Siem Reap, Cambodia

We arrived in Siem Reap with one thing on our mind, Angkor Wat. What else do you go there for? Since millions of tourists come to see the temples of Angkor every year the city of Siem Reap has everything you need. There is every kind of food you can think of, ATMs on every corner, and some body offering you something to buy where ever you look. We had a hard time when little kids would come up to you while you were eating wanting you to buy postcards and when you say no they walk away crying. Real tears or not, it was sad to see children working the streets at night to make a buck. Another think about Siem Reap is everything is in US dollars which was strange after not seeing the greenback in a long time. It was nice not doing the math to figure out that your dinner costs $2. The first day at the Angkor Wat we rode bikes to see explore the area. Once we bought our three-day pass we got a map and found out how large the area really was. The first temple we went was the famous Angkor Wat which was surrounded by a giant moat. The actual wat was incredibly impressive with the thousand year stone all intricately carved into designs and figures. The four walls surrounding the wat are all carved telling different stories of the past. The next temple we saw was Bayon and it turned out to be our favorite. This old temple had tunnels, rooms, and statues all over the place. Each tower of the many towers has a face on each side. We ended the day going to a tower on a small hill that had a great view of the sunset. We hired a wonderful driver, named Cheam, the second day to take us to some of the temples that were further away. He was a great guide as he explained the meaning of the temples and gave us some of it's history. We saw a few temples that had huge trees with the roots draping over the walls of the temple. The temples are from the 9th-13th century of the Khmer Empire. The Angkor Archaeological Park encompasses more than 400 square Km and is a World Heritage Site. The Khmer people are the dominant ethnic group in Cambodia, they have beautiful dark brown skin and beautiful big brown eyes. Unfortunately there country is strewn with land mines and there is a high rate of amputees. It was devastating to see so many of them begging at the temples, a result of the genocide done by the Khmer regime as late as the 1970's. We absolutely loved exploring the temples of Angkor Wat, soaking in the memorizing sunsets, and meeting the kind people of Cambodia.