Temple Eating Tree

“Daddy, is that tree eating temple?” Adi questioned when we saw Ta Phrom Temple & the huge tree on top of it.

Ever since I visited Borobudur in Yogyakarta, wanted to see Angkor Wat in Cambodia. Angkor Wat is the world's largest Hindu temple. In fact, no other Religious Structure (in any religion) of this big size exists anywhere else in the world. There are many temples in Angkor area, built during 8th till 12th century by Khmer Kings. The whole Angkor area was abondoned after being sacked by Thai's in year 1431. It was covered by jungle for almost 500 years. In 1908 it was accidentally found by French. We could visit only few temples, one Shiva (Banteay Srei), one Vishnu (Angkor Wat) & two buddhist (Ta Phrom - 'Tomb Raider' fame & Bayon with giant stone faces) temples. All are in ruined state.

Actually this has no relation with Indonesia, except, we made this trip from Indonesia and after I posted the pictures of Cambodia in Orkut, many of my friends asking me details of Angkor temple, how to go there etc. I thought it is a good idea to put the details in one place, which can help all who wants to visit Angkor. This is how this post got a place in my blog.

Flight: The airport is Siem Reap. There is no direct flight from Indonesia to Cambodia. There are direct flights from KL, Singapore or Bangkok. We went via Kuala Lumpur. It’s 2 hours flight from KL. From Bangkok, it is possible to go by road, crossing border.

How many days: 2 - 3 full days are enough to see all the main temples. One having archeological interest may need more than 3 days.

Main tourist pullers: Angkor wat, Ta Prohm, Angkor Thom & Bayon, Preah Khan, Banteay Srei. The first 3 temples are must see.

Accomodation: Hotels are cheap; we stayed in a 3 star hotel, for just US$35 a night (City River Hotel). Hotel was good but breakfast, there was no vegetarian except eggs (if one consider it as veg) & fruits. The hotel was better than the 3 star hotels in Kuta area (Bali).

Transport: We hired a car, $25 a day, including fuel & driver. Tuktuk’s (auto rikshaw) are available for $12 a day. From airport, prepaid taxi till hotel is just $7. It takes 20 - 30 minutes to reach Siem Reap city center.

Visa: Cambodia visa can be obtained thru internet (e_visa) before entering or can be obtained on arrival at airport. Visa fee $20.

Exit tax: Exit tax while leaving Cambodia is $25 per person. Childrens only 50%. I wonder why they charge more to get out of the country than get in.

Entry fee for temples: To visit temples, we need to obtain the pass, one day pass costs $20 & three days costs $40. Childrens - free.

Guide: Only certified people are allowed to work as guides. Fee $25 per day.

Food: Local food is cheap, Chinese & Thai food is available everywhere. We had Indian food there, costs around $8 per person per meal. We liked Currywalla restaurant, run by a punjabi. Food was very very good, but the ambience was not that good. There are 4 - 5 Indian restaurants around Siem Reap.

Currency: Currency is Rial (1 USD = 4000 Rials), but USD is accepted everywhere. We exchanged only $20 in the airport & could not spend all of it & bring it with us as souvenir. Note - it is better to carry USD in cash, since it is difficult to find ATM's in Siem Reap.

Language: Many people in Siem Reap can understand & speak English.

Shopping: There is nothing much we can buy compared to Bali or Bangkok. I was looking for miniature of Angkor wat but did not buy since the good one was very expensive. We visited the Old market to buy souvenirs, disappointed to see most of the items were imported from China or Thailand.

Season: Best months to go Nov to Feb. June to Oct is rainy season, humid but still ok. Better to avoid March – May, I heard it’s very hot.

Click the below link to see the pictures of Cambodia. I added comments on most of the pictures for easy viewing.

http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/vinushetty/CambodiaAngkorTemples

Biawak

In evenings, we often walk around the camp, mostly within Oleander complex. Two rounds to Oleander would take 40 minutes and bring sweat out of us. We generally finish this walk before 6:30pm, before sunset. Especially Vrush avoided such walk since one evening we heard some strange sound of animal from jungle, while we were walking on the other end of oleander where most of the houses are unoccupied. We suspected this sound must be of tiger or some big bear. Next day, when I told about this sound in office, my Indonesian friends voted for tiger & also told me not be worried, since there is lot of wild pigs available for tigers to feast, so they may not try to eat humans!

Though we never seen any other animals in camp except monkeys, wild bores, snakes and huge lizards, we are sure there are other wild animals live just few meters away from us, outside the fence. When I was here in 2004, someone spotted a tiger inside the camp. In 2006, an 8 meter long python was found sleeping in a garage of one of the house in Jati complex. In Duri, there are instances of herds of Elephants visited the camp at night. Despite the massive deforestation for palm plantation, there is still large area of dense rainforest, housing these animals.





I heard a lot about the Komodo dragons, which are big monster lizards, live in Komodo Islands of Indonesia. The smaller version of these is seen in Sumatra & sometimes even inside camp. These are called “biawaks”. One evening, when we were walking around Oleander, we saw such a biawak. Its head was inside a big hole, it was trying to dig it deeper. Generally these biawaks are very shy & run away on seeing humans. This time it could not see us till we go very close. I went home to bring camera, took some pictures without disturbing it.

I think it may be laying eggs on that hole previous night. Next evening when we went there, the hole was leveled with fresh soil.