ANGKOR WAT ARCHAEOLOGICAL PARK
Step aside Indiana Jones and Lara Croft. Angkor Wat Archaeological Park offers visitors the rare opportunity to wander its many temples without the usual crowds. But for how long?
Imagine stepping through an ancient archway, its exterior decorated with the intricate remains of stone relief depicting worshipers and mythical creatures. Though much of the stone work has succumbed to the 800 years of time since the temple was completed, enough remains for your imagination to begin filling in the gaps. As your mind begins to try and picture what this place could have looked like centuries ago, you wander further into the temple grounds and are presented with a sight that you have only seen in Hollywood adventure movies. The remains of large stone serpents guard the entrance to the stairs leading into a tower-like temple, its windows, with stone columns as bars, letting in just enough light to illuminate the interior as you step foot inside. Although empty, you marvel at very fact you are allowed to wander these ancient ruins, touch its stone walls and stand in silence within a building that once served as a place of worship for one of the greatest empires the world has ever known. Then, the silence truly hits you and as you look around, you realize that you are alone. Completely alone. You even look around to make sure that you didn’t enter some restricted area without knowing. After wandering for some more and taking as many photos as your phone can store, you finally come upon the only other person with you at the temple, a seemingly bored park employee. This was my reality when exploring Banteay Samre Temple, and although the other temples I visited during my two day tour did have tourists, I never counted more than fifteen. This is the best time to visit Angkor Wat Archaeological Park.
With Cambodia slowly receiving visitors transiting from its far more popular neighbors Thailand and Vietnam, the number of tourists visiting Angkor Wat is still a trickle of what it once was. To put it in perspective, the park used to received roughly 5000 visitors per day, now it is lucky if it welcomes 500.
The park itself spans a huge area, over 400 square kilometers, making it the largest religious monument in the world and boasts over 50 temples to explore. This can only be done by hiring a Tuk-Tuk driver or motorbike to get around, with day trips aiming to either start with the sunrise or finish with the sunset. It gets hot in Siem Reap, Cambodia’s second largest city and entry way to the national park, with temperatures hitting the high 30s shortly after the sun rises. This heat becomes the biggest impediment to enjoying the days of temple exploration, making exploration become more and more swift as the day progresses, with a very quick walk-through of the last temple of the day from sheer heat exhaustion. This is also why day trips don’t last from sunrise to sunset, since after several hours of walking through temples in the heat, you’ll be dreaming of a cold shower or a jump in the pool.
Within the Angkor Wat Archeological Park also stand the remains of Angkor Thom, the last capital of the Khmer Empire. The remains of this ancient capital are reached by crossing a statue lined causeway, flanked by a 100m wide moat, once filled with crocodiles, that leads to one of five entry gates featuring a 23m high stone tower with four large faces carved into each side. The grandiosity of entering the site is awe-inspiring and leaves you wondering just how much of a marvel this place was at its peak, and wishing you could go back in time to see it. This goes for all the temples you see while exploring the archaeological site. With years of investment from various organizations from around the world to clear, restore and maintain the temple grounds, visitors can walk through these ancient sites freely for the most part, with only small portions of temples cordoned off. Giving visitors the freedom to roam, admire and imagine the splendor of what the Khmer Empire built so many years ago.
