Breakaway to Siem Reap

Day 1
Reached Siem Reap by Jetstar Airline from Singapore, Siem Reap Town is where we stay during our visit to Angkor. The area has been receiving foreign visitors to the temples for over 100 years.

Today is a relaxing day for me, purposely staying at the hotel with swimming pool so that I could tanned my body, was so much sick of my fair skin, but sadly after 3 hours of tanning, my skin is still not so tanned :(

Day 2
Today would be dedicated to Angkor Wat, the most famous of the Angkor monuments. This is the 3rd of Seven Wonders of the World that I've visited. Angkor is the pinnacle of classic Khmer architecture. Dedicated to Vishnu and its builder, King Suryavarman II, Unlike many other world class monuments, the ruins of Angkor are as yet unspoiled by over-development. This will not be true in a couple of years. Though the major temples are relatively well touristed these days, it is still possible get away from the crowds, to explore the area and discover Angkor.

It's 20 USD for one day pass or 40USD for 3 day pass, according to the Lonely Planet travel guide, it's definately not sufficient to see all the temples in one day as they are so far from one to each other. We got the 3 day pass. Angkor Wat maximizes its symbolic potential by serving as a physical representation of both time and space. As you walk inward - across the causeway and moat through the main gate, along the internal causeway and up the tiers to the summit - you in turn go back through time, from the present moment to the birth of the universe at the top of Mt. Meru. Similarly, by going inward you cross the rivers and oceans, the land of the continents, the sacred foothills, and (again) the summit of Mt. Meru, the symbolic center of the universe and the source of all life.

And despite our profane reality of sweat, many kids are selling flutes and postcards aggressively, all of them look pathetic, but the price they offered are not certain, just right after we bought one set of postcard at 2USD, then we realised she sold to the tourist behindus at 1USD for 2 sets, gosh...

Angkor Wat delivers a holy and thoroughly mystical experience. I've got a noticeable bounce in my step as we walk down the causeway to the main gate - I still can't believe I'm actually here. At first we got a little over-anxious and tried to snap some pictures. The sun begins to shine brightly as we reach the gate, a shadowy stone arch that obscures the view of the structures beyond it. I'm sure this was the intended effect, for as we cross through the darkness, suddenly the arch opens to reveal the full glory of Angkor Wat itself. Another long causeway terminates at the temple entrance, its column-studded base stretching far to the left and right. Another row of columns cover the second tier of the temple; above these I can see the temple's five towers that make Angkor Wat so recognizable. I wonder how high we can climb inside.
We decided to climb up to the third tier, an imposing task considering the steps are thin and rise at about a 75 degree angle. I was kinda of nervous looking down after I climbed up. The main corridors extending cardinally from the center of the summit, old nuns sat on the floor and chatted with younger women and a park policemen enjoying a cigarette.We had reached the top of Angkor Wat and I felt it was time to give thanks for our safe journey through Cambodia, so I lit some incense praying in front of the buddha statue. We stayed there for about one hour and taking around 50 photos...haha..so vain..

It was about 11 am now and we were proceed to visit another famous temple, Ta Prohm by our appointed 'tok tok' taxi....What's that special of Ta Phohm? it features a set of concentric galleries with corner towers, but with many other additional buildings and enclosures. The complexity of its layout is increased by its partly collapsed state, with tree interlaced among the ruins. Eventually the tree becomes a support for the builiding, but when it dies, or is felled by a storm, the loosened blocks collapsed. This is the special feature of Ta Prohm temple.

TA PROHM was the place where Tomb Raider and Indiana Jones was filmed...do you remember the scenes of indiana running through ruins with jungle trees growing in and out of them...what an amazing sight nature entwined with sandstone...

After that, we felt so tired especially under the hot sun for couple hours, we went back hotel for rest, thought of going again at around 3pm. Unfortunately, after we chilled out at the hotel, the heavy rain began...we have no choice but keep sleeping again.

At night, we crossed the street to the massage centre for foot massage, the masseurs has taught me few of their local language, like 'thank you' is 'Oak khun', 'Hello' is " Susdai'...haha..after that we went to one of their recommended restaurant for dinner, I like the 'amok' chicken, it is the famous local delights of Khemer food, we spent our meal blowing small flies off the table. Haha...terrible... We hit back hotel by 11pm. Tomorrow we would visit the Bayon Temple, the most famous temple carved with four faces buddha... Despite my high level of anticipation awaiting another glorious day at Angkor, I managed to get a good night's sleep.



Day 3
We woke up to the sun shining and the heat increased somewhat, big butterflies as we approached into the park on our tuk tuk...the same feeling as going to a big amusement park...everywhere so green and lush..We first went to "Bayon Temple" Angkor Thom (Great City) this is the classic temples with a collection of gothic towers decorated with 216 beautiful budda faces ...these huge heads glare down from every angle, in it's time it supported one million people...the architecture blew us away..This was built by the most famous king Jayavarman VII.



In here there were alot of temples and buildings including the terrace of the leper king and the terrace of elephants - was the carvings of elephants along its wall. The next destination is East Mebon, it is a temple that was dedicated in 953, approximately 50 years after construction of the baray.

After that, we left for Banteay Srei in a cloud of dust and stayed in that cloud for 25 km from the main Angkor group in order to visit Kbal Spean, with pretty name of " The 1000 Linga river'.It consists of a series of carvings in and around the Stung Kbal Spean river.

It was a fair trip out from the other temples, but the 'mountain' was easy to climb. Each of those circles is a linga, but i need to do more research on the squares that surround them. This riverbed carving went for quite a distance, and looked so fresh and recent!

Its a good 8m from the bank im standing on to the other bank. While the river wasn't really running all that much across the carved river bed at Kbal Spean, we were delighted to find clusters and clouds of butterflies, of at least five different varieties, dancing over and resting upon the stream bed. It was so fabulous.

After 3 hours spending time in Banteay Srei, we are rushing back to Angkor Group area to catch the sunset at Phnom Bakheng. But we stopped when we found another nice temple along the way. PRE RUP temple, althought its appearance may seem similiar to East Mebon, Pre Rup is a temple-mountain while the former is not. We spend half an hour time snapping nice photos.
Unfortunately, the sky turns grey. It was going to rain heavily soon. We quickly climb the hill at Phnom Bakheng, which apparently offers the best view of Angkor Wat at sunset. There is not so easy to reach the temple on the top of the hill, there are so many people awaiting the nice scene of sunset, but the sky became darker...we snapped some photos and decided to return as it's going to rain soon, sigh..we had been disappointed in our inability to see the sunset view after all. Just right after we rode on the tok tok, it rains heavily...I couldn't believe our good fortune at this moment. Day 4
Decided not to go temple anymore today as we have visited all the best temple in Angkor Wat. This day will like to browse around the Siem Reap town and do some shopping. The town is actually a cluster of old villages, which originally developed around individual pagodas, and later overlaid with an French colonial-era center. Note the colonial and Chinese style architecture in the town center and around the Old Market.

At night, as it's the last night in Siem Reap, we decided to pamper ourselve having a better dinner. We went to the bar street, and select the most cozy restaurant, IN TOUCH for fine dining. The food there are nice especially with the live band singing list of oldies...it was a fabulous night, we really went trigger happy. Bye Bye, Siem Reap!