After arriving in Siem Reap after effectively a full day transfer from Bangkok via Giant Ibis bus our plan was to take it easy for a day.
So Day 1 was a little look around the main city centre; the infamous pub street and surrounds. Plus a look at the museum. The museum was good albeit a little old fashioned and too plainly factual to give every exhibit its due. Still it gives a reasonable introduction to Cambodia’s ancient history.
The following day the first day of the new year we arose early for a full day temple / birding trip with Sam Veasna. Being the first day of the year was, in hindsight a bad choice for a full day temple tour. We planned to go to bed early and did. However the rest of the country didn’t. There was astonishing noise, music, explosions – some of which sounded as if they were happening within our room – until about 3-30am. We had to wake at 5am….You can do the math.
Our guide and driver arrived on time however the guide smelled as if he had only recently stopped drinking. Despite my judgments he proved to be quite good although he did lose much energy and enthusiasm come lunch time as the heat peaked and perhaps his fatigue….. Mind you we were starting to suffer from lack of sleep too so we were happy to call the day a couple of hours early than the original plan.
So we visited three temples and, to a certain extent did a little birding at each.
First stop was Anchor Wat and while others no doubt clamoured for the best position to take pictures of the temple complex in the dawn light we went looking for early morning owls. Brown Boobooks were the target and while we had some responding to our call backs none were seen. WE had better luck a little later with Asian Barred Owlet.
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| Tom and our Guide from Sam Veasna |
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| Forest Wagtail |
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| Asian Barred Owlet |
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| White throated Rock Thrush |
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| Variable Squirrel - Cambodia style |
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| Hainan Blue Flycatcher |
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| Asian Palm Swift |
Other notable species seen in and around the dawn in the forest surrounding Angkor included Forest Wagtail, Hainan Blue Flycatcher, Black naped Monarch, Black naped Oriole, Ruby cheeked Sunbird. Three species of Phyllo warbler were identified by call; Pale legged, Two barred and Yellow browed [or inornate]. Great Racket tailed Drongo, both sub spp of Ashy Drongo plus Comb crested Drongos were seen. We saw, pleasingly enough, several Black Bazas.
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| Black Baza |
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| Blue Rock Thrush female on Angkot Wat |
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| Blue Rock Thrush male on Angkor Wat |
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| Blue Rock Thrush male on Angkor Wat |
And then to Angkor Wat. It is pretty bloody impressive.
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| Angkor Wat temple perimeter walls |
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| one of the gates |
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| scale of engraved panels |
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| Panel detail |
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| Panel Detail |
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Panel Detail - From the north-west corner anti-clockwise, the western gallery shows the Battle of Lanka (from the Ramayana, in which Rama defeats Ravana) and the Battle of Kurukshetra (from the Mahabharata, showing the mutual annihilation of the Kaurava and Pandava clans). On the southern gallery follow the only historical scene, a procession of Suryavarman II, then the 32 hells and 37 heavens of Hinduism. On the eastern gallery is one of the most celebrated scenes, the Churning of the Sea of Milk, showing 92 asuras and 88 devas using the serpent Vasuki to churn the sea under Vishnu's direction.
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| cool battle elephant |
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| Long tailed Macaques inhabitat the grounds of Angkor Wat |
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| Long tailed Macaque |
From Wikipedia;
One of the first Western visitors to the temple was António da Madalena, a Portuguese friar who visited in 1586 and said that it "is of such extraordinary construction that it is not possible to describe it with a pen, particularly since it is like no other building in the world. It has towers and decoration and all the refinements which the human genius can conceive of."
Angkor Wat ("Capital Temple") is a temple complex in Cambodia and one of the largest religious monuments in the world, on a site measuring 162.6 hectares. Originally constructed as a Hindu temple dedicated to the god Vishnu for the Khmer Empire, it was gradually transformed into a Buddhist temple towards the end of the 12th century. It was built by the Khmer King Suryavarman II in the early 12th century in Yaśodharapura (present-day Angkor), the capital of the Khmer Empire, as his state temple and eventual mausoleum. Breaking from the Shaiva tradition of previous kings, Angkor Wat was instead dedicated to Vishnu. As the best-preserved temple at the site, it is the only one to have remained a significant religious centre since its foundation. The temple is at the top of the high classical style of Khmer architecture. It has become a symbol of Cambodia, appearing on its national flag, and it is the country's prime attraction for visitors.
Angkor Wat is a unique combination of the temple mountain (the standard design for the empire's state temples) and the later plan of concentric galleries. The construction of Angkor Wat also suggests that there was a celestial significance with certain features of the temple. This is observed in the temple's east-west orientation, and lines of sight from terraces within the temple that show specific towers to be at the precise location of the sunrise on a solstice. The temple is a representation of Mount Meru, the home of the gods: the central quincunx of towers symbolises the five peaks of the mountain, and the walls and moat symbolise the surrounding mountain ranges and ocean.
The scale of the place is amazing; The outer wall, 1,024 m by 802 m and 4.5 m high, is surrounded by a 30 m apron of open ground and a moat 190 m wide and over 5 kilometres in perimeter. Access to the temple is by an earth bank to the east and a sandstone causeway to the west; the latter, the main entrance, is a later addition, possibly replacing a wooden bridge. There are gopuras at each of the cardinal points; the western is by far the largest and has three ruined towers. Glaize notes that this gopura both hides and echoes the form of the temple proper. Under the southern tower is a statue of Vishnu, known as Ta Reach, which may originally have occupied the temple's central shrine. Galleries run between the towers and as far as two further entrances on either side of the gopura often referred to as "elephant gates", as they are large enough to admit those animals. These galleries have square pillars on the outer (west) side and a closed wall on the inner (east) side. The ceiling between the pillars is decorated with lotus rosettes; the west face of the wall with dancing figures; and the east face of the wall with balustered windows, dancing male figures on prancing animals, and devatas, including (south of the entrance) the only one in the temple to be showing her teeth.
The outer wall encloses a space of 820,000 square metres, which besides the temple proper was originally occupied by the city and, to the north of the temple, the royal palace. Most of the area is now covered by forest.
The temple stands on a terrace raised higher than the city. It is made of three rectangular galleries rising to a central tower, each level higher than the last. Mannikka interprets these galleries as being dedicated to the king, Brahma, the moon, and Vishnu.
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| Tom, taking it easy on the steps of one of the gates |
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| Alexandrine Parrot |
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| Red chested Parrot pair |
We then visited Ta Promb – This is the tomb raider temple. The temple is famous for being in beautiful disrepair. The decay provided by the years and the endless growth od surrounding fig trees strangling the temple’s rocks as effectively as they throttle their tree hosts. The roots of the trees wind serpentine along the walls and through them and cascades of roots curtain other of the temple’s former walls. Parrots are noticeable here; Alexandrine and Red chested The latter being the most common and conspicuous.
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From Wikipedia;
Ta Prohm is the modern name of the temple at Angkor, Siem Reap Province, Cambodia, built in the Bayon style largely in the late 12th and early 13th centuries and originally called Rajavihara. Located approximately one kilometre east of Angkor Thom and on the southern edge of the East Baray, it was founded by the KhmerKing Jayavarman VII[as a Mahayana Buddhist monastery and university. Unlike most Angkorian temples, Ta Prohm is in much the same condition in which it was found: the photogenic and atmospheric combination of trees growing out of the ruins and the jungle surroundings have made it one of Angkor's most popular temples with visitors. UNESCO inscribed Ta Prohm on the World Heritage List in 1992. Today, it is one of the most visited complexes in Cambodia’s Angkor region.
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And then the Bayon Temple, located in the centre of the Angkor Thom. This depicts, among other things, huge smiling and serene faces and again, these have become symbols of Cambodia.
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| Father and son in a rare photo together |
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From Wikipedia;
The Bayon (Prasat Bayon) is a richly decorated Khmer temple. Built in the late 12th or early 13th century as the state temple of the Mahayana Buddhist King Jayavarman VII the Bayon stands at the centre of Jayavarman's capital, Angkor Thom. Following Jayavarman's death, it was modified and augmented by later Hindu and Theravada Buddhist kings in accordance with their own religious preferences.
The Bayon's most distinctive feature is the multitude of serene and smiling stone faces on the many towers which jut out from the upper terrace and cluster around its central peak. The temple has two sets of bas-reliefs, which present a combination of mythological, historical, and mundane scenes.
Lastly we visited a small wetland within the area of greater Angkor and added Cotton Pygmy Goose, Darter to our lists. Black Baza did another fly over and a flock of Ashy Minivets flew through.
We re-visited Angkor Wat over a morning later in the week with the birding highlight being Blue Rock Thrush. Several were seen which makes me wonder why we saw none of our first visit.
Risking Temple overload, we allowed ourselves to be talked into a Tuk Tuk for a day tour visiting two temples.
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| a grim reminder of Cambodia's history |
The first Beang Mealea. This was some 70 or so kilkometres away from Siem Reap. However it was probably worth the drive. The temples were again in an attractive moss covered state of decay and dilapidation. And again, the forest had done its best to recover its ground. As a result, the area was pretty birdy. Good numbers of common birds were seen feeding; bulbuls, barbets, orioles, drongos, warblers, sunbirds, minivets to name a few. The highlight was a small family group of Great Slaty Woodpeckers.
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| great Slaty Woodpecker |
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| main path in |
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| Calotes sp |
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| calotes sp - close up |
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| Western Striped Squirrel |
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| Linneated Barbet |
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| Temple ruins |
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| Spreading tree roots |
Beng Mealea or Bung Mealea ("lotus pond") is a temple in the Angkor Wat period located 40 km east of the main group of temples at Angkor, Cambodia, on the ancient royal highway to Preah Khan Kompong Svay. It was built as a Hindu temple, but there are some carvings depicting buddhist motifs. Its primary material is sandstone and it is largely unrestored, with trees and thick brush thriving amidst its towers and courtyards and many of its stones lying in great heaps. For years it was difficult to reach, but a road recently built to the temple complex of Koh Ker passes Beng Mealea and more visitors are coming to the site, as it is 77 km from Siem Reap by road.
The afternoon temple visit also provided a new trip bird; Pheasant tailed Jacana seen flying across a nearby wetland. Name of the temple?
Another feature of our Siem Reap week was an evening boat trip into one of the floating villages that survive on the edges of South East Asia’s greatest lake; Tonle Sap. Tonle Sap, the extent of it at least is impressive; it looks to be a vast inland sea – which is pretty much what it is save its water freshness. The villages are less impressive to my eye. It is difficult to imagine say a James Bond film wanting to use them as a backdrop. Who am I to judge though as over 1 and a half million people live in floating villages somewhere on the edges of Tonle Sap so one can imagine that through fishing, snaking, crocodile farming, rice paddies etc there is enough to support great numbers of people.
The trip cost $38 each including transfers to and from Siem Reap, boat trip, dinner and free drinks on a floating restaurant. The food was just ok so we made sure that we got a few drinks in….
Our week in Siem Reap went very quickly and it was very easy to fill in the time as it would have been to waste more...
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| Yellow vented Bulbul |
The following day the first day of the new year we arose early for a full day temple / birding trip with Sam Veasna. Being the first day of the year was, in hindsight a bad choice for a full day temple tour. We planned to go to bed early and did. However the rest of the country didn’t. There was astonishing noise, music, explosions – some of which sounded as if they were happening within our room – until about 3-30am. We had to wake at 5am….You can do the math.
