Total litres of water consumed: 8
Temples visited: 5
Hours in direct 37℃ sunlight: 6
We opted for a tour with a very nice tour guide by the name of Rath Sopheap. He was very informative and funny without being too dry and overloading you with information.
He took us round the temples in a good order because each one was more interesting to look at than the last (with the exception of Phnom Bakheng). In order, we did:
- Angkor Wat
- Ta Prhom
- Bakheng
- Angkor Thom
- Phnom Bakheng
There was a nice Mancunian couple in the same tour group as us. They have been traveling around Asia for a long time and are heading to Australia to work after they have toured Asia.
It was great having another British couple to share our annoyance at the arrogant drunk man in our group who boasted about every aspect of his life. His children are great, he is great, travelled everywhere, retired at 42, likes beer (chuffin’ clearly). I just don’t know how he isn’t a God. Total prink.
We visited the last temple at the top of a hill to watch the sunset. Only 300 people are allowed up there for safety reasons, so our guide dropped us off there earlier than the crowds so we could get a spot.
We were dropped off to go up the hill at 4pm. Sunset is not until 6pm here. I was well aware of the 2 hour gap, but wanted to see the view anyway. Once we’d got to the top, I checked out the view. I was nothing special. You couldn’t see any other temples and it was just greenery.
We all swarmed to the shade and sat on the roasting ground. But after 40 minutes of waiting, we called it day. The pictures of the sunset are not worth it on our opinion.
While sitting waiting for the sunset, this Asian guy next to us was too hot sitting on the stone ground. So he put his straw hat on the ground… he was visibly bracing himself by hovering his bum above it for a few seconds. He then lowered himself on to it and it very audibly crunched and he did not look in a good way according to his face. Once his arse reached the ground and the crunching stopped. People had turned heads and started laughing. ourselves included. Ruined a hat for that. He got up and left 3 minutes later anyway. What a waste of a hat!
The 4 of us (us and Charlotte and Scott the Mancunians) got tuk tuk back to town just before 5pm. Laura and I want straight to the pool after a shower and watched the sunset. We still had to wait 35 minutes for it and were glad we didn’t waste the time up the hill at the temples.
We had a great day. Extremely interesting, but the sunset thing is overrated.
p.s. the drunk man isn’t pictures here and wasn’t with us during any of the temple tours themselves. He just sat getting drunk, talked to dogs, and waited for the next stop. He reminded me of one of my uncles… I wonder if he thinks the earth is flat…
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