Thursday, March 6, 2014
Up early again to beat the late morning heat. We were only 40 kms from the temple entrance, so also planned to beat the other tourists. The drive to reach the temple was a bit challenging, as the road was quite steep near the top. Nothing Sterlin could not handle. We got our free entry tickets and were in the temple grounds by 8 am. We had the entire temple to ourselves and enjoyed this greatly. After 30 mins we finally noticed two other people also wandering around.
The site itself was very impressive and very well preserved without significant reconstruction. And it was quite vast for being on a mountain top, so we had lots to visit. We were lucky enough to hear and see the morning prayers of the local Buddhists in the half collapsed main temple.
There were many soldiers at the site, as the ownership of this site is disputed between Thailand and Cambodia, to the point that each side has on occasion shot at each other. There are active fortifications and bunkers where the Cambodians keep an eye on the neighboring hill where the Thai soldiers are. Apparently the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague very recently ruled that the temple is on the Cambodian side of the disputed border. So hopefully this will help ease tensions.
We then headed south to Kompong Thom where we stayed for the night. It was too far to drive to Phnom Penh, and we have one more temple in this region and before we call it a day on Khmer style temples.
