Siem Reap river park, dinner and a tuk-tuk ride

The previous post in this series is here..

Believe it or not, this is the 10th stop for day 3 of our trip. Our first day of sightseeing in Cambodia that started before 7AM and ended at 6:30 PM.

Our driver stopped near the river park that was just beautiful. Given the traffic we ran across to catch the view and came back to the car. We found that we could actually walk to this place from our hotel. Made a mental note to do that the following day. After this our driver showed us around the night market area and the central square with all the restaurants. He told us it would be a 15 minute walk to our hotel after our dinner or we could take a tuk tuk back for 1 to 1.5$.

It was a choice between Modiji’s Indian restaurant or Lotus Indian restaurant. We picked Lotus. The food and service was awesome. We did feel that the yogurt was interesting. Later we learned that yoghurt in Cambodia was made from milk powder. Dairy is not a concept there and cows are only eaten. Was thinking “little wonder then that all the temples are in ruins”.

Here is a video highlights reel..

After dinner we decided to take the tuk tuk to the hotel. We were going to be picked up by our driver at 4:30 AM the next morning to see the sunrise..

It was an exhausting day with 10 stops and non stop sightseeing, a fall that ended in a bruised leg that still had not been attended to.. just went back to the hotel, took two tylenol and crashed. The next day was going to be busy as well!

Watching the sunset atop the Pre Rup temple

The previous post in this series is here..

Our last tourist stop for the evening was the Pre Rup Temple. A magnificent temple built for Shiva worshipped as the god of death. A place where the royals were cremated at the base of the temple. The sunsets facing the temple. There are four shrines on each side with lingas. Our driver had already mentally composed the shot he was going to take with me doing yoga in front of Shiva with the setting sun in the background.. trying to bring all three together needed some angles and calculations in a narrow time window. He already hyped me for the sunset. San kept rolling her eyes as she knew that Saruk was mentioning all my drugs in one sentence.. yoga, sunset, photography, shiva.. she warned me that this had the potential to be a big disappointment..

We were driving fast and Saruk said the only way we make it to the top is if we went through the side entrance. So off we went. There was a person checking our tickets but no crowd. We walked up to the temple and saw each stairs was a foot or more in height and there were more than a 100 steps to climb.. machchu pichchu style.. San rolled her eyes again, but the Wagh Bakri chai was still flowing and with my SLR back on my shoulder, started climbing up the stairs. We made it in time for me to do a timelapse video of the sunset, Saruk to try his yogagraphy (he should have gone wide but got an A+ for effort again) and walk back down right when it was starting to get dark.

A video highlights reel..

Our sightseeing for the day was almost over. We were going to go back towards our hotel but stop in the night market area for us to find food. . .

Banteay Srei temple - a beauty that was ahead of the big temple by 50 years

The previous post in this series is here..

After our epic romantic lunch, we drove a short distance downhill to reach the Banteay Srei temple. This temple predates the Tanjore big temple by 50 years! It is a Hindu temple with a beautiful moat and carvings with separate shrines for most of the main deities. Sadly the French dismantled most of it and took it to France.. what is left is a fraction of the original temple and is still mind blowing. Humans don’t know how to leave a magnificent creation the way it is. Religiion, language, culture wars take a toll on beauty.

We walked around the temple. It was hot already. The restrooms here were really well maintained. The staff friendly but firm in enforcing people stay within the ropes. Was thinking “isn’t this a too little too late!”

Sarak of course was practicing photography the entire time. I should have spent more time teaching him how to use portrait mode better.. would have had more good pictures. In any case here are the photos..

after we had taken a portrait at every door frame and window frame we told our driver, all the pictures are starting to look the same. So we can finish this location and move. We did get to see the moon rise over the temple top when we went all the way to the back of the temple. It was beautiful!!

after the temple we drove past a market to our next stop. I got fresh roasted local cashews. They were amazing. San got jackfruit which she kept eating through the rest of the trip. I am very allergic to it so when she gets it already in a sealed pouch, I cannot complain. Just told her not to keep it in my suitcase and all will be well. Then she ate fresh palm cakes with jaggery and kept raving about it for the next two days. Apparently this is not something even the locals can make at home. They just buy it in bulk in the market.

The video highlights reel.. the interesting part is the way rice is harvested.. hopefully more desi kids see this so they know how rice gets to their plate the way it does!

Then we went towards our next stop. The sun was up and it was hot and humid. We had already seen 6 locations since 7AM. We were getting tired, but weren’t going to give up. So we tredged on..