Chapter VI
'The Khmer Empire'
So after a few days in Thailand it was off to Cambodia in particular Siem Reap, Siem Reap is located in the northern region of the country alongside the Maeklong River, no markets floating down this one though unfortunately. After some research this was 100 percent the place to be in Cambodia especially for a short amount of days, the flight from Bangkok was no more than an hour and for the equivalent price of a chocolate bar its definitely the way to travel. It was a small plane and even then I reckon it was half full, the airport is portably one of the coolest I’ve seen though, its not particularly big but the terminal is all white stoned with bright red asian style roofs, like something out of an old command and conquer game if any of you ever played it. You pretty much land and park where ever you want and walk across the rest of the runway to the terminal. Theres no visa required or papers to sign, incredibly easy process, just security to get through and another stamp to add to the passport. I didn’t organise any transport to or from the airport as apparently this is a rather new airport, the original which is still standing is about 10 minutes drive to the city centre but this one is about an hour, so be warned when looking up Siem Reap Airport don’t get confused with the one that is closing if not already closed down.
There was a handful of taxis and buses pulling up outside the airport but there was a lot more tuk tuks and as previously stated these are the way to travel, take in mind I did arrive midday ish and it was boiling hot, so an hour in a tuk tuk which goes probably a max 25mph seems ok, if I arrived at night I would probably not recommend it, most of the roads are unmarked, the roads arn’t lit from what I could see and the buses and cars zip by you, it feels perfectly fine in the daylight I just think it may be a different matter at night personally.
But it was all part of the experience, you’re going slow enough to get your phone out and take some amazing pictures, similar to the outskirts of Thailand etc, shopping stalls just plastered on the sides of the roads, most likely selling road kill and actually there was some crocodile being sold at one, but it really is worth seeing. 30 mins go by and we started to hit some civilisation, I don’t think I mentioned yet but you can buy instead of individual e-sims, continent e-sims, well to a certain degree, I think I paid about 60 pound for the whole 2 weeks spread across 4 different countries for unlimited Internet so ideal. Anyway we got to the outskirts of the city centre so I knew we were reasonably close, these guys don’t really have sat nav in the tuk tuks, might be lucky if they have a phone they can look at for gps but he got me right outside and even offered to carry my backpack, there was no need but I did tip him for just being a nice person, he politely requested for me to take his number incase I needed a lift back to the airport, as I said just genuinely nice people. I stayed in a hotel based on location, it was smack in the middle of Siem Reap, not that its a big city anyway but plenty of shops and restaurants within walking distance, the hotel was called ‘Side Walk Hotel‘ it was nice, more about location and price over comfort etc, not to say it wasn’t comfortable by any means. I explained to the staff on reception that I am being picked up around 4am for an excursion the next day, so they said they would make me a packed lunch/breakfast, which I 100 percent agreed to and thanked them for it.
I took to the streets mostly to explore my surroundings but also because I was bloody hungry, there was probably 100 different places I could’ve tried, they all looked so good, but a raised wooden like temple as a restaurant seemed to call out, I sat down and chose a seat outside overlooking the quiet streets of Siem Reap, the menu was vibrant full of colour and lots of choices, I went with a chicken and noodle style dish served on a banana leaf and to soak it down a very, very nice local beer Angkor, its up there as one of the best, i’ve got to be honest, incredibly surprised no idea how its made or with what but regardless a fantastic little tipple. The food was fantastic and very reasonably priced.
I went for a walk around the city centre, as I said its not that big so fairly easy to walk most of it, the humidity is the toughest challenge! My excursion is to the infamous temples of Cambodia ie ‘Angkor Wat’ and some Khmer Villages so I thought I would brush up on some history before going. I headed for the Museum and passed through the ‘Royal Independence Gardens’ which seems nice and normal…. until you look into the trees and realise the branches/leaves are all moving making noises too. Thousands and thousands of bats, yep bats! I have no idea what brings them to this small park in the middle of a city but every single tree is crawling with them its actually awesome to see, they don’t swoop down to attack you or anything, well, they didn’t when I was there anyway. But it really is a sight to see, I spent longer than I thought I would walking through this park couldn’t believe what I was actually seeing, but eventually got to the ‘Angkor National Museum’.
It cost about a tenner for entry and you even get an android with headphones, choose your language and off you go. You arrive in a courtyard and on inspection the pond in the middle is full of turtles swimming and koi fish, attention to detail of course. Its like any other museum really, room after room with everything numbered so you don’t miss anything on the virtual tour guide. Theres 12th century statues from the khmer temples, models of the ancient cities, lots of really knowledgable information plastered all around. It took me about an hour to get around, I then proceeded outside and jumped in another tuk tuk, I returned to the hotel to relax by the pool and see out the day there, after all its an early start tomorrow.
A minibus picked me up around 330am and then parked up just outside the city, we only stopped three times so it was nice to know it wasn’t going to be a fully packed bus. The exact trip I booked was a full day tour of the temples and Angkor Wat sunrise viewing. As you can imagine this isn’t the only trip so on the entrance theres plenty of busses and people queuing, its better to pre book so you skip these lines. Its a bit of a rush to the entrance to make sure you get the best viewing spot, the whole area is surrounded by a moat of sort and the
original bridge crossing is fantastic unfortunately it was being worked on so they’ve created temporary floating bridges, you then enter into a huge courtyard with Angkor Wat in the background, it was still pretty dark at this point but as we got closer its magnificent outline became more apparent. I think its classed as the unofficial 8th wonder of the world and fell just short of making the top 7 new wonders of the world, trust me it would be in my top 7 every day of the week. As far as craftsmanship goes its by far the most incredible, if not more impressive than the colosseum in my opinion. I took a walk around the lake that surrounds the temple and tried to get the best position possible for the sun that was about to arise over Angkor Wat and lo and behold there it was…
I wasn’t lying its bloody amazing! isn’t it. There were people crying, clapping, brought out emotions in everyone. Amazing, amazing, amazing deserves another picture actually…
The temple is massive, we entered through the east side of the temple, the engravings, the attention to detail, everything about it was fascinating, you can walk to the very top but unfortunately that was also being worked on that day, mind you, theres hundreds of steps and steeper than anything i’ve seen, the temple itself is still used today, monks come and go, the very interesting thing is how the temple was built. Theres plenty of statues the older being Hindu and then after the khmer empire sacked the temple and tore down the Hindu religious statues it swayed towards Buddhism, it’s very evident by the different statues around the temple. Due to the mass amount of battles and even earthquakes in this region, a lot of temples fell, but Angkor Wat is built on a sand based lake, I cant quite remember the exact planning of it but its well worth googling, amazing again how they can build such things all these years ago and we struggle to replicate anything even close this day and age! We then moved on to the next temple which was ‘Angkor Thom’ which was the capital of the Khmer Empire, what was most fascinating about this temple was the amount of people that lived in this area on top of that each tower had faces, the more faces the richer the family, its just crazy information but it all fascinated me so much.
Within the Angkor area is something I think most people would recognise, ‘Ta Prohm’ Lara Crofts Tomb Raider, the giant tree growing into and out of the temple itself, theres not just one, we did a walk around the whole area where the trees especially their roots are the talking points, they are gigantic, we also entered the ‘Bayon Temple’ where a lot of Indiana Jones was filmed, you can see why I told you Siem Reap is a must visit! And these temples or ‘Wat’s’ if you haven’t caught on yet are plastered everywhere they are about 5 min drive from one another, where you can then walk for miles enjoying the views and history. I cant speak highly enough about this trip, its one I had booked long before even coming to Cambodia, you meet some awesome people, all with different backgrounds but all with the same reason as yourself to see this incredible place!
I had one last day in Cambodia and due to myself always being on the move I intended to have most likely the only really relaxing day doing absolutely nothing! Actually having a lie in, being able to enjoy the complimentary hotel breakfast, sitting by the pool and doing nothing! I read a book, enjoyed some instagram time from my latest trip and took several dips in the pool. That was until the biggest wasps turned up, well asian hornet I think they’re called, I stayed in the pool waiting for the coast to be clear as they say, there was only one but one was enough! I then jumped out of the pool to find some giant caterpillar just walking by the edge, was like jurassic park, so much for relaxing. It actually wasn’t all that bad haha, especially after you walk through a park complete with bats. My time came to a close in Siem Reap and Cambodia, for now. A completely different atmosphere to Thailand but equally as majestic, maybe I just take things for granted closer to home, but I just cannot compare anything I have seen so far, the east is just better!
