothing deep, just those.  Anyway, we spent about another hour walking around the temple and it was really an amazing experience.  To think that I am walking on the temple floors that someone a thousand years ago built just blows my mind.  The insides were lined with relief sculptures, just like at Borobudur in Indonesia, but there were much more detail here.  Rows of the same soldier sculpture lined the temple walls.  You could smell the mold and mildew of 1000 years laying stale inside the temple chambers.  



After that, we went to Angkor Thom, which was a city enclosed within a stone wall and had a few temples within it.  The first stop was Bayon.  It wasn't very large, but there were many large faces carved into the structures.  The structure itself was pretty tall with lots of steep steps rising three stories and then some high rise towers.  This one was one of my favorite.  


After that, it was a quick drive to the Terrace of the Elephants, which (surprise surprise), was a structure dedicated to elephants.  It was very small, only about 10 feet (3 meters) in height but the columns were shaped into elephant trunks with the heads as column tops.


We spent about 30 minutes here and then went off to Ta Prohm, another huge temple.  This one definitely had the ancient ruins feel to it because it had the trees growing out of the stone walls.  The most famous part of this temple is a tree which has grown inside of another tree.  Aparently, it's made the cover of National Geographc.  We mistook about 5 other trees before seeing the real one, which had been marked out to be obviously seen.  


After Ta Prohm, we went about an hour north to see Banteay Srey, a temple dediated to the Hindu god, Vishnu.  Whereas all the other temples has a grayish stone color to them, this one was made primarily of rocks with a reddish tint.  


It was smaller than the other temples, but wins in terms of detail in th a sculptures.  The Lonley Planet said that this temple must have been made by women because of the intricate detail.  I didn't really buy it.  


Once we finished walking around Banteay Srey, we headed off to the Landmine Museum.