I left my keyboard in Vietnam along with most of our luggage, so this will be short.
We visited the ancient temple of Angkor Wat today, and I was more impressed than I expected to be. It is a huge temple complex covering many acres. Visitors are allowed to wander around with few restrictions, able to view close up and touch the many detailed and beautiful bas relief carvings covering most of the walls. It was quite fascinating.
Machu Picchu was impressive more for the setting than the ruins themselves, high in the rugged green Andes. Angkor Wat is much bigger, more detailed and much better preserved. The jungle setting is also striking, but I could do without the accompanying sweltering heat. At least it’s not the rainy season.
There are several other similar ruins nearby, some of which we viewed today and will continue to explore tomorrow.
3 responses so far ↓
1 Richard // Mar 5, 2014 at 8:45 am
You’re going to need a vacation to rest up from this trip!
I’ve seen several documentaries on Angkor Wat. Fascinating place.
2 Mom // Mar 5, 2014 at 5:10 pm
Is it Buddhist, Muslim, or other? Some of the places have very beautiful surroundings (at least, they were in Hawaii) My TIVO will be glad to see you; it doesn’t record the last five or six seconds of some shows; for example, one night, “Castle” cut off, and I later discovered that in those last few seconds, he had said to Beckett, “Will you marry me?”
3 Daryl // Mar 14, 2014 at 3:55 pm
Mom,
You’ll probably never read this reply, but anyway: Angkor Wat was originally built as a temple to the Hindu gods, but around 900 years ago the locals converted to Buddhism. So most of the bas relief carvings in the walls are Hindu, but there are often statues of Buddha. It seems to me they were very religiously tolerant to have left the old carvings in place, fortunately for later archeologists and tourists.
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