Nice weather had returned to Siem Reap. We set off at 0800 by tuktuk again to Eastern Mebon, picking up where we had left off the day before. The sunlight was perfect, illuminating the facade of the first few sights we visited.
The big one for the day was Ta Prohm, made famous by the movie Tomb Raider. It was much more built up than I remembered. I vaguely recall clambering over fallen pieces to get to the well-rooted ruins. Now, the most photogenic areas are barricaded and there are walkways around the rebuilt monuments.
I’m glad we didn’t do Ta Prohm yesterday as it would have competed with Preah Khan a little too much in our heads. It would have been too much of a good thing all on the same day.
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- Starting the day at Eastern Mebon.
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- Starting the day at Eastern Mebon.
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- Starting the day at Eastern Mebon.
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- At Ta Prohm.
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- At Ta Prohm.
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- At Ta Prohm.
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- At Ta Prohm.
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- At Ta Prohm.
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- At Ta Prohm.
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- At Ta Prohm.
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- At Ta Prohm.
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- At Ta Prohm.
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- At Ta Prohm.
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- At Ta Prohm.
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- At Ta Prohm.
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- At Ta Prohm.
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- At Ta Prohm.
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- At Ta Prohm.
Next stop was Sra Srang. The artificial lake would have been dried up but there was a little water from yesterday’s downpour. It wasn’t much of a spectacle so we walked across the road to Banteay Kdei.
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- Sra Srang with a tiny bit of water in the pool.
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- At Banteay Kdei.
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- At Banteay Kdei.
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- At Banteay Kdei.
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- Back at Angkor Wat.
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- Back at Angkor Wat.
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- Back at Angkor Wat.
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- Courtyard between the levels at Angkor Wat.
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- Queue for the upper levels at Angkor Wat.
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- Queue for the upper levels at Angkor Wat.
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- Back at Angkor Wat.
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- Back at Angkor Wat.
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- Siem Reap old town; we think we stayed in those arched shophouses 14 years ago.
We felt a bit templed out after seeing the best part and decided it was nearly enough. We thought it would be proper to head to Angkor Wat itself for a second look. Even though it was lunchtime, there was still a reasonable number of visitors.
The queue for the stairway up to the top was long. We could not face queueing in the midday sun. I explored the lower levels and visualised what it would be like at the top; one would see three sets of squares of the lower levels, the courtyards in between and the forests beyond. Having visualised that, I didn’t feel too bad about not going up. It would have been more of the same, I told myself.
We headed back to Siem Reap for lunch. At the next table, this western woman ate a quarter of her hamburger meal and left it behind. The staff mumbled amongst themselves as they cleared up. I think it was extremely rude leaving perfectly good meal largely eaten in a poor country where the meat content would have fed a family.
The rest of the day was spent cooling off in the pool, resting and having a massage.