Angkor Wat and Beng Mealea

When people plan a trip to Cambodia, they as often say they are going to Angkor Wat as Siem Reap because Angkor Wat is the most famous of the temples. Angkor Wat is the largest religious monument in the world and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The temple was built by the Khmer King Suryavarman II in the early 12th century. 

Our guide brought us late in the day on Friday, when it was somewhat cooler and so we could see the sun setting on the temple, which turned it a stunning golden color. He said that it was hard to take good pictures in the morning, because the sun would be behind the temple, which faces west, unlike all the other temples that face east.

Angkor Wat was incredibly cool and lots of fun, with monkeys roaming around the grounds.  I loved that there were libraries, which must have been filled with scrolls, back in the day.  Te grounds are lovely and it was beautiful as the sunset reflected on the water of the moat surrounding the temple. 

The girls climbed up to the very top of the temple, while Chris and I enjoyed a small break. After a great tour of Angkor Wat, we headed back to the hotel for some dinner and a relaxing evening.


On Saturday, Beng Mealea was the last temple we toured, although I was sick and stayed at the hotel while Chris and the girls went to climb the ruins. It was probably for the best that I skipped that one, as it was a 2 hour car ride to Beng Mealea, over very bumpy and twisty roads.  Even though things are that far apart in the Angkor area, the roads are so choppy that I'd already almost gotten car sick on our way to Ta Phrom the day before.  Plus, when the got to Beng Mealea, Chris and the girls found that the stairs were really more like ladders with no hand rails and lots of scary heights and edges.  I don't think it would have been my cup of tea, even if I wasn't sick in bed.

Beng Mealea is a temple in the Angkor Wat style located 40 km east (two hours on very bumpy roads) of the main group of temples at Angkor, Cambodia, on the ancient royal highway to Preah Khan Kompong Svay. It is very much still in ruins and reclaimed by the jungle.

It's one of the most mysterious temples at Angkor, as nature has well and truly run riot. Built to the same floor plan as Angkor Wat, exploring this temple is Angkor's ultimate Indiana Jones experience. The temple used to be utterly subsumed by jungle, but some of the dense foliage has been cut back in recent years.

The trip to Beng Mealea took several hours, given the long drive each way and the tour itself, so when Chris and the girls returned to the hotel, we had some lunch, swam and played games and hung out at the hotel before Sopanha came back to pick us up at 8 p.m. to take us to the airport. 

Unfortunately, there is only one flight on China Eastern from Siem Reap to Shanghai, which leaves at 10:45 p.m. and lands in Shanghai at 4 a.m., Shanghai time. Fortunately, we had scheduled a driver to meet us there and bring us home, so we were able to take our tired bodies and loads of luggage and stumble back to the apartment. The trip was a great experience, even though Chris and I both got a little sick at the end of the week.  We had a good mix of touring, resting, playing, pampering, and quiet reading time.  For a place that I never planned to visit, our week in Cambodia ended up being a great vacation.