Honeymoon stop 1: Cambodia

We landed in Bangkok for a 10-hour stay, and found this beautiful bed waiting for us. Great start to the honeymoon.

Landed in Cambodia and got swept away to artists tours, including a silk farm where we saw silk in the making.

We spent the afternoon driving through some rural villages to Tonle Sap lake, where thousands of people live in floating villages like this.

Looking over the village. Most buildings are floating on giant barrels. Houses, convenience stores, a school and church. Everyone paddles small canoes, some fitted with motors.

We had a buffet dinner with a traditional Cambodian dance show – several dances telling stories of fishing villagers and Hindu gods.

We got to Angkor Wat, the jewel of the temple ruin park, at 5am for sunrise spots. Sadly it stayed too cloudy for much sun, but still an impressive way to get our first look at the temples.

Angkor is huge with many buildings inside the ~1km sq moat. This is the library!

Most of the walls at all of the temples were carved. Some walls were like tapestries carved into the rock. This one told a story of Hindu gods fighting demons, which stretched for over 100 ft.

The temple of Angkor Wat was built about 900 years ago. It changed “ownership” several times, and walls d graffiti from French and Chinese conquerers. This one was dated!

The temples at Angkor are in various states of disrepair. Here’s a pile of carved stones that have fallen off something and waiting for repair.

It’s easy to forget we’re in the jungle, until we walk to the end of the building and found a stone shrine covered in monkeys! Look closely – there’s lots there.

The back of Angkor Wat is very iconic with the three main spires and the long fortress walls.

One of my favorite views in all of the temples were the open corridors with apparently “nesting” doorways – looking down the whole line seems like it should open to magic places.

Angkor archeological park is the official name of the park that spans hundreds of square kilometers and houses dozens of temple ruins. Our second stop was the famous Ta Prohm, made famous by the Tomb Raider movie. Everyone in Cambodia knows Angelina Jolie.

Ta Prohm is still pretty ruinous and in the middle of restoration. Here’s Patrick with a bunch of fallen rocks.

The wall carvings were deep and beautiful, and surprising. Check this one out. Dinosaurs in 12th century Cambodia??

The trees crawl all over the walls. This outer tree is a parasite that grew around the central tree, killed it, and now is hollow inside.

We stopped for lunch at a touristy little spot with great fruit smoothies. We ordered from the local specialties list – this one is called Amok. It’s green curry-like and cooked in a young coconut, so it’s smooth, sweet and tasty.

Next stop, Bayon temple. This was Patrick and my favorite. It’s famous for its 54 spires each with 4 large carved Buddha faces.

Giant carved faces make for good photo ops. 🙂

Patrick kissing Buddha.

We managed to bring out our “little people” a couple times – here’s one of their glamour shots. Our guide thought it was hilarious that we were playing with toys, because in Cambodia, “adults don’t have toys.”

Our guide pointing out details of the stories carved in the walls at Bayon temple.

Beth and Patrick standing outside Bayon temple.

Tuk tuk caravan – there were hundreds of these little motorized carts buzzing around with tourists and guides.

Some fairly typical steps outside of one of the temples. Super steep with only one railing.

Read this sign. Good to know they’re not serving dog or worms!

We spent plenty of time wandering through the night market – they sell everything! Artsy craftsy things and mass produced plastic knick-nacks, shoes, alcohol, you can find anything.

One of the best parts were the opportunities for very inexpensive ($1-$2) fish massages. These tiny fish in tanks eat the dead skin from your feet, leaving them smooth and shiny. We didn’t try.

Day 2: we told our guide we wanted to try some less touristy food, and we had a food tour between our temple stops. First – fresh squeezed water from young coconuts. So sweet.

Banteay Srei is also known as the Temple of the Pink Ladies, not because of any feminine connection, but because its carvings and pink-hued sandstone was considered so beautiful like a beautiful woman.

Some of the deep relief pink carvings in Banteay Srei.

There was a small bridge next to the temple, and a young girl ran past, collecting little critters from the water. She looked up at just the right moment.

Another beautiful temple – we took a quick stop for a few photos.

In our local food tour, we had a very local lunch. There were two pots – one red stew and one green. Get a scoop with a dallop of rice for $1.50. We dug in and it tasted great!

After lunch, we had a young coconut for dessert. Cold, sweet and delicious. Just hack the top off with a machete and sip.

Outside the temples was a hot spot for snacks. Local women here were cutting up palm fruits. You eat a small silver-dollar sized packet of translucent white liquid. Odd but yummy.

Inside the temple there aren’t any sellers except those selling religious items near the shrines, like this kind looking old woman. Sorry for the finger in the shot – I was trying to be sneaky!

Outside temple gates, everyone is selling. “Hey lady, hey lady!” Postcards, tshirts, and other little souveniers for “good deal today”.

Our second afternoon we walked around the wall surrounding Bayon temple. It’s about 1.5 km on each side and densely wooded. Beautiful.

Our guide was good with nature hike tips, including whacking this red ant nest open for us to see. Ick!

The hike ended with sunset at the corner of the temple walls. Beautiful over the moat, and dragon-tail tourist boats added to the scene.