Last Updated on October 9, 2024
Visiting Angkor Wat had been on the bucket list and last week, it finally happened. After almost six months in South East Asia, we arrived in Siem Reap, the city used as a base for a visit to the famous ruins of the seat of the former Khmer Kingdom. We met up with our friends Shannon and Anna and joined them for the Angkor Adventure with Urban Adventures, a tour that introduced us to the three main temples: 1) Angkor Wat, the best preserved and most significant temple complex, 2) Ta Phrom, the beautiful jungle temple that was made famous through the movie Tomb Raider, and 3) Angkor Thom, home of the famous Bayon temple.
54 towers cluster around one central peak here at Bayon. Each tower has four of these massive stone faces as seen above – meaning over one relatively small space, there are 216 of these perfectly formed faces in total! Seeing the world’s biggest religious site was just as amazing as we had imagined it and all the different temples that we visited in Angkor left us in awe.
The Amazing Angkor Ruins, UNESCO World Heritage Site #668 - The Traveluster
Thursday 12th of December 2013
[…] Jayavarman VII built the temple, which contains 216 gargantuan stone faces, around 1200 AD. Some say that this was the pinnacle of his massive building campaign. Bayon was […]
The Amazing Angkor Ruins, UNESCO World Heritage Site #668 | The Traveluster
Tuesday 8th of January 2013
[...] Jayavarman VII built the temple, which contains 216 gargantuan stone faces, around 1200 AD. Some say that this was the pinnacle of his massive building campaign. Bayon was [...]
Aaron @ Aaron's Worldwide Adventures
Monday 23rd of April 2012
Believe it or not, I liked the Bayon much more than I liked Angkor Wat itself! Such a special place!
Dani
Monday 23rd of April 2012
Aaron - we also preferred Bayon to Angkor Wat - actually we found most of the temples we visited more impressive than Angkor Wat itself. We went for sunrise but it was a cloudy morning - I think we would've been more impressed if the sunrise had been as stunning as we had hoped it would.
Andi of My Beautiful Adventures
Saturday 21st of April 2012
Gorgeous shot!
Dani
Saturday 21st of April 2012
Thanks Andi!
Ayngelina
Friday 20th of April 2012
One of my favourite places in the world, well worth the hype.
Dani
Saturday 21st of April 2012
Totally agree! Wish we would have had a few more days there, three days to explore the temples are just not enough.