Temple Pics

As promised, pictured from the Angkor temples. The temple area is pretty amazing. Just TONS of old temples. Some you'll see have been preserved or are in the process of being preserved, others are left to nature (ie the one with the trees growing all through it). Seeing how big the temple area is, how large the temples are and how impressive the ruins are, in it's prime this place had to have been absolutely unparalleled anywhere in the world. The detail in the construction is mindblowing. Every wall in every temple has these incredibly intricate and detailed ancient carvings of battle tales, etc., and they are about the largest buildings you've ever seen with massive man made moats surrounding them and incredible walls and entrances.

The temples have been the scene of so much conflict over the past 800 years from battling the Champa's (sp) to the Vietnamese, to the Thais to the Mongols to more recently acting as a refuge for the Kmer Rouge. Plus you see all these empty places that used to be occupied with buddhas that were all taken out when one of the kings believed in hinduism rather than buddhism, and there must have been thousands upon thousands of these buddhas that no longer are in place. At any rate, I'm afraid the pics don't fully do the place justice, they really can't possibly, but it will give you a little taste of it. More temples early in the morning tomorrow then going to a floating village before Bangkok thursday.