Angkor, wat wat wat?

We arrived at the bus stop just after sunrise, half asleep and feeling a little disorientated. After picking up our bags we noticed that the gate to the station was closed with a number of eager tuk tuk drivers waiting outside. The next moment someone opened the gate and the hoards of men rushed in trying to collect passengers. I was glad we had a pick up arranged by the previous hostel in PP as now was not the time for any of our wearisome selfs to be dealing with the frenzy of drivers. After a little rest, freshen up and breakfast we hired bicycles and headed along the road that would take us to Angkor. I had ignorantly assumed that Angkor was one of those tick-box tourist sites, dismissing it as 'just another wat' - how wrong i was. On arrival to the complex (i had previously thought it was just one temple) I reaslised that my expectations were completely underestimated. I was astounded, starstruck - can one be starstuck by a building? well i was! The beaming sun and blue skies added to the overall impression of the Hindu temple which was erected for King Suryavarman II early in the 12th centure (at a similar time to Notre Dam in Paris for comparison). From pictures (which i will put up soon!) you cannot appreciate the scale of the structure and the impression it impacts on you as you traverse around its various parts. The engineer part of me wqas going crazy thinking about how it would have been constructed and how much effort was involved in just to get the materials to the site. We spent a few more hours cycling around the other temples, stopping off at those that took our fancy and getting overly-excited by a large community of resident monkeys. For the evening we had a local dinner at the night foodstalls and then exercised our bargaining skills at the well stocked night market. Thinking of my already rather full pack (stupid winter clothes) I was successfully restrained and bought only one t-shirt anda purse made from recycled fish food bags (how sustainable!). As we walked around we enjoyed a live band playing Cambodian music and also marvelled at the number of 'fish foot massages' where live fish eat the dead skin off your feet, hence, 'massage' - hmmm, think i'll pass!