Our three days of temple exploration were, in the words of our French friend Mustafa, "romantical". Each day we toured a different section of temples. Each set of temples so distinct. Each and every moment smiling uncontrollably at the mere idea of riding bicycles around these ancient Cambodian temples.

We started with Angkor Wat...angkor what? Almost 1000 years old, Angkor Wat is the main and most well preserved of the temples. The layout of the wat overseen by its towers represent the Angkor concept of the universe. In the middle of that universe is a mountain, signified by the central tower. We discovered this representation to be very accurate as we climbed the thin, steep, sand covered steps to the top. The corridors surrounding the towers host the most intricately carved scenes and images of myths and legends, some Hindu, some Buddhist. As the reign changed, so did the temples, as the rulers would destroy icons of the other religion. Hence the many headless Buddhas we saw.

Baguettes in our bike baskets accompanied us on our second day to Bayon Temple in the middle of Angkor Thom, an ancient city. As we rode through the rice fields, we could imagine the wooden homes of the Angkorians who were responsible for building the temples. The towers of Bayon feature giant Buddha faces, each facing one of the four cardinal directions. We couldn't escape the glance of buddha in this temple, so we were sure to be on our best behavior. On our ride back homeward, we were stopped on the way by a pack of monkeys, posing for pictures. We ended our day watching the sunset from one of the few hilltop temples. We shared this amusement park-esque (elephant rides to the top and all) experience with all the other photo snapping, fannie pack toting tourists.

The third and final day took us to Ta Phrom, a temple seemingly consumed by the surrounding jungle. Jij felt like he was back on the set of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. It was also our longest bike ride, a whopping 20 km. Our day was made most memorable by several side stops we incurred in search of souvenirs. Kids in these parts are top notch salespeople, some with great material. A little boy we met would shout in his funny, raspy voice, "Oh my god" each time we told him his price was too high. We later returned to give him some pocket money and he offered Jij a piece of string for 3000 riel (75cents) which, using his fine tuned haggling skills Jij got down to 1000 riel. With huge smiles on both of their faces, the boy was proud to have sold a piece of string for 1000 riel, and Jij proud at getting such a steal!

We very much enjoyed our stay in Siem Reap and our visit to the Angkor Temples. They were as lovely as Jij's mom said they would be! If any of you are ever in the area we know a nice couple at Dara Guesthouse who would be thrilled to share their home with you...their bicycles have nice bells.

(I can't take full credit for this post as Jij and I tag-teamed it. I can take full credit for the layout, I finally figured out how to rotate pictures!)