Yesterday and today was the Angkor Wat complex, including the Angkor Wat temple and a whole bunch of other old temples.

My camera battery ran out just as we entered the big show – Angkor Wat so that made me a bit grumpy. But I pulled out my phone! So I’ve been able to dump a bunch up on to Facebook (ahead of getting home and going through all the photos from my camera)

Visiting the temples was interesting. The are all old and in ruins. All very well maintained and organized for tourists, though. The best (worst?) part was climbing horribly steep steps to get to the top of the ruins. Most had wooden ones constructed over top of the ancient ones. The first temple we went to, however, did not. (I’ll find the name of the one later..). The original steps are shallow, and about 2 feet high? (Julie- confirm if you read this!) (EDIT: Julie says they were three feet high! And there were huge spiders chasing us!) (EDIT 2: Julie didn’t really say that: the stairs came up to about her knee, maybe a foot and a half). So I climbed up like a monkey, using my hands. And on the way down I cried a bit, and sat on each step. OK -I was able to step down after the first couple, but I had to scootch myself to the edge of the first. These stairs are very steep.

There were some amazing story-telling carvings, which I like but didn’t have enough time to study thoroughly. They are the stories of the gods (Hindu and Buddhist) and I’m not familiar with any of them. But this was a good introduction.

The pictures tell a better story than my words. I’ll post some at a later date. (Hopefully I will be able to remember which ruins is which. I saw quite a few.)