I don’t think I need to waste anyone’s time going on and on about Angkor Wat. We all know it’s a World Heritage Site, one of the most fantastic architectural accomplishments of mankind, and breathtaking to behold so I won’t repeat that which has already been said a million times by a million people. However, I would like to say a word about the trees.
If you ask me, the magnificence of this place wouldn’t be half of what it is if it weren’t for the surrounding flora. The buildings themselves are pretty, but when buried in the jungle, grown over with trees and dappled by the sunlight filtering through the heavy foliage, they truly are magical. It is enchanting.
Of the sites that we visited on our two-day exploration of Angkor, I think my favourites are Ta Prohm and Preah Khan. (That probably means little to anybody who cares to read this, but I needed to get the names in there for posterity.) Both of these complexes were almost entirely shaded by trees that grew out of the jungle, then migrated into the courtyards and finally penetrated the structures. The curvy roots creep around window frames, push stone walls aside and grip gateway buildings so tightly that they look as though they would surely fall to pieces if a tree was not holding them together.
The greens are luminous. Mosses and lichens fringe the walls and rubble and seem to dampen echoes inside the buildings. The trees bend and hook their branches through door frames to lift up tonnes of rock and force their verdure indoors. These ruins are peaceful, quiet, sublimely serene. When we visit again, I will go straight to Preah Khan to sit, again, in the silence and breath in the hot, ancient air.
Across the street from the notorious Tuol Sleng genocide museum is the Boddhi Tree, a restaurant which deserves fame in its own right. Jan and I ordered triple-decker sandwiches with goat cheese, grilled eggplant and other vegetables. After craving goat cheese for months, it was a euphoric treat.
On our last day, we visited Friends Restaurant which trains street kids for opportunities in the restaurant industry. A small army of students and a few teachers, all of whom seemed to be in their late teens or early twenties, runs a slick operation with attentive servers, a creative menu and tasteful décor.
Still eager to explore the menu, Jan finished off with splendid caramelized pineapple and ice cream, and I tried the lemon and blueberry cake. Again, we kept the meal under $20 USD.
Lonely Planet also directed us to a supermarket where we took advantage of the colonial legacy to self-cater a meal to remind us of France. Few pleasures beat brie, a good baguette and a bottle of wine sitting on a patio on a beautiful day. We already feel Phenom Penh’s epicurean luxuries pulling us back.
After viewing the largest reclining Buddha in the country, visit the building in the back for an hour’s worth of Thai massage. Put yourself in the hands of a student of this discipline as he or she uses his/her elbows, knees, feet and chin to find, expose and force into submission every stiff muscle you didn’t know you had. Enjoy.
As soon as I read that we would be visiting a part of Thailand that was near where they filmed The Man with The Golden Gun, I made sure that we went out of our way to see it. Imagine! Scaramanga’s island!
We forgot to write about the Taj Mahal!
It turns out that the beaches in Thailand are as spectacular as everyone said they were. The views? Stunning. The water? Warm, and the colour of light jade. The sand? Powdery, white, perfect. But with so much paradise at hand, we seemed obsessed with beach comparisons. As many as we visited, we were never too tired, or too satisfied, or – thank goodness – too sunburnt to visit yet another. Someone we would meet for two mintues would swear up and down that the best beach they’ve ever set eyes on is ‘xyz’. So, we would promply make plans to go to ‘xyz’ and agree that it is beautiful, but maybe the sand isn’t quite as powdery as ‘abc’ or the snorkeling not exactly as clear as ‘def’. At every stop, we had no reason to ever move on but I’m glad we did, if only to prove that all and none of the beaches here are perfect.
Long Beach on Koh Phi Phi [ed. Koh means island in Thai] provided our first taste of snorkeling in Thailand and Marc’s first snorkeling adventure ever. I saw more fish in five minutes than I’ve ever seen and Marc spotted a couple of harmless black-tipped reef sharks in the distance. In fact, we didn’t really even need to swim because the curious little zebra-stripped-yellow-backed fish would come to visit as soon as we were knee deep into the bay.
Of course, we made a special stop on our snorkeling tour at Maya Beach, also known as “The Beach” from the movie of the same name. Those location scouts really know how to pick a brilliant site to shoot a film. The colour of the water here is unbelieveable and our pictures could never do this place justice. Maybe the pictures taken by the hundred or so other tourists who were there at the same time would paint a better picture.
Rai Leh Beach at Krabi is where we spent Christmas. (Actually, we stayed at the cheaper beach next door, Ton Sai, and just walked over to the posh beach at low tide each day.) Nothing wrong here with the long, wide swath of sand and the clear, tepid water which is the perfect depth in which to sit and drink a cold beer. The sheer cliff faces and small, off-shore islands made for some especially dramatic scenery.
This year, we were very lucky to be able to spend Christmas on a beach in Thailand. Even luckier, we were able to meet up with another Canadian couple, Julia and Jeff, whom we had met at the ger camp when we were all in Mongolia. Odd to think that we had met six months ago and only knew each other 36 hours before deciding to spend the holidays together, but we had a brillant time comparing travel stories and toasting our good fortune at actually having somplace to stay.
Upon entering the temple we were immediately besot by the splendor of gold tiles covering buildings with shapes I had never imagined, and statues of monstrous figures. Each building was unique, with little to tie it visually to the next, except for the gold tiles.
The most unusual for me was the gold bell-shaped temple, though I have seen many similar shapes since.
In the one-horse town of Hampi, Marc and I decided to get some money. We walked 500m to arrive at the only bank in this village of 3000 people. We weren’t desparate for the cash, and could’ve gone a bit further afield to visit an ATM, but thought we’d give the local branch a shot.