Cambodia and Thailand - October, 2005 Asia Trip Home Page
Angkor Wat, Cambodia
We visited Cambodia principally to visit Angkor Wat, and it didn't disappoint. Actually, as we looked into the area we learned that Angkor Wat is just one of dozens of Khmer ruins that are in close proximity to the city of Siem Reap. Angkor Wat is perhaps the poster child, the largest and best preserved/best restored of the bunch, but we liked several of the others at least as well.
Rather than try to describe Angkor, we're going to send you to another web site that is dedicated to the subject.
We also took the liberty of copying the map from that web site. The description of our activities makes much more sense if you print this map for reference before proceeding.
OK, first things first. We were met at the airport by Leak (pronounced LEK), who drove us to the Pavillon Indochine Lodge, our guesthouse. This was a charming, well run place that you can view here. The staff was very attentive and the only bad thing we have to say about the place is that they could use some new bikes. The ones we used left some things to be desired, comfort for one, straight frames for another. We stayed in the original lodge building since the "Resort" expansion was not yet open.
One of the major circumstances of Cambodia - it was hotter than the gates of you-know-where the entire time we were there. Of course, Thailand also was pretty darn (you know what we really mean) hot as well, but Cambodia seemed worse. Now it may seem kind of, well, stupid to be complaining about the heat at a tropical low latitude destination, but the ugly truth is that we underestimated the impact of the heat and humidity throughout the trip, and particularly in Cambodia. For one, we really had to cut back on our favorite activity, walking. If you have read any of our other travel pages, you know that we walk endlessly around the various cities, town and sites we visit. Not so here. It was just too hot and humid. After about ten minutes, we were soaked and fatigued. One solution we employed was to walk r e a l l y s l o w l y which helped a little. Strangely enough, we did better on bicycle since our modest speed generated a refreshing breeze - although we went pretty slowly on our bikes as well. We also used taxis and tuk-tuks much more than expected. It was a necessity.
Getting to our guesthouse from Chiang Mai took nearly the entire day, so we didn't do much more than settle in after we arrived. The fun started the next day, and what a day it was.
After a good breakfast at the guesthouse, off we rode on those lousy bikes. Over the years, certain conventional routes to see the ruins have developed. In the 19th century they used to be followed via elephant. On this first day we ended up riding our bikes about 20 miles, following the so-called Big Circuit. This route is shown on the map (you printed it, right?) by combining the red and green highlighted routing, but eliminating the red segment that runs in a SW direction from Banteay Kdei down to Angkor Wat. This proved to be more than we should have bitten off and we ran out of daylight a fair distance from home. Adversity to one person is adventure to another, right? Well, we had quite an adventure pedaling home in the dark, as my mother would say, blacker than the inside of a cow, along roads packed with buses, tuk-tuks and taxis all making their way back to town after witnessing the sunset photo op at Angkor Wat. It was a zoo, intervals of apprehension bordering on terror that we were going to be run over, alternating with more similar intervals after the traffic would pass and we would momentarily be plunged into total darkness with only the abrupt road shoulder for company. The good news is that we had an incredible day and made it home shaken but safe. In fact, we even had enough energy to go into town for dinner.
The second day we had a reunion with Leak as this time he donned a motorcycle helmet and served as our tuk-tuk driver, taking us to more outlying ruins. Another full day and another high spot of the trip.
Day three found us back on the bikes to see some of the ruins we had to blast by at the end of day one. We took it much easier on this last day at the ruins and returned to the guesthouse in mid-afternoon for some needed down time.
Rather than present a thumbnail gallery here, which takes some work to set up, we are just going to link you to the first photo and assume that you will cruise through them all (there are 23 posted here):