Tuesday, March 9, 2010

New entry fee

The new $5 entrance ticket for Preah Khan
I realise this information will be useful to a mere handful of adventurous travellers but be prepared to pay an official entry fee of $5 next time you go to the remote temple of Preah Khan of Kompong Svay (also known as Prasat Bakan). Instead of a few thousand riel to the policeman who was guaranteed to appear at some stage during your visit, he'll be on the main gate now, will give you a ticket (see above) in exchange for your five dollars. It's the same fee for Beng Mealea and Banteay Chhmar whilst Koh Ker will cost you a whopping $10. Preah Khan is still the 'hardest to get to' of the main Angkorean temple sites around the country and remains off-limits during the rainy season. There's no accommodation anywhere close by except in a villager's house in the village of Ta Seng. For a taste of the adventure that is Preah Khan, read about my trip there in January 2003 here.
The more popular Beng Mealea also costs $5 to get in

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Sunday, May 17, 2009

En route to Preah Vihear

A section of the road that defeated us on the way to Preah Khan
I've now reached Preah Vihear in the recollections from my trip to northern Cambodia that took place in late March. We'd arrived in Tbeng Meanchey after the gruelling 11-hour moto ride from Stung Treng. In the Malop Dong restaurant we met up with Vutha and Seyha, who would accompany us on the remainder of our trip to Preah Vihear, Anlong Veng and Banteay Chhmar over the next couple of days. They work with me at Hanuman Tourism and came equipped with a 4WD to make life a little easier for my old bones. Early the next morning, during a thunderous storm, we headed south towards the temple site of Preah Khan for a quick inspection, however the rain of the last few days did us no favours. Preah Khan is hard to reach at the best of times, located a long way from any main roads and reachable on local dirt tracks which get very muddy after rain, and so it proved. Two hours into our trip and with Vutha, our best driver at the helm, we deemed it impossible to continue and get to Preah Vihear in the same day. So, reluctantly, we turned around, sloshed through the water-filled track we'd just navigated and returned to Tbeng Meanchey by 10am.
Our lunch stop at Sraem as Vutha cleans the wheels of our 4WD
The road to Preah Vihear was much easier, though diversions aplenty as they are laying lots of concrete culverts at various points especially the small bridges. At the turn off for Choam Khsan, the recent upsurge in interest in the province has cleared the heavily-forested area into a mini-housing centre with a new large market standing empty, whilst at Sraem, where we stopped for lunch, the small town was awash with military personnel. It took us 2 hours to reach Sraem. Our lunch of chicken and deer was quickly consumed and the final 45 minutes to Kor Muy, the village at the foot of Preah Vihear, was remarkable for the sheer volume of military troops and heavy guns and equipment that is visible from the main road. This area used to be a wilderness with nothing and no-one between the sleepy villages. The change is dramatic. We quickly confirmed our guesthouse booking then took the newly-laid road to the top of the mountain. It took about half an hour as the incline is very steep in places and not for the faint-hearted. At the beginning of the road we spoke to a few soldiers to check the situation which they said was quiet, and as we neared the top of the road we encountered a barrage of machine-gun posts dug in on both sides, with plenty of troops milling around, especially when we reached the summit and the area around the small pagoda. This had been the scene of one of the main disputes with the Thai soldiers in the preceding months. All the soldiers appeared at ease, though each carried their own arsenal of weapons and the gun posts facing Thailand were heavily-manned from what I could see. We had reached Preah Vihear and parked our 4WD next to the 5th Gopura.
Our first sight of the mountain with Preah Vihear on top
The rock formation at the top of the Preah Vihear mountain - I would be standing there a few hours later
The beginning of the newly-laid road to the top, built by the military
The incline is much steeper than it appears in these photos - ask anyone that's been
The only traffic besides us was military traffic - we were the only tourists that day
A rough section of the road that will need to be widened in the future
The village of Kor Muy as seen from the road to the top
The final leg of the mountain road, just around the corner are the machine-gun posts and the summit of Preah Vihear

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Thursday, January 15, 2009

My schedule

The East Gate of the city of Angkor Thom
Okay, enough stalling, what have I been doing the last few days? After attending parties galore in Siem Reap on Saturday and Sunday, it was all work, work, work on Monday through til Wednesday night. Now that I work in the tourism industry, rather than visiting the temples purely for fun, a few days in the temple capital of the world (in my view) necessitated me casting a keen eye over some of the Angkor temples, how and when to visit to see them at their best (without the crowds), testing guides, trying out a few remote sites and so on. Monday morning was spent meeting our new staff in our Siem Reap branch before a six-hour bicycle ride around Angkor Thom after lunch. I started at the South Gate and headed for the rarely-seen East Gate (or Gate of the Dead) which doesn't lead anywhere hence its solitude. I took my bike on top of the city wall to ride onto Victory Gate, sought out the hidden last known shrine of the Angkor period, Mangalartha (aka Monument 487 and Prasat Top East), before poking around some bits of rubble near the two Khleangs and the towers of Prasat Suor Prat. Onto the oft-overlooked handful of shrines that make up the Preah Pithu group - which house some fine carvings and are very peaceful - and then over the road to visit Tep Pranam and Preah Palilay. The latter was a major disappointment now that they have cut down the trees that gave it it's own unique forest setting. Hot and sweaty, I headed back to the office to catch up on my emails before taking my evening meal at the Curry Walla on Sivatha Street.
The gods lining the causeway to the South Gate of Angkor Thom
The eerie dawn light at Ta Prohm
Tuesday was an early start for a dawn visit and sunrise at Ta Prohm. It was pitch black when we arrived at 5.30am, no-one was about, not even the Apsara guards, and it was just me, my guide, a torch and the shrill of the green parrots that inhabit the temple's trees. We walked through the temple as the dawn light gradually improved as the sun rose over the horizon - which we obviously couldn't see as the temple was in the way - but the solitude inside one of Angkor's busiest temples was palpable and evidenced when my guide jumped a foot in the air as something scurried across our torchlit path. At 7pm we eventually saw another human as we made our way out of the east entrance and headed back for breakfast. I forgot to say that my overnight stay was at the Tara Angkor Hotel, which is pretty swish in all aspects, and their breakfast was a real treat after my early start in the extremely chilly air. Now warmed up, my day continued with the aid of my old pal, Kim Rieng and his moto. At 9am we headed out for a 9-hour trip to see a few of the remoter, rarely-visited sites of Phnom Bok, Prasat Banteay Ampil and Chau Srei Vibol. More on these sites in individual postings but Phnom Bok was a killer of a climb with 630 steps to the top, Banteay Ampil involved walking barefoot and pushing the moto through two small rivers and the route to Chau Srei Vibol was sandy and hard going. It was good to get back to my room at the HanumanAlaya (yes another change of hotel) for a welcome shower prior to a lovely meal and late-night chat at the home of my friends Eric and Lida.
Tree roots strangle this window frame at Prasat Banteay Ampil
The face of a demon, asura, on a false door of one of the towers of Bakong
A 5am start beckoned again on Wednesday. A new guide, a new temple, this time Preah Khan, but the bitterly cold air was the same. Preah Khan was an almost identical replica of Ta Prohm except there were no parrots, no sign of life at all, except for some bats, more doorways to duck through and by the time we reached the Hall of Dancers the first rays of sunlight were peering through the trees at the eastern entrance. Both of the guides gave me an excellent historical overview of the temples and the carvings (by torchlight) but also added snippets about the religions, the various gods, fauna, wildlife, customs, and so on. Certainly it reminded me that though my travels for many years have been solo, a well-informed guide who knows his/her stuff adds immeasurably to a visit to Angkor for first-timers. I'm certainly no novice but I learnt a few things on both of my dawn visits that I hadn't known before. After breakfast I conducted some training in the Siem Reap branch, took the opportunity to visit The Sothea luxury five-star resort that will open next month and gulped down lunch. Kim Rieng returned with his car this time and we headed out to the Roluos Group for a whistle-stop visit to Bakong and Preah Ko before taking a short-cut towards Chong Khneas, for an early evening sunset boat cruise on the edges of the Tonle Sap Lake. Dinner at HanumanAlaya and for the second time I fell asleep at my pc whilst trying to upload some photos to this blog. This morning it was back to Phnom Penh by Mekong Express at 7am - it takes six hours - despite the bus being clipped by a truck and we then came across a major road accident where a man's body lay in the road, motionless, with blood seeping from his head and his mouth. I fear he wasn't going to survive.
These are monks going to meditate, though they appear armed and ready to do battle
Some of the day's last rays of sunshine over the Tonle Sap Lake

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