Steffen's Travel Blog: Angkor What? The most amazing place on earth. Siam Reap/Angkor

I had crossed over at the most interesting border crossing yet, there was literally 100 people on the Thai side trying to sell fake Visa’s or scamming tourists into a visa on arrival charged at higher rate as they guide them over. I already had my visa so I was sorted and didn’t have to worry about it, but at the immigration desks the number of tourists finding out they got done was amazing…

In between Cambodia and Thailand in no mans land where casinos, and lots of them. 6 major casinos in a 400m strip, and there where people flooding into them.

I got past the Cambodian border control with no problems and had a lovely chat to the local police while I was there, they were interested in my bike as always… but nothing happened they actually wanted to buy it off me, have no idea why???

My target today was a place called “Siam Reap” a town some 300km away from the border, I was a bit worried as I had no idea what the roads would be like. To my amazement the Cambodia roads were by far the best I had ridden on thus far. They were flat, no pot holes and over taking lanes…

The country side in Cambodia was also a surprise to me, I imagined lush thick jungles and hills but it was laser line flat and rice fields. For 299/300km it was the same thing on both sides of the road. So I put my foot down and bolted for the town.

Siam Reap is famous for 1 thing, Angkor Wat. The Angkor Wat area is a large complex of temples built around the year 800AD, its about 15km by 8km with several sister sites outside the main complex as well, some 30 temples or so around the tourist town of Siam Reap.

I had talked to people in Laos and Vietnam that had visited Angkor before and all said they ran out of time seeing it all, so I was determined to see the lot. I was well rewarded.

Im going to explain a few of the temples but all in all, there was so many, so much to see and each one was different in its own right.

The main temple of Angkor Wat was massive; the scale is larger than the Forbidden City in Beijing and older as well… It is the worlds largest religious Temple.

The temple had a grand entrance, which opens up, into a large field with the main temple in the middle. The temple with 4 walls covered in carvings explaining different aspects of the Hindu/Buddhist history were extremely detailed and as you progressed from one wall to another the story would continue till death.

The center was a large spire can be climbed and gives a amazing view over the complex, it also features a Buddha (now) for which Buddhist pilgrims visit.

I took a good 3 hours walking around the grounds and looking at the wall carvings. It was so beautiful.

The second temple I visited was another famous one, you may have seen pictures or seen it in movies without realising it. Bayon a section of the sub-complex of Angkor Thom, a much smaller temple but its spires have 4 large faces smiling out, one for each direction.

The temple has some 200+ faces of the king at the time/mix with Buddha. The complex was like a small maze and it was breath taking beautiful. It also had lots of carvings and other features on it, but not on the scale of Angkor Wat.

The entrance area to Angkor Thom was also protected by a large gate with the same faces and 2 large naga (a mythical serpents with 7 heads) and guards pulling the naga back.

I had been riding the entire day around the temples and I sat down in front of Angkor Wat for the sunset, it gave a nice orange glow over the temple.

The days following I visited more and more temples, there is far to many to give account by account but at the end of the blog i will put some more pictures up with the good ones.

One worth mentioning is Ta Prohm the temple featured in the movie “The Tomb Raider” where Lara Croft follows the small butterflies to flowers and falls though into the tomb below (set in Hollywood). The tree roots growing out of the temple are what make this temple truly magical and although they are slowly destroying the temple they cannot be removed either…

The temple is being restored by a Japanese team, but its very slow process as no build documents are around from that period of history.

I also took a day out to visit a small Vietnamese floating village on the large lake in Cambodia. It wasn’t that grand I must admit, I was expecting to much but it was still nice to say hi to the locals and see how they live. On the way out and back in merchant boats would come up drop a lady or kid off who had drinks and food and then pick them back up, all while our boat was still moving.

Another day I also visited the local war museum, it displayed tanks, guns, bombs, landmines from the vietnam and cambodian wars.

The town itself was nice as well to sit at night, I ended up spending Christmas Eve and Day here in Siam Reap.

All the bars and clubs had decked out in Christmas colors and tunes it was nice… apart from the constant every 10 seconds a beggar asking for money, it was all to much in the end, i headed home and rang the family in Denmark and takled to my friends over the internet.

I headed out the following day having spent 7 days in Siam Reap, next stop Battambang and a bamboo train??? That should be interesting. Then on to Phnom Penh for new years.

I leave you with a few more pictures and comments below. Enjoy,

Till next time.

HAVE FUN!

Steffen.