10/15: Last day in Siem Reap, Cambodia

Can hardly believe our time here in Siem Reap visiting the magnificent temples at Angkor Wat and those further afield will come to an end after today.  Steven had wanted to come here for so very long I am so glad we spent the time exploring not just the wats in town but also those north and east of Siem Reap too.  I don't know about Steven but I preferred getting out of town and discovering the less touristy sights of Kbal Spean and Beng Melea to some of the temples that comprise the Angkor Wat complex so close to Siem Reap.  I wouldn't have missed Angkor Wat for a moment but the latter sights for me were simply spectacular.

Decided to explore the sights of Siem Reap today after spending days and days getting out of town.

Outside our hotel, the Tanei Guesthouse, in Siem Reap.

Some of the bridges spanning the two sides of town.

Enjoyed seeing the pretty lamp post and watching the waterwheel across the river. 

Wat Damnak: a very large living temple across the river.

Steven took the above photo of the white robed monks at Wat Damnak   It was very unusual seeing white robed monks as  virtually all others we saw on the trip wore orange robes.  

While Steven took the above photo, I sat in the courtyard updating my little red book containing my notes from my trip.  Notice the red duct tape on the binding?  We bought that at a street stall in Beijing.

More photos of Wat Damnak above.

Walked around the Old Market and finally found these bobbing flamingos in lots of different sizes;  I had read about them on Trip Advisor and had REALLY wanted to buy one for ourselves to bring home.  Still haven't put it up as we're not quite sure where's the best place though!

This lady at the Old Market helped me find a huge array of Cambodian spices I bought for Natalie and friends.

More of the eensy weensy bananas we only saw in Cambodia.

Chicken and live fish anyone?

Bought scads of the kromas I've mentioned in previous blog posts.  Hard for me to resist the variety of colors and different sized gingham patterns.

                                                            Loved seeing gas for sale in Bacardi and Johnny Walker bottles!

In the afternoon we hired Mr. Sarath, our tuk tuk driver, to take us back to Bayon for one final look at the "temple of faces" and then out to see sunset over the temples.

Bayon photos above.

On our way by foot to Phnom Bakeng to see the sunset over Angkor Wat.  We had checked out so many possibilities where the best place was to see sunset on our last night and decided finally on Phnom Bakeng.  Turned out to be an absolute bust because there was no "sunset" to be seen, just lots of haze as you see from the photo below/

View from atop Phnom Bakeng.

 

After the non sunset, we walked down the longish elephant path to meet up with Mr. Sarath.  On the walk down though I got stung alive by fire ants, an experience I do NOT wish to ever repeat, believe me!

Pretty seeing the bridge I had photographed earlier in the day all lit up at night.