At the beginning of October we had two public holidays and an extra day off from school that made for a five day weekend, so it was time to check a must-see travel destination off our list--Cambodia! I've been wanting to go to Siem Reap for the famous ancient temples. We split time between Siem Reap and Phnom Penh, but SR was by far our favorite of the two.
Our first full day we hit it early with our tour guide/driver for the day named Chet. On the agenda was temples, temples and more temples. The first temple up was Angkor Wat, the most famous. It was amazing and the pictures don't do it justice.
The kids are fresh and ready to go in the first family pic shown below... you'll see their sweaty, grumpy progression throughout.
The Angkor Wat complex is supposedly the world's largest religious monument, was built in the early 1100's, and is surrounded by a big wall and a huge moat (now mostly dried up, and is not this pond behind us). It was originally Hindu and later was made into a Buddhist temple. It's amazing that with no heavy machinery, the builders hauled all the sandstone from far away hills and then built a three layered gigantic temple complex, and then amazingly decorated the whole thing with carvings.
The Angkor Wat carvings feature over 2000 of these fine ladies, called apsaras, and they have counted 60 different hair styles and only one of them is smiling showing her teeth.
Now we're up in the second level...
And then only grown-ups without mobility issues or babies in their bellies were allowed to climb up into the third level. I read repeatedly that we needed to have our shoulders and knees covered for the temples, and so I made the kids wear pants. But it turns out the only place that was the case for the temples we visited was this third level of Angkor Wat where the kids weren't even allowed and where shorts pulled temporarily longer to cover your knees sufficed. But they would have been only marginally less sweaty anyway.
Paul claiming his territory with his manly stance.
So the kids had to stay down below on the second level with Chet and from above I zoomed in to snag a pic of them hanging out with their new Cambodian friends...
...who asked to take a family picture with them when we came back down. So funny the woman is hugging Esme's head, but Esme's not thrilled.
A parting shot of the bridge crossing the moat, the main gate, and the temple in the background.
We said goodbye to Angkor Wat and the kids excitedly asked if now we could go back to the hotel to go swimming??? Um, no. Mama's got two more major temples to go and you're along for the ride.
The second place we went to was Angkor Thom, which is a walled complex with five big gates that used to be a big bustling city in the late 12th century. Our tour guide proudly told us more than once that at its height, one million people lived within its walls at a time when London had less than 20,000 people. We drove through this gate to get to the Bayon temple in the middle of the complex.
The Bayon temple is famous for its 37 (remaining) towers that are each carved with four faces facing each direction. As you can see, kids more sweaty, more grumpy.
Can you see the faces yet?
This face below is known for being the one with the biggest smile of all of them. The statue, not Paul Eli.
Tour guide Chet wanted to get the kids lined up to look like they were kissing the big face. Esme played along...
...but PE just gave us his best glare. I actually love this pic of him.
After the Bayon temple, we drove the rest of the way through the Angkor Thom grounds to exit out this gate. It was so pretty with all the green moss growing on it.
Our last temple of the day was Ta Prohm, which was in the Angelina Jolie Tomb Raider movie, so I'm told. It feels different from the first two we visited because this one was purposely left in its taken-over-by-nature state and only partially cleared of trees and partially restored. The trees are amazing with their snakey roots and the moss and lichen allowed to grow on the stones makes for pretty colors.
This tree is famous for looking like a butt. Paul was enjoying being inappropriate.
This is the famous tree above the famous door that the famous Angelina ran through for her famous movie, that I didn't see.
It was nice of this tree to leave this stone lady a view.
Here the kids are posing with tour guide Chet outside a small room that has cool acoustics. If you stand against the wall inside and thump your chest a deep tone reverberates throughout the room.
The kids are doing their part to keep the temple standing.
After that it was time to stop for a late lunch and refresh ourselves with coconuts bigger than Paul's head and amazing iced coffees (the Cambodians and Vietnamese win this coffee category).
The Cambodian adventure continues in our next entry with four-wheel ATV's and circus performers...
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