So I have finally got around to telling you about the beautiful Angkor Temples, this was one of the things Daniel and I were looking forward to most out of our travels and was most definitely worth every penny. We went to see them on Tuesday 24th August 2010.
We woke up early, 4.30am to be precise, still feeling dazed and confused I pulled on some clothes and washed my face. We heard a knock on the door which we weren't expecting. It was Chris he told us that Ellie was feeling slightly under the weather and she had decided to give Angkor a miss and do it the day after, so Chris and Ellie stayed behind and Daniel and I ended up going it alone, they were very much missed. The sky was still dark and the air outside was as cool as I had known it for quite some time. Our tuk tuk driver stood at our Guest house gate looking about as blurry eyed as us. We jumped in the tuk tuk and set off on our way in to the night that would be vastly approaching dawn within the next hour. There's something about seeing a town by tuk tuk while it's still dark and the streets are deserted, it already felt magical before we'd arrived at our destination.
After a quick stop at the ticket office we were soon arriving in the parking area of Angkor Wat. It was still pitch black out and we were pointed in the direction in which we were to head to catch the sunrise over the temple. Luckily for us Angkor Temples are still popular out of season and we followed a line of people that led the way, we hadn't thought to bring a flash light to guide our feet on the uneven pavement so it was handy to have a crowd to follow. As the sun rose slowly on the over the top of the Angkor Wat Temple it wasn't no way near as impressive as we might of hoped due to a slightly cloudy morning, however the atmosphere was incredible, the silence of so many people in anticipation, the sound of hens"cockadoodling" as the dawn broke and the tremendous presence of dragon flies each equally as beautiful and colourful that surrounded the air around the temples. The Angkor Wat Temple itself is a beautiful old building, which has been restored in parts. There are so many parts to explore and even just the first temple took Daniel and I nearly two hours to walk round. We visited about another 6 through out the day, my favourite being The Bayon. The Bayon is a building that you imagine seeing in Tomb Raider or Indiana Jones movie, a lost world of it's own. The temple has something like 50 towers on it each with huge carved faces, it has a green mould growing over the very old stone and plants that have wiggled there way through every nook and cranny. It was so hard not to be a big kid in this place imagining you'd found a lost world of your own.
The Angkor Temples are infinite with more than you could ever imagine taking in in a week, let alone 1 day! We have already said this will be an adventure for our future holidays to come!
We spent a few more days in the lovely Siem Reap before getting a bus to Bangkok, Thailand. Daniel and I did some wandering around, took in some local temples and even went up to the Angkor Childrens Hospital to donate some blood and they even gave us a free T-Shirt to say thank you. The journey to Thailand on the 27th August included a very tedious boarder crossing and a result of us arriving nearly 4 hours later than expected in Bangkok.....
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