Cambodia: Watching the sunrise over an Ancient Wonder of the World
- Esther
- Nov 30, 2018
- 3 min read
Updated: Apr 4, 2020
With our bus to Thailand already pre-booked, we've actually only had four full days to explore Cambodia.
Half a week was never going to be anywhere near enough time to see all of the country's best bits (especially as it's felt like the last few days have literally flown by!), but we’ve still managed to visit some incredible places while here.
Phnom Penh
Our first stop in Cambodia was its busy capital, Phnom Penh, where we took a quick look at the city’s glittering Royal Palace and had a tuk tuk ride with a really funny driver before arriving at our hostel.
While we were in Phnom Penh, we went to the Killing Fields and the Toul Sleng Genocide Museum; two of the biggest memorials of the genocide that took place under the Khmer Rouge in the '70s and stole the lives of nearly two million Cambodian people.
The fields and the museum were the most upsetting places I've visited in Asia by far, because the things that happened there only a few decades ago were just unthinkable. But learning about the events which so many Cambodian people are still recovering from was also a really eye-opening experience.
Afterwards, we spent our evening in Phnom Penh exploring its famous night market and trying out some delicious Cambodian dishes, like lime-marinated beef salad, red curry and some delicious pork noodles.
Siem Reap
From Phnom Penh, we took an overnight bus to Siem Reap to explore the Angkor temples which Cambodia is so known and loved for - and which were all even more beautiful than I'd expected them to be!
We started our tour of the Angkor temple complex by looking around what our tuk tuk driver called the ‘smaller’ temples (even though they were still pretty huge!), which were incredible to see.
On that first day, we saw temples entwined with overgrown trees, crawling with monkeys and surrounded by water. Some of them had about a hundred steps to climb, some were full of hidden passageways and some had crumbled so much over the centuries that there were only a few elaborate wall carvings or archways left standing.
After spending about eight hours (!) exploring just a handful of Angkor's eerie and beautiful ancient temples, we went to watch the sunset from an ancient mountain temple called Phnom Bakheng.
At the top of the mountain, we saw one of the most bright pink sunsets I've ever seen before heading back down to finish day one of our tour.
That night, we wandered around the night market and visited an incredible restaurant which sold nothing but different flavours of spring rolls!
Afterwards, we went along to Siem Reap’s famously lively Pub Street to have some drinks (and try the street vendors' hand-rolled ice cream bowls!)
The next morning, we kicked off our second day of exploring Angkor by watching the sunrise over Angkor Wat; the largest religious monument ever built and one of the 7 Ancient Wonders of the World.
Even though this meant we had a painfully early start to the day (and had to do a lot of waiting around in a crowd of other tourists), the view could not have been more worth it!
After the sun had fully come out, we went for a walk around the iconic temple itself. Inside, it was enormous, which made the amount of detail its creators had carved into the stones on every corner even more incredible.
We spent a good couple of hours walking around Angkor Wat. At one point, I put some money into the monks’ social activities donation box and got given a blessing and a handmade bracelet from one of the monks in return.
After that, we went to have a look around the Bayon Temple, which was (in my opinion) just as beautiful and unique as Angkor Wat, but not quite as well-known.
One of Bayon's most stand-out features is the fact that it's filled with over two hundred ancient sculptures of calmly smiling faces, which have kept their gentle expressions for nearly a thousand years.
The jungle-covered Ta Prohm temple also felt unique and special because it had the roots of giant trees winding through all of its loosened stones, making it feel really mystical.
Ta Prohm was also the temple where the original Lara Croft: Tomb Raider movie was filmed. A lot of the temples here do almost feel like they could just be movie sets; they're too mysterious and elaborate to be real!
Overall, our visit to Cambodia has been short but sweet. There are still loads of places that I'd like to have seen here, but I’m really happy with all that we've managed to do in just a few days. The Angkor temples alone are worth travelling here for!
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