Arriving in Siem Reap was a bit of a shock to the system after six weeks of travelling through the wilder, less-explored parts of South-East Asia with limited tourist infrastructure. The town is a bustling tourist hub geared towards mass-tourism and caters for all types: from backpacking students to jet-setting pensioners.

Of course, the main reason that so many people come here is a valid one: to see the amazing temples of Angkor.

The Angkor Archaeological Park, a UNESCO World Heritiage site, covers about four-hundred square kilometres and was the home to several different capitals of the Khmer empire between ninth and fifteenth centuries.  We spent three days exploring the park, hiring a tuktuk with a driver for the entire time to get around (we would recommend our tuk-tuk driver for anyone heading to Angkor; his Cambodian mobile phone number is 0976 666985 - unfortunately we've lost his name).

We used two different guides while we were there and although all guides go through a rigorous training programme, we found that our second guide, Nak, was significantly better than the first. We would definitely recommend this excellent, eager, knowledgeable, well-spoken guide if you're planning on visiting Angkor - his website is The Angkor Guide/. We stayed at the comfortable Green Garden Home Guesthouse.

Bayon and Angkor Thom

We started our first day at the Angkor Thom, which was the last capital of the Khmer empire. It was establish in the late 12th century by Buddhist King Jayavarman VII. The main temple, Bayon, is easily recognised by the huge number of stone faces that adorn the many towers. The temple was built as a Buddhist temple, but as we saw in many of the Angkor temples, later Hindu leaders made changes to remove any references to Buddha.  On the walls surrounding the ground level, we saw amazing bas-relief which showed scenes from both everyday life and war battles on the outer wall, and hindu mythology on the inner wall. We spent time exploring all three levels, and enjoying the views from the top - where serene faces carved out of the stone watch you from every side.

Baphuon

Next we walked along to see Baphuon, although we could not go in due to restoration works. Baphuon was three tiered temple mountain (a temple built to represent Mount Meru, home to the Hindu gods). It was built in mid-11 century as part of the older capital Yasodharapura which overlaps with Angkor Thom. The restoration work has been extremely slow. Originally restoration work started in 1960 and completely dismantled the temple. Unfortunately this work was disrupted when the Khmer Rouge came in to power and all notes about how to re-assemble the stones were lost.  Of course, this has severly hampered the second restoration attempt which began in 1995 and was still ongoing when we visited - you could see the dismantled stones lying in rows in front of the temple and can only imagine the complex jigsaw puzzle it must be to put it back together again!

Phimeanakas and Terrace of the Elephants

Just next door is the slightly older Phimeanakas, which is also a temple mountain built at the end of 10th century. It is not nearly as spectacular as the previous two temples, but the very steep climb up is still worthwhile.  From here we walked to the Terrace of the Elephants, from which King Jayavarman VII would watch his army's victory parades.

Ta Prohm (the "Tomb Raider Temple")

Next stop was Ta Prohm, also known as the Tomb Raider Temple after being used as the location for the Angelina Jolie movie. This temple was built as a monastery in the Bayan style by Jayavarman VII in the late twelfth century or early thirteenth centuries.  Ta Prohm felt really different to any of the previous temples that we'd visited as it hasn't been fully cleared and restored. This makes it really magical with strangler figs wrapping themselves over collapsing walls and it really does feel like something out of a movie — which of course it is!

The entrance is quite far from the central temple and on the walk in we were witness to an exiting natural spectacle — a little frog hopped across the path in front of us with a small green snake hot on its heels. It had almost managed to escape, but at the last minute it hesitated and the snake grabbed it from right in front of us and slithered back into the bushes.

Ta Som

After lunch, we stopped at some of the temples on the northern side of Angkor Thom. Ta Som is a small temple which was also built during the reign of Jayavarman VII. Smaller than Ta Prohm, it has also had little restoration work and has strangler figs growing over its delapidated walls.

Preah Khan

Preah Khan was built on the site of Jayavarman VII's victory over the invading Chams in 1191, possibly over the site of older royal palaces. Again, the restoration work has left many the strangler figs in place

Angkor Wat

We finished this long day with a visit to the most famous of all the temples, Angkor Wat. This enormous temple-complex —the largest religious building in the world — was built in the mid-twelfth century by King Suryavarman II as his state temple and capital city. What makes Angkor Wat different to every other temple that we saw, is that it has never abandoned been to the jungle and has been occupied as a monastery for most of its existence, so it is very well preserved, although restoration work is continually ongoing.

It is an amazing building, but after all of the other beautiful temples that we had seen — and because it was so crowded compared to the other monuments we'd visited—we actually found it a bit of an anti-climax. Having said that, it was still incredible to see first hand. It's decorated with highly detailed bas-reliefs depicting the epic of the Ramayana — the same legendary epic we're leant about in India. Another incredible feature of the temple complex is the moat: at about six kilometres in length and 190 metres wide and still filled with water, it must certainly be the largest moat we've ever seen. Lastly there were beautiful carvings of divine guardians or devetas on the walls of the galleries. Unfortunately we were not allowed to climb to the top level of the temple-mountain as this was closed when we were there.

On the second day, we kept the same tuktuk driver, but had a much more enthusiastic and interesting guide - Nak. We did not do nearly as much but enjoyed it and learned far more that we had on day 1.

Banteay Srei

We started the day at Banteay Srei, a 10th century temple which is about 25km north east of of Angkor Thom. Although smaller, and only on one level high, this temple is one of the most beautiful. It is made from red sandstone which is harder and more suited to carvings than the sandstone used for the other temples. And it is the carvings that really make this temple special - they are spectacular and still in very good condition, even though they are over 1000 years old.  The temple is also known as the Lady Temple. No-one seemed sure exactly why it got this name, but one suggestion is that the carvings are so fine that they could only have been done by the hand of a lady.

Neak Pean

Neak Pean is quite different from any of the other temples that we saw. It was also built during the reign of Jayavarman VII as a hospital.  It consists of four connected pools representing water, earth, fire and wind, which surround an island with a temple on it.

Phnom Bakheng

For our last stop of the day, we headed to Phnom Bankheng which is supposed to be a wonderful spot to enjoy the sunset. We wouldnt recommend heading there though as the huge number of people that flock here completely destroy the ambience.  To get to the temple, you have the choice of walking up or riding on elephant. We chose the former, and, after a brief look around, found a comfortable spot to sit for sunset. The views are beautiful - you can see Angkor Wat as well as the massive lake Tonle Sap, but for us, the huge crowds really spoiled the moment.

On the third day, Kate felt "templed out" but Andrew headed to the magical Beng Mealea which will be the topic of our next post.