https://youtu.be/eB7jvmgDKN0 Here is a video we made of our visit to Ta Prohm!

We wandered around Baphuon temple briefly, which was small but right beside the palace. We were being relentlessly followed by a “tour guide” so we walked through this area pretty quickly before checking out the Elephant Terrace. Sadly Elephant Terrace was under construction, but this used to be the front of the royal palace. One million people used to live in Angkor Wat, making it one of the largest cities in the world at the time. The King would hold events for the people at this Elephant Terrace. I found all of this so interesting!! 

We then rejoined our tuk tuk driver and bought water before heading to the next stop, Preah Khan, a lesser known temple I believe…? You have to climb super high steps to get to this temple, but you are rewarded with a cool view from the top! You can also see out over the lake. There were butterflies everywhere! Our driver told us that this was one of the oldest temples (possibly the oldest) and that it was a Hindu temple.

We then headed to Ta Prohm, the “Tomb Raider Temple” and possibly the most famous temple, more so than Angkor Wat. This temple is covered in Banyan trees and looks to have been taken over by the jungle. Although when I was last here in 2011 it was a lot more jungly, with moss covered rubble everywhere! The place looked a lot different. We wandered around this temple for so long, a few hours for sure, but we kept thinking we were done and then exploring more and more. There were so many little hidden pathways to explore. 

Next we went to Banteay Kdei Temple, at least I think that’s what it was called. This temple was almost deserted and certainly the least busy temple thus far, but also the most in disrepair of the temples we had visited during the day. We then stopped at the lake for a lovely view on our way back to the room, as Jives was getting pretty unwell.