Exploring Cambodia

As part of my quest to have an Invincible Summer, I spent most of the month of June traveling to Cambodia and Vietnam with a couple of friends. We did very little pre-planning, and decided to let the wind take us wherever it may go. This was the first time I didn't have all of my lodging and destinations mapped out before the trip, which turned out to be kind of exciting and nerve-wracking all at the same time.

Devatas, or deities, at Angkor Wat

We flew into Phnom Penh, the largest and capital city of Cambodia, after taking a hop from Singapore. The main attractions of Phnom Penh are the Genocide Museum and the Killing Fields. Prior to the trip, I had absolutely zero knowledge of the Khmer Rouge and Pol Pot.

Ta Prohm

We hired a guide at the museum, and she took us through the various rooms of S-21, just one of the over 150 execution centers during the Cambodian Genocide. One of the most shocking parts of the tour, at least for me, was how recently this happened. The Khmer Rouge, led by Pol Pot, reigned from 1975-1979. The Khmer Rouge sought to eliminate capitalistic activities, and therefore, many of the almost 1.5 million prisoners were educated, racial mixed, or connected to foreign government.

Ta Prohm

Every room was essentially a torture room. There was blood splattered on almost every ceiling and wall. I didn't feel right taking any pictures, so I didn't. At the end of the tour, she introduced us to one of the only 12 survivors. I cannot imagine enduring that amount of torture and sitting across from that very building every single day.

One of the rooms at S-21 (courtesy of trekearth.com)

The second half of our tour included the Killing Fields, where thousands of prisoners were executed and buried in shallow graves due to overcrowding at the execution centers.

At the Killing Fields (courtesy of traveltelly.com)

Upon arriving at the Killing Fields, we are given a pair of headphones, as the entire site is an audio tour. They are still working to recover the bones of victims and place them in Choeung Ek, the memorial to the victims. As we were walking along the path, I saw a set of teeth, which was very upsetting.

Banteay Srei

We were originally going to spend two days in Phnom Penh, but after the emotional heaviness of the first day, decided to move on to Siem Reap. We took a bus between the two cities because it's fairly safe and was only $13.

Ta Prohm

Siem Reap was definitely more to my liking. It was less city, and more beautiful as far as land goes. There were also a ton of temples in the Angkor Archaeological Park. The first night we were there, we went to Pub Street, which if you couldn't guess, was full of bars and $1 massage parlors. It is also where the night market is located, where artisans sold all kinds of merchandise. If you've been to Southeast Asia, they all pretty much sell the same thing.

Strolling down Pub Street

We ended up drinking way too much the first night, but that didn't stop us from hopping on a tuk-tuk, a motorcycle rickshaw type of thing, the following morning and touring the temples.

Banteay Srei Temple

The way the temple circuit works is you drive through a checkpoint where you buy a pass for one, three, or seven days. They take your picture and print it on your pass so you can't give it to someone else. You then drive past another checkpoint where they stamp your card and then allow you to drive past all the temples.

Banteay Srei Temple

The first temple we went to was Banteay Srei, dedicated to the Hindu god, Shiva, and also known as the temple of women. What made this temple special is that it was built out of red sandstone, and is known for its elaborate carvings. It was first built in 967, remained in use until 1303, and was rediscovered and restored in 1914. Overwhelmed can't even begin to describe the feeling of seeing and walking through these ruins.

Carving of kala, a creature representative of time and Shiva

About halfway through our visit, we started sweating out the previous night's festivities, which influenced our decision to eat a quick lunch and head back to our hotel.

Absolutely breathtaking

Apparently our tuk-tuk driver wasn't feeling the best either because we literally stopped about every five minutes so he could stretch. Banteay Srei was located about an hour away from our hotel, so we had a lot of time to sit and wait in the 100 degree heat.

We offered him a beer and Diet Coke hoping that might help. It did not.

So many cows along the road

Random temple we got to see on one of the many stretch breaks.

We spent the rest of the night recovering and enjoying the air conditioning in the room and scheduled the sunrise Angkor Wat tour, which is the main tourist attraction in the area.

Angkor Wat at sunrise. Kind of a crappy day for it, but whatever.

The hotel packed us a breakfast, plus an extra for the tuk-tuk driver, who was luckily better rested than the previous day. Angkor Wat was packed by the time we got there, so we sat on a wall, ate our breakfast, and attempted to watch the sunrise. We unfortunately went on an overcast day, so it wasn't as spectacular as it could have been.

Apparently I'm not the only one overwhelmed by the ruins.

Angkor Wat was the center of the Khmer Kingdom, and is now an UNESCO World Heritage site. It was built in the 12th century and is the largest religious monument in the world. The temple combines the two types of Khmer architecture, the temple-mountain and galleried temple.

Temple-mountain

Galleried Temple

It took us forever to tour the entire temple because it just kept going on and on.

After we made our way through, we found our tuk-tuk and went to Bayon Temple, another famous temple in Cambodia.

Bayon Temple - can you find the faces?

Bayon was the last state temple to be built at Angkor, and is known for the massive stone faces carved into the walls.

Oh yeah - there they are! There are over 216 on the temple!

We didn't spend a lot of time at Bayon because it looked like it was about to rain, and since we had spent so much time at Angkor Wat, we were getting worn out. The final temple we went to was Ta Prohm.

Leaving Bayon

Ta Prohm was the one I was most excited to see because the pictures I saw of it beforehand showed trees intertwined with the architecture, a true nature meets man ordeal. For some reason that sort of I Am Legend type of thing really gets me going.

Needless to say, I wasn't disappointed.

Unlike many of the other temples of its time, Ta Prohm has remained mostly untouched, which explains why the trees have taken over. Just like Angkor Wat, it is an UNESCO World Heritage site, though it wasn't nearly as crowded, which was nice.

There were multiple ways to access Ta Prohm, so once we were done exploring we had a bit of an emergency trying to find the exit. It was only an emergency because we really had to pee, and there's just something that feels wrong about peeing on a world heritage site.

Was this our exit?

As we were trying to find our way out, we ran into a nice Cambodian man who started telling us about the temple. He led us to areas we hadn't been and seemed very knowledgeable about it. We asked him if he was a tour guide, and he told us he lived there. Can you imagine living there? He then showed us a small carved face peeking out from behind the massive trees. It was honestly one of my favorite parts of the temple.

We thanked him for showing us everything and gave him a few dollars for his time. After locating what would pass for a bathroom, we headed back to our hotel to decide what we were going to do next. Originally we had planned on going to Laos, but the plane tickets had tripled in price. One of the girls I was with suggested we go to Vietnam since she liked it the first time she went, so we applied for our visas using the least secure application process known to man, and booked our tickets for Hoi An, Vietnam!

So long, Cambodia!

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Elephants & Tigers, Oh Chiang Mai!

As a little last hooray before Mark deployed, we traveled to Thailand for a two week getaway. This was a very special vacation for us because it was the first time we went somewhere just the two of us without attending someone's wedding. We spent the first half of the vacation in Chiang Mai, and the last half in Phuket.

Our hotel room at Fern Paradise in Chiang Mai.

We stayed at the Fern Paradise in Chiang Mai. The rooms were made from rice barns, so it was basically like staying in a treehouse. It was amazing. The owners were super sweet; they even gave us a little gift when we checked out. The only downside about the hotel was that it was a little outside of Chiang Mai so we had a little bit of trouble getting the tuk tuks to take us back.

Wat Pra Singh Voramahavihara

After checking in, we went to the downtown area of Chiang Mai to check out the markets and wats, the Buddhist temples. As we were walking around, a man approached us and started asking us about our trip. This is very common in Asian countries; many locals will approach Westerners and use it as an opportunity to practice their English. It also often benefits us because they tell us about places to visit that most tourists don't know.

I couldn't get enough how much detail were in these huge structures.

The man we met told us about a special silver wat. He explained that it was the only one in Thailand and then showed us where it was on a map. We thanked him and after lunch, found our way to the silver wat.

Wat Sri Suphan - the only silver wat in Thailand.

There were signs posted all around the wat saying women were not allowed into the ordination hall area. This was not a problem because we were not properly dressed to enter any of the wats, though even if we would have been, I wouldn't have felt comfortable doing so.

Wat Sri Suphan front view.

We ended the night at our hotel and had the best Tom Kai Gai & Panag Chicken I have ever had. The next morning was our elephant day! I was super excited, but nervous at the same time.

My elephant, Ruby.

Once we arrived at Thai Elephant Home, the mahouts (elephant trainer) explained some basic commands to us and how to keep safe with our chang (Thai for elephant).

Pretty afraid I was going to fall to my death right about here.

The only command I remembered was "bye" which told them to go. There was another one to tell them to kneel down so we could jump off, but it never worked when I said it. After paying our respects to Ganesha, the Thai elephant god, we got to feed them and then practice riding in a small area. Each of us got our own elephant and rode bareback with a rope in the front and back to hold on to.

Mark feeding his elephant, Punoy, which means little boy in Thai. He was not very little.

We then rode up a steep hill through the trees. It was absolutely beautiful and only a little scary because they were constantly stretching over the edge to eat.

The whole group. Mark volunteered to lead. His wasn't as well behaved as mine.

After riding for a couple of hours, we came to a clearing and had lunch. The mahouts had brought Pad Thai wrapped in a leaf for us to eat. After we finished, we fed whatever was left over to the elephants.

Lunch time! It was super yummy.

Ruby getting our leftovers.

Then, the mahouts had us stand next to the elephant and started saying, "Joop, joop!" My elephant then proceeded to give all of us a kiss. It was super slimy and suctiony.

Mark got a nicer kiss than I did.

After lunch, we gave the elephants a mud bath. They told us the mud was also good for human skin, and then slathered it all over our faces. Mark was not a fan.

When in Rome...

Mark's least favorite part. He just supervised the whole time.

After each elephant was covered in the mud, we hopped back on and rode to the river. Apparently my elephant loved to swim and as soon as she got in the water she dunked under. It took me by surprise and at that moment the mahout asked if I could swim. I'm glad we covered that before we were in the water.

On the way to the river. We bought bananas to feed them.

They had us both get on Mark's elephant for pictures.

The mahouts thought it was fun to have the elephant roll around and make us fall off. In doing this, I almost got swept under the elephant, which was kind of scary. Luckily, Punoy used the sides of his tusks to catch me from going down the river.

Oh ya know, just seeing my life flash before my eyes. No biggie.

Yay to living!

We then returned to camp and took a cold water shower. This was my favorite part of our trip. I would definitely recommend it, especially the Thai Elephant Home. They seem to take good care of the elephants, and part of their mission is wildlife conservation and breeding.

ROAR!

The next day we went on the Flight of the Gibbon zip line through the jungle. They took pictures of us flying, but something about a harness just makes you look awesome. We were on our way home and the cabbie offered to take us to the Tiger Kingdom. The Tiger Kingdom is where you are able to pet the tigers, and it was also the one thing Mark did not want to do.

I obviously talked him into it. 

We went with the medium tigers because they had the shortest wait time. It took us about 45 minutes for them to call our number. When we entered the enclosure there were four, completely NOT drugged, tigers roaming around. We were told to approach them from behind, make no sudden movements, and never run.

This one was not into the petting. Again, saw my life flash before my eyes.

They called this one Fat Boy. He was super into the tummy rub.

They kept telling us to hold their tails for some reason.

After we walked around for about 15 minutes, one of the tigers got into their pool. Mark started taking pictures like crazy so the keepers pulled out a stick with some leaves on it and they really started to play.

Fat Boy playing. He doesn't like swimming.

It was a crazy experience and I'm so glad we did it, but I would never do it again. I feel like you can only look death in the face so many times before you run out of luck.

And that was our time in Chiang Mai. Between Chiang Mai and Phuket, I definitely liked Chiang Mai more just because there was so much to do and see. After Chiang Mai, we spent the rest of the vacation beaching and relaxing.