Get ready for an early start for sunrise at Angkor Wat. Enjoy a well-deserved picnic breakfast at Angkor as you watch the sun rise over the temples before heading into the ancient city to explore Ta Prohm `Tomb Raider` fame. Ta Prohm has been abandoned to the elements, a reminder that while empires rise and fall, the riotous power of nature marches on, oblivious to the dramas of human history. Left as it was ‘discovered’ by French explorer Henri Mouhout in 1860, the tentacle-like tree roots here are slowly strangling the surviving stones, man first conquering nature to create, nature later conquering man to destroy. We head to the ancient city of Angkor Thom, the last capital of the great Khmer empire under the reign of Jayavarman VII, surrounded by an 8 meter high wall that creates a perfect location. Cross the embankment of the moat, flanked on both sides by a series of 54 deities and demons, each holding a sacred naga snake, and an impressive entrance gate adorned with three-headed elephants and four smiling faces of the Buddha is covered. Continue to Bayon Temple. At the exact center of Angkor Thom, this is an eccentric expression of the creative genius and inflated ego of Cambodia’s most celebrated king. Its 54 towers are each topped off with the four faces of Avalokiteshvara (Buddha of Compassion), which bear more than a passing resemblance to the king himself.
We journey out to the Mother of all temples, Angkor Wat. Believed to be the world's largest religious building, this temple is the perfect fusion of symbolism and symmetry and a source of pride and strength to all Khmers.
Overnight in Siem Reap.