Day 22 - Thursday 21st September

This morning's excursion was to see the sunrise at Angkor Wat. The guide had told us last night that we were to leave the hotel at 4:35am and so we'd set our alarms for 3:45am. Peter was still unwell and so there was only the four of us again.

After about 20 minutes, we reached the parking area near the temple. There were already others in the carpark who had the same plans as us. We left the van to walk to the spot near the temple where we'd view the sunrise. Along the way we'd passed a checkpoint where they checked our tickets.

Angkor Wat is surrounded by a wide moat and you cross it on a floating bridge. This bridge is about 200m long and 10m wide. I'm not sure what the surface is made of but it's soft and rubbery under foot.

After following the path on the other side, it was about 5:20am by the time we reached the reflection pool where we would watch the sunrise. There were already dozens of people lined up on the edge of the lake. Everyone had cameras and some had set up tripods. The temple was about 200m away.

Although it was still dark, we could see the reflection of the temple in the water in front of us. The official time for sunset was 5:53am but it was about 6:10am before the sun appeared over the temple. While waiting, we'd taken lots of photos as the light gradually improved.

By this time, there were hundreds of people watching the sunrise. Surprisingly, most people started to drift away soon after the sun first appeared - rather than waiting to see the full outline of the sun. We'd been lucky that there were no clouds obscuring the spectacle.

Our hotel had provided us with breakfast boxes and our guide took us to a nearby outdoor restaurant where we found a table to eat our breakfast. We ordered coffee to go with our supplied breakfast. As usual, there were people approaching us all the time to buy scarves, books and postcards.

Yolanda's injured leg was giving her a lot of trouble and so she decided to go back to the hotel. Our guide organised for our driver to take her back.

After breakfast, our guide took us towards the temple complex. Initially he took us around the exterior of the site stopping at certain locations that were ideal for photographs. Then we headed into the site.

He showed us corridors where the inscriptions tell the story about the construction of the site. Mostly this takes the form of carvings in the stone walls showing people, carts, elephants, etc. There is also some text in ancient languages.

Eventually we reached the main towers in the centre of the site. Elsewhere they've built timber stairs and walkways to protect the stonework from tourist traffic. Here they had a steep set of timber stairs that led up the side of the tower.

They only allow a limited number of people onto the top level to avoid collapse of the structure caused by excess weight. So there was a queue waiting at the bottom of the stairs.

It was worth the effort to go up there because there was so much to see. There were several courtyards and towers. We walked along corridors along the perimeter to see the courtyards, statues, carvings, etc on one side and to look out at the view below on the other side.

It's incredible that they managed to build such a massive construction all those years ago and it's incredible that it is still standing. In quite a few places, you can see where they are currently working to restore parts of the structure.

Maria had decided not to climb the tower and waited at the bottom with our guide. Suzy and I spent about 30 minutes up there.

Next we went to a different part of the complex containing statues. There were saw several monks in their saffron robes.

From there, we walked back through the grounds and across the floating bridge to reach the carpark. By this time, there were large crowds of people heading in the opposite direction coming to visit the site. The return trip through the grounds was much easier than the earlier journey in the dark.

We then drove for about 20 minutes to reach the outskirts of the next site, Angkor Thom. There is an ancient bridge across the river outside the wall of the site. This would have been a great photo site by itself but it was even better because they were offering elephant rides that took people across the bridge and into the site.

Back in the van, we drove about 2km to reach the temple. Our guide told us that one million people used to live within the walls of this site many years ago but now there are none.

The significant feature of this site is the dozens of faces of Buddha carved into the stonework. Once again there is an elevated area in the centre of the site. This time Suzy and Maria stayed at ground level while the guide escorting me up the staircases to the top.

He guided me to the best vantage points to take photos. I lost count of the number of Buddha faces. At one spot, there were three lined up in a single photo shot.

Back on ground level, there was a very large golden Buddha statue nearby.

The van took us to a different gate to leave the site. Along the way we passed by a wall that was more than 300m long with elephants carved into the entire length of the wall.

At the gate we stopped for photos. On each side of the gate, there are carvings of triple-headed elephants. This time we included the driver and guide in our photos. About 2km further on, we passed through a modern replica of this gate.

Originally the hotel had organised to send a lunch for us out to one of the temples so we could have a picnic lunch at about midday. However, with Yolanda and Peter back at the hotel, we decided that it would be better to have the lunch back there instead.

We were back at the hotel by about 10:45am. Although this was much sooner than originally planned, it suited us just fine because we were very tired after such an early start. What's more, the walking over rough ground and climbing of structures had been hard on our legs.

Peter was feeling well enough to join us for lunch but didn't eat much. Once again, we were the only people in the restaurant when we had lunch at 12:30pm - we were outnumbered by the staff looking after us leading us to wonder how they make money.

Suzy and I had booked to have our complementary full body massage at the hotel at 2:20pm. It was quite different from the one we'd had last week in Hoy An and we decided we preferred the one in Vietnam.

When we left the spa area behind reception, a thunderstorm had arrived. There was lightning, thunder and heavy rain.

About an hour later, the rain was easing and the girls caught a tuk tuk back to the old market and naturally they came back with more scarves. Peter and I opted not to go this time.

We decided to take advantage of the happy hour at the hotel again. Because of the wet weather, they had set up under cover next to the pool rather than on the terrace overlooking the pool. Suzy and I got there first and the other three joined us a few minutes later at about 6:30pm.

As always, the staff were very attentive and only too happy to keep topping up our glasses - all for free.

Peter was there but did not feel well enough to join us for dinner and so the rest of us caught a tuk tuk to take us to Malis Restaurant where we had a booking for 7:30pm. It was only a short ride. This restaurant is next door to where we stopped for lunch with Scenic a couple of days ago.

This is a a high class restaurant with great food and service. We caught a tuk tuk back to our hotel.