While we make our way through the vast wooded space that is now Angkor Thom, a tip if you ever want to visit the Angkor monuments. I’d strongly advise a visit to the Angkor museum in Siem Reap. Eight small and well-presented galleries of statues and figurines will give you a good grounding in the history of the Khmer empire, and also in those aspects of Hinduism and Buddhism that are relevant to the temples. Their 1000 Buddha gallery is worth a look on its own.
Our friendly tuk-tuk driver tells us we’ve reached the temples. Let’s get out and take a look.
The Buddhist temple of Bayon, 12-13th century, built by Angkor’s most revered king, Jayavarman VII.
I promised you more faces. Bayon has dozens of them. Four faces on each tower, each serenely gazing out in one of the four cardinal directions.
Angkor Wat is the big drawcard, but the other temples, smaller and more enigmatic, also draw the crowds.
Mind your head! (I didn’t always.)
Who is it? A Buddhist bodhisattva, more-or-less a saint, here themselves personified by Jayavarnam VII himself.
Sublime.
Unfortunately, more crowded than these pics let on, and getting up the steep terraces can be quite a scramble even with the modern steps. So, after being unceremoniously shooed out of the photo line of one group of tourists, I got out.
A ten minute walk to the temple of Baphon, where I was beginning to succumb to the common Angkorian condition of being “templed-out”. So out of Angkor Thom, and on we go.
Next to Thomannon, a delightful and rarely-visited temple with its own atmosphere and in its own enchanted spaces.
Time’s running late – the park closes at 5:30! – so with an hour to go, we rush on to Ta Prohm. The one with the banyan trees.
The French – never ones to appear arrogant at all – decided to leave one of the temples unrestored to show what the lost city looked like before they turned up. That temple was Ta Prohm.
Not a bad idea. Naturally Hollywood came calling…
On the right is the top of the temple entrance from the Tomb Raider films. Not the full view – I don’t feel comfortable photographing people without asking them. And there was quite the crowd here.
Note how the light is changing on the temple walls. Of course, the really big ticket here is witnessing Angkor Wat at sunrise or sunset. Maybe I’ll give it a go in the two days I have left on my site pass.
Because, as exhaustive (and exhausting) our tour has been today, we have only followed what is known as the Small Circuit.
There’s a Great Circuit as well.
Told you this place was big.
orwellianTwo 