Today, I stepped foot in one of the places I’ve been dreaming of seeing for years: Angkor Archaeological Park!

This UNESCO Heritage Site contains the remains of a number of the capitals of the Khmer Empire from the 9th through the 15th centuries. This was actually the largest pre-industrial city in the world! I’ve drooled over photos of the temples here – especially of Angkor Wat – for as long as I can remember.

Caitlin and I met our tuk-tuk driver at 4:30 this morning in order to get a spot in front of Angkor Wat to view the sunrise.

Angkor Wat

The sunrise was very pretty, even if it wasn’t spectacular. We later appreciated that we had begun our day so early to avoid some of the heat and crowds that developed later on.

After the sun had come up, we ventured into the temple to explore. There was so much to see within this one temple! There were intricate carvings on every surface, including four large-scale wall reliefs that showed major moments in Khmer mythology.

We spent hours just at Angkor Wat before finding our tuk-tuk driver again.

Bayon Temple

We got to Bayon at the perfect moment, as a huge group of wild monkeys was just beginning to pass through. We counted at least 25 monkeys, and they proceeded to raid the offerings left at a shrine at the temple entrance for their breakfast. It was an absolutely incredible experience to suddenly have monkeys swarming all around! Within 10 minutes of making their entrance, the whole group headed off into the forest.

Bayon Temple was one of my very favorites that we visited today. It was full of towers with enormous faces in the sky, and was simply stunning to look at.

Baphuon

Terrace of the Elephants

Ta Keo

This staircase was a doozy. We were already exhausted from a day of walking and climbing stairs in the hot sun, and this wall of stairs in front of us was an intimidating sight. We climbed anyway, though – despite the pain and panic! I definitely think it was worth the climb, if only for the amazing feeling that we had “conquered” another incredible ancient monument.

Ta Prohm Temple

Ta Prohm was the other of my favorite stops today. This was one of the only temples we saw that didn’t emphasize height, so there was very little climbing involved. Instead, this one was hidden amongst the forest, with trees taking over and growing in and on top of the temple. It emitted the vibe of a lost, undiscovered ruin that gave it a very cool atmosphere.

Ta Prohm is known as the “Tomb Raider” temple for having been featured in that movie, which means that it also attracted lots of visitors who we ran into in our attempt to exit.

Banteay Kdei

After an incredibly active morning and early afternoon exploring this site, we went for a big lunch, had a swim at the hotel, and did some intense napping this afternoon!

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A note from the end of the trip:

By the late afternoon, both Caitlin and I were feeling pretty nasty. Even though we made a point to constantly drink water throughout the day, and kept buying more and more giant bottles, we just couldn’t keep from getting dehydrated. I have never sweat so much as I did that day, as we were dealing with 100-degree weather, direct sun, crazy high humidity, and a seemingly endless number of stairs to climb. We were soaked through with sweat and physically unable to replenish our bodies’ water fast enough!

We made it a point the rest of the week to take it a bit easier. Cambodia’s climate is rough to deal with, so we figured a half day of activity each day was the way to go to not make ourselves sick again.