Siem Reap - Part 1

The guide book says that the boat journey from Battambang to Siem Reap is the best trip in the country. Everyone else says it's a hellish journey of over 10 hours in the dry season. Which is now.

So I took the bus.

Five hours, of Bolivian style fun. On the way I met some people from Belgium, and Noin whose studying to become an English Teacher. We end up sitting next to each other and chatting away and sharing food along the way. Including the rather unusual - but tasty - dried mango with salt, sugar, and super hot chili.

Here's a pic of Noin:



Most of the road is paved now - but there's one section that's rough dirt, and at one point we hit this huge hump and the back of the bus bounces up into the air - with everyone lifted out of there seats. After the initial surprise - it's laughter all round (particularly after an amusing re-enactment on my part)...

After finding a place to stay, I decided to do a trip out to Phnom Bakheng to see the sunset over Angkor Wat. I was introduced to Raman who was going to take me to buy the three day ticket to the Angkor temples, and then on to see the sun set.

On the way to see the sunset:



I wasn't sure about whether it would be worth doing, because the Planet says that it's often packed with people - and while it was fairly busy, it was definitely worth doing. After the climb up the hill you eventually get to the top of the temple and see the views.

From the top:



Angkor Wat



All the people, so many people, they all go hand in hand:



As we're waiting I get chatting to some people on holiday from Melbourne, who are on there way to Singapore so I was able to pass on some tips.

And then sun sets, and the sky is really incredible:





Most people had left by the time I took the last picture above - and it was getting dark, and there were people from the park going around saying: "park close now - go home time". But a few people hung around until we were thrown out, and after making it down in the dark, I met up with Raman and it was back to the hotel.

I took this photo on the way back. It's the moat and main entrance of Angkor Wat. I was under some pressure to take the picture, as a lady from the park kept saying it was closed and that when she counted to three I'd have to leave - which as a problem, as this was on a 15 second exposure :-)