28 Sep
After a night's rest, we got ourselves ready for a 2nd day of temple visiting. Armed with masks and shades (lesson learnt after getting sand in your mouth and dust in our eyes), we set off on a 30min tuk tuk ride to Banteay Srey, a relatively small temple famed for its deep and intricate carvings. The rest of the day was spent visiting Preah Khan, Ta Keo, Ta Prohm and Ta Som. Between each temple we had to travel by tuk tuk and all in all we spent about 6-7 hours walking around the temples.
On the way down those steep steps of Ta Keo, I started imagining how more than one person must have tripped and rolled all the way down like a ragged doll. The temple was almost 8 storeys high! And that thought scared me. I was almost on all fours all the way down.
Ta Prohm was just awe-inspiring and humbling at the same time. Huge tree roots engulfed the temple walls or just sprouted above them, as if reminding mankind that no man-made structure can stand in the way of nature.
By about 3pm, temple fatigue set in. We had visited a total of 13 temple ruins in those 2 days and had to skip one. We couldn't take in anymore of those temples. So we made our way back to shower. Seriously, the heat and humidity was just way too much for us to handle. Amanda and I then parted ways at my guesthouse.
To counter the temple fatigue, I headed back to Pub Street in the evening and just chilled at this nice little cafe, Blue Pumpkin. The plush white lounge sofas were just sooo welcoming and they had free wifi! Too bad I didn't lug my laptop along.
