Angkor Wat With Marla and Brenda

We were up and going early this morning, we wanted to be to the complimentary breakfast when it opened and then head to Angkor Wat. Since it is cooler in the morning we wanted to visit as many of the temples in the Angkor World Heritage park as we could before it got too hot.

Angkor is a Khmer word which means Capital City and a Wat is a Buddhist temple, so Angkor Wat is the Capital City Buddhist Temple. It is considered the largest religious monument in the world. It took 37 years to build and includes a moat that is one mile long and .80 miles wide. They estimate that there were over 350,000 slaves that were used to build it and they had to lay one very large stones every three seconds when it was being built. They not only had to lay the stones, but it has very intricate carvings all over the inside and outside of the temple. The temple has three levels and when it was in use only the king and priests were allowed to go up to the third level. The stairs that the king was allowed to climbed had a 45 degree angle, but the ones for the priests was an 80 degree angle. We climbed up to the top, but the modern stairs were about a 60 degree angle.

The Angkor World Heritage park has about 239 ruins, but only about 69 have names and not all of those 69 are restored. After Angkor Wat we went to Angkor Thom, which was the actual capital city of the Khmer Empire. Marla and Brenda wanted to go on an elephant ride, and that is where they could take one. Angkor Thom was built after Angkor Wat and they did not use as big of stones so it did not survive as well. One of the most prominent features is the four faces of Bayon on each of the fifty-four towers of the structure.

We also visited Ta Prohm or Tomb Raider temple before lunch. It is famous because the movie Tomb Raider used this temple as the backdrop. It was originally a university and monastery. It is unique because they did not cut down all of the over growth trees when they restored many of the structures.

After a relaxing lunch we went to Banteay Srei or Pink Lady Temple. This is a much smaller temple that was built by a priest instead of the king. It is also unique because it is built of red or pink sandstone. We had a very full day and it felt good to have a while to relax at our hotel before going out for dinner.