Wandering the World: Angkor Day 1

Nov 20 – Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom

We were up before the sun and were on our way to see the Temples of Angkor at 5am. We arrived at Angkor Wat, along with many other tourists, and waited for the sun to rise. It was quite spectacular with the sky changing colours as the sun came up. The only things that marred this moment was the scaffolding encompassing part of Angkor Wat and the locals trying to get you to come eat at their restaurant. Once the sun had risen the crowds seemed to disperse and we were able to explore Angkor Wat without too many other tourists. We had brought some longan with us so we had a little break to snack on them. We headed back to the tuk tuk and went on to see Angkor Thom. We got out at the north gate and walked through so we could take pictures then hopped back in the tuk tuk and continued on to the center of Angkor Thom. We saw the Bayon, the Baphuon Temple, the Royal Palace & Phimeanakas, the Elephant Terrace, and the Leper King Terrace. We were starting to tire after seeing all these site but our tuk tuk driver whisked us away to another set of temples. Our next two temples were Chau Say Tevoda and Thommanon. At Chau Say Tevoda there was a man selling temple rubbings. They were very beautiful so we bought a big one for a decent price. Next we went to Ta Keo and then on to Ta Prohm. Ta Prohm was very cool. It's called the jungle temple and was actually used as the set for one of the Tomb Raider moves. One of the coolest things about this temple were the trees. There were massive trees growing out of some of the walls and roofs. The building was built over 800 years ago and the trees would have started to grow on the buildings after Angkor was abandon. It was really cool to see how nature will grow right over top of the things man builds. Our tuk tuk driver still had two temples for us to see today but we put them off till tomorrow. We were quite hungry and footsore, we had been explore temples for about 7hrs and it was only 1pm. We went back to the hotel and just ate their restaurant before having a nap. We headed out to the restaurant area called the Alley and Bar Street. For dinner we had a self bbq dish. There was broth to cook your vegetables in a metal center to cook your meat. Ours had a mixture of meats including snake, beef, chicken, shrimp and alligator. The alligator was very tasty but the snake was tough. It's good to try new things!