Angkor

Made it to Cambodia safe and sound. I am staying in a guesthouse right in the middle of Siem Reap and was picked up at the airport by one of their drivers. I have engaged his services for the first three days of my stay here and he has been a godsend so far. There is so much more to Angkor that I ever imagined, even after several hours spent reading about it in my guidebook. It is absolutely huge and can't be attempted without transportation of some sort. Samso, my driver, has put together an itinerary for me, and it covers all the places I had marked with an asterisk in my book. I wasn't really planning on starting as soon as I got checked into the guesthouse, but start I did, and I haven't stopped since. I have just completed day 2 of my 3 day tour of the Angkor area.

I have to start by just saying "Wow". It's absolutely spectacular. Although the rocks used in the buildings are not as big as those used by the Inca, this certainly gives Machu Picchu a run for it's money. There are temples and towns and pools and carvings spread over an enormous area. There aren't any major structures that don't have some kind of water nearby - either a moat or pools. The moats are the size of rivers and pools are like my lake. There are two pools that have since dried up that each would have contained 71 olympic size pools. There is a mixture of Bhuddist, Hindu and secular influences in the buildings and carvings.

Yesterday I started with Angkor Thom which is an entire walled city. It housed 1 million people at a time when London was a city of 20,000. It took me about 4 hours to see most of the highlights - a temple, massive terrasses, palace, pools etc. Almost every inch of the buildings are covered in carvings. It's mind-boggling. In the afternoon I did the famous Angkor Wat which is the largest religious structure in the world. After spending a few hours there, I stayed and watched the sun set on it, which is something that just must be done although I didn't really see why. It nice but not spectacular. These structures are all open to everyone, so you can climb all over them (except in places which are under repair or dangerous). Their stairways remind of the Mayans' - steep, high and very narrow. Not exactly my cup of tea, but I wasn't going to leave without seeing everything. I often left my shoes at the bottom of these stairs as I felt I stood a better chance of living through the ordeal in my bare feet. In every case it was worth the climb for the views alone.

Today I went a bit further afield to a spot about 30 kms up the Siem Reap river from the city. There is a stretch of river (actually a creek at this point, and hardly that since we're in the dry season), that is covered in rock carvings. Some are on rocks along the river, but most are on rocks on the actual riverbed, so can only be seen when there is little to no water running over them. Very bizarre and really beautiful. This location was only recently reopened after the war, and it's a spot where sticking to the path is of utmost importance due to UXOs. The walk in through the jungle is about 1.5 kms and really beautiful, but there's no stepping into the bush for a quick pee here.

We went to a second site out of town which is said to be the most beautiful of the Angkor temples. It is a smaller site, but the carvings are much more spectacular. There is literally not an inch of rock that isn't carved and the carvings are very delicate and intricate. It's called the temple of women because they figure only women could have done such delicate work.

After lunch we stopped at another spot near to town that is said to have been a crematorium. It was also a pretty spectacular building, with many different "stove pipes". The last building today was used in the filming of Tomb Raider with Angolina Jolie. I never saw the movie so it didn't mean much to me but the other tourists were eating it up. This particular temple has not been rescued from the jungle, so there are massive trees growing through and around the buildings. It's very cool and I think my favourite so far. Unfortunately I showed up at the same time as several tour groups so I didn't get to really enjoy it as much as I would have liked.

These buildings all have that really wonderful energy and peacefulness about them that Machu Picchu does and it just makes me dream of spending some time alone there. Unfortunately that's just not possible without sneaking in after hours. One of the places I'm going tomorrow is apparently way off the beaten track, and Samso has promised me that I'll find some space and time to be alone there.

I have been really busy since I arrived two days ago, which I think is a good thing. I am totally enthralled by Angkor, but think that the rest of Cambodia might be a bit hard to take after Laos. It's like going from 0 - 60 overnight. Laos was so laid-back and Cambodia just isn't. As frustrating as it is to deal with the constant hassel to buy things, I try to keep remembering how tough these people have had it in the very recent past and that they are just trying to put some food on the table. The situation here is still really lousy and it will be awhile before many of these people can make decent livings.