Siem Reap

We arrived back in Phnom Phen this afternoon after a 2 day visit to Siem Reap! It was a great experience and we had a lot of fun. Siem Reap is about a 5 hour drive north...and that in itself was quite an adventure! We rode in 2 vans - really like church vans - and had drivers that stayed with us in Siem Reap to take us around. Our drivers were great, but driving in Cambodia is a whole new experience. They pass like crazy, there are motorcycles on all sides, and today we came so close to running into a cow that was crossing the street! What an adventure.
Siem Reap is very "western" and has lots of tourists that go there. There was a lot of shopping, lots of nice restaurants, and fancy 5 star hotels and guest houses. Our team stayed in a garden villa guest house that was very nice! It was also very cheap - one room was only $15 a night! Both nights we would order our breakfast before going to bed and then when we came down in the morning, we would sit out on the patio in the garden and they would bring us our food. It was great! Tuesday when we got there we did some shopping in the night market and had some good American food. Wednesday we got up and visited a bunch of very old temples. Our first stop was Angkor Wat, the biggest of all the temples. It is over 1000 years old. We crawled all through it, jumping and climbing around. It was a lot of fun. After that we went to a different temple, Bayon. Then we had lunch. Next we headed to Dat Pram, the temple that is still covered with trees. It was very very cool. This is the temple where Angelina Joile filmed Tombraider. It was fun to climb around on all the tree roots that have grown up through the walls of the temple.
From there, our group split in half. Half the group went to tour a floating city on Tonle Sap lake and the other group went to 2 more temples. The last temple we went to was on top of a very tall hill and we went to watch the sun set from there. I will have to let someone else tell you about the floating city - it sounded very cool, but Randy and I went to the temple on the hill for the sunset. We thought we were going to be able to ride elephants up the hill, but when we got there we found out we had to be there much earlier to reserve an elephant ride. So, we started our hike up the mountain. It was a long steep walk, but so worth it when we arrived at the top. The temple up there was a square, and there were very steep, thin steps going up each side. To climb it you had to put your foot sideways. It was so much fun and the sunset was pretty. We walked down with all the tourists in the dark and some of us went back into town to get foot massages that were much needed! We also got to eat another great dinner - Randy and I ate at the Red Piano, which is a great restaurant that is famous for having Angelina Joile frequent it. It was my most favorite meal of the whole trip!
This morning we packed up and made the 5 hour trip back to our hotel in Phnom Phen. The Pickerings and the Culverhouses will be staying a few more days, so we checked into their rooms. We are all showering and resting and then we will be heading to the airport around 9:30 pm our time. We are looking forward to getting home, and hoping that weather doesn't hold us up! There is a lot of snow in Seoul right now!! Thanks for all your prayers - we are tired, but full of great memories and experiences!!!