While I feel mixed about Phnom Penh and Battambang, and perhaps a little ambivalent towards Southeast Asia in general, seeing thousand year-old Angkor Wat is absolutely jaw-dropping. I would come to this corner of the world just to tour the temples, ruins, and faded glory palaces of the Khmer Empire. Then, I would go to Singapore😉

But before I get to the temples: Siem Reap is the charming town that is closest to Angkor Wat, and I found it delightful. It is absolutely a tourist town, and I am not ashamed to admit I liked it for that. To me, tourist towns mean good restaurants, pretty town centers that tend to be more walkable (it was still a challenge to cross streets with no crosswalks, walk signals, or traffic lights, but easier), friendly people, and a wonder of the world next door. Honestly, Siem Reap reminded me a little of Moab. And whenever my dad hears locals in Moab complain about the tourists, he always points out that tourism is a better industry than the uranium mining that used to support the town. I’m sure the people of Siem Reap, in a province that was a hotbed of Khmer Rouge activity, don’t mind the tourists and their dollars. One of my favorite things we did in Siem Reap was eat at an incredible Italian restaurant (yes, you read that right. It was so trippy to enjoy those flavors in Cambodia!). I also adored our guesthouse, which had a huge focus on reducing plastic consumption, a delightful garden with a bar and great Wifi, and really nice people. Add in the fact that it is relatively easy to get around, and of course, Angkor Wat close by, and its easy to see why Siem Reap is loveable.

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The main attraction is, of course, the temples of Angkor, which were the crowning glory and capital city of the Khmer Empire. From the 800s to the mid 1300s, the Khmers dominated Southeast Asia. At one point, their empire covered all of Cambodia and Lao, and huge chunks of Vietnam and Thailand. One of my favorite tidbits that at a time when 50,000 people were living in London, a million were living in Angkor. Whoa! The society was an absolute monarchy with god-kings, who all built fabulous temples and palaces in Angkor, the capital city. Now, about 2.1 million people visit Angkor Wat and the surrounding ruins every year.

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Of those 2.1 million, a huge chunk of them, us included, tour the temples via a tuk tuk. Ben called these “tourist chariots”, and it truly was a bit surreal to see lines of tuk tuks whisking all of us foreigners around. Since many of the temples were quite far from Siem Reap, we were able to see a lot of villages and the Cambodian countryside, which is quite beautiful. We noticed that every single restaurant had red chairs, and every home and business had a small shrine outside. We also loved just sitting in the tuk tuk together, talking over everything, with the wind in our hair.

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I was also amused that at every site, the tuk tuks all parked in the shade and the drivers took a  chat break, ate snacks, or had a snooze. Some of them hung up hammocks in their tuk tuks, to which I tip my hat to them. Cambodians LOVE hammocks: we saw them strung up on the side of the road, in tuk tuks, in front of every house, in the markets. As a fellow hammock lover, I think it’s great!

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I’ll be honest and admit many of the lesser temples ran together, and I didn’t catch the name of most of them, much less the history. Our driver was awesome, but also not as chatty with telling us the name of the places he took us too. Often, he would just pull up, smile, and say he would meet us back in the parking lot whenever we were ready. So for many of these sites, I don’t know anything about them other than our impressions. Which were ones of amazement!

We were in awe. For many of the temples, you approach via a wide path, through an impressive gate, and then the building emerges through the trees. Some were crowded, but these places are also BIG, so it only took a side detour or going to the back to find yourself totally alone with the carvings, the statues, and the walls. This is an incredible feeling.

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There is also a lack of supervision at most of the sites, so you could poke around with freedom and walk through small doorways or outside the grounds at will. There is definitely a heady and exciting sense of discovery, and Ben and I would frequently call to each other “come over here! You won’t believe what I found!”, and we raced around with the camera like little kids.

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For three of the most famous temples, I did manage to learn the names. These three are part of the badly named “Small Circuit”, (nothing small about these places) and if you only have one day in Siem Reap, it is absolutely worth it to do the small circuit only. I loved the more minor temples as well, but these three will do the trick for all of your jungle temple dreams.

The first, and most famous, is Angkor Wat. Surprisingly, this was our least favorite of all the temples (hey, sometimes we are difficult). We got up at 4AM to see the sun rise over the temple, along with thousands of fellow tourists. Marching along in a huge crowd in the dark was not pleasant or special in any way, and the sun rise itself was…underwhelming. I think at this point, unless we are in the Sahara Desert or the Grand Canyon, sun rise things aren’t worth the pain. I also could not believe the crowds for this: I felt like I was at a concert, there were that many people milling around trying to snap pictures.

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We walked around Angkor Wat, but it was already getting very hot and honestly, I didn’t see anything that blew me away. Where were the fabulous carvings? Giant statues? It just seemed like a bigger, far more crowded version of what we had already excitedly explored. We wanted to save our energy–which saps quickly in the oppressive jungle heat–for the next two temples, so we left fairly early. After grabbing a most refreshing smoothie, we headed towards the next temple in our tourist chariot: Bayon.

Of all of the places, I was most excited to see Bayon, and it DID NOT disappoint. I absolutely loved this place. This is the Versailles, the Las Vegas, of Angkor Wat. So over the top, so ludicrous, that I laughed out loud when I finally saw the main attraction here. At first, this seems like all of the other temples. But when you climb up to the third level, there are gigantic four-sided columns every few feet…and on each side of the column is a huge, smirking carved face. They are EVERYWHERE, and so over the top. I can only imagine the flamboyant king who commissioned it barking at his royal architects: “More faces! BIGGER! Make them smirk down onto the little people!” The workmanship is impressive, and the views are beautiful. This site is pure delight, and after taking a bunch of pictures I climbed onto some steps and just took it in for several minutes. This is a place I am so thankful I got to see.

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The final temple we explored is Ta Prohm, more commonly known as the Tomb Raider Temple. This site is famous for how the huge trees have reclaimed the temple, and it is incredible to see the stones and the jungle clash in an epic battle. The tree roots snake through the walls like octopus tentacles, and since this is a huge temple complex, there was a lot of opportunity to discover the struggle between man and nature without crowds.

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Siem Reap was hands down my favorite part of Cambodia, and seeing Bayon and the other temples was one of the highlights of our trip. The most thrilling aspect of exploring these temples and ruins was the shiver of discovery everytime we rounded a corner and found a statue by ourselves, or walked through a gate covered in tree roots, or climbed up some steps only to emerge surrounded by 200 smiling stone faces as tall as we are. In Angkor Wat, I felt awe. This is why we went out into the world, and all of me is full of gratitude.