Siem Reap/Ankor Wat - Final Day

On our last day of our ticket and in Siem Reap, we decided to explore the remaining temples on the short circuit by bike. It was an excellent way to see the sites, stay somewhat cool, and cover the large distances between them. The first temple we stopped at housed and taught dancers in the kingdom. It was very large and beautiful, with even more images of dancing deities.

We then cycled on to the water temple, which is in the middle of a huge lake, and during the monsoon season is flooded and mostly underwater, which the temple was designed to accommodate. It wasn't very big, but with the lilies surrounding it and the pools of water, it was quite a unique temple to see. We then got beckoned into a food stall for lunch and almost got ripped off on the food, until James managed to haggle them down to a slightly more reasonable price.

On the way to our next temple, we went off-road along a shortcut dirt track, which ended up being so much fun. We saw tucked-away ruins that weren't on the map and, through the forest, saw more cool lizards and birds than on the main path. We slowly rode past a couple of temples on our route but decided to only stop at the temple where Lara Croft was filmed, as our butts were getting sore. We couldn't actually remember what the scene filmed here looked like, so we spent much of the time looking around saying, "Was that where it was filmed?" However, we did come across an area where lots of people were taking photos, so we assumed it was there and got our cursory photo.

We headed back just in time, as when we stopped cycling, we realized we might have gotten heat exhaustion if we'd been out any longer. After a rest in our rooms and lots of water and salts, we felt better and only left briefly to grab snacks for our travels later that night. At 9 pm, we packed our bags and checked out of the hotel to get to our overnight bus to Vietnam and Ho Chi Minh City. After such an exhausting day, we hoped we'd go straight to sleep on the bus.Read more