this is an apsara and apsara means a beauty a phenomenal Beauty
getting here requires 46 steep steps
come here and yes you really like Cambodia so much that she donated to the government
the largest religious Monument anywhere in the world and I bet you don't know most of
the things about this place so this video is about exploring Angkor Wat giving you tons of
information practical and historical to make an amazing amazing trip to this beautiful place so
let's start this beautiful journey into Angkor Wat my day started early from Siem Reap and I would
recommend starting really early and it took about 30 minutes to get to the ticket office I made
it and I got my ticket which is 37 and the funny thing is they actually put your photo on it so you
can't transfer it to anyone else it's a single day ticket that's valid for two days three day tickets
filed for five days and seven day ticket as well for 10 days I don't know why they call that but
I'm happy to come back a second day as well so we're gonna go around it's quite a big complex and
you can't just go around you know randomly so I'll show you some of the main points um if you want to
hire a guide it's going to be about 35 which I definitely recommend because how do you get
all the information otherwise right let's start this beautiful journey there's so much to learn
from the ticket office it takes about 20 to 25 minutes to get to the entrance of Angkor Wat
almost there and the first temple we will see is
and now this is a huge archaeological park with a lot of places to see so you need to
pace yourself and you need a couple of days if you want to explore them properly so one thing
I would say is keep your ticket close to you at all times because they keep checking pretty
much everywhere you go they keep checking the ticket so let's go see angkor wat
so angkor is a huge archaeological complex it's not just a simple temple there are more
than 60 temples here and Angkor tom which was the capital used to be the biggest city at one
point in 12th century it was even bigger than what London is today so I mean with that in
mind you need to plan your trip properly do bring some comfortable shoes get some water
wear loose baggy clothes because honestly it's hot and humid here pretty much all the
time and there's food you can have around you need to get your ticket before coming
here and you make sure you bring plenty of sunscreen because you will need it
Angkor Wat was built by King Surya varman II it took more than a million people and
thousands died it was all basically labor for the love of King it took thousands of elephants and
Ox to bring Stone from as far as 60 miles away some of them weighing up to 70 ton to complete
this absolute Mammoth now I said before this is the largest religious monument in the world
which means no cathedral in the world no mosque in the world has been built that has surpassed
the gigantic size of this beautiful Temple it was initially dedicated to the Hindu god Vishnu which
at that point Hinduism was the main religion and later it was switched to a Buddhist temple and
it's been absolutely amazing it was abandoned in 15th century
um I think because the water system around that's one theory was too delicated and it
couldn't cope with all the resource consumption and it collapsed and that's how it was abandoned
and things were moved to Phnom Penh and it was later discovered in the 19th century by the French
Angkor Wat the temple had 12 Towers originally three on the West End entrance and then five
Towers on the third floor as well as Four Towers on the second floor so there are three floors
one hell which is the ground floor not very well decorated for that reason perhaps the second floor
is Earth and the last floor is heaven so that's why you see the last floor has these five Towers
which represent the mythical mountain meru where all the gods live in harmony now they might look
like solid structures but they're not they have a hole on top of it and they are designed so that at
a specific time of the year the Sun comes and Shines on the Tomb of the king which is buried
cremated and then buried 14 meters down under these towers absolutely brilliant
in order to bring the stones from quite far away they had an ingenious technique they
were not just using the logs to roll them over look at these four holes so what they
would do is they would make these holes and then they would insert wood in it and then
put water the wood would expand and it would take hold and then the elephants would drag
these stones all the way from there it would take up to three days to bring these bad boys
one thing that's really beautiful about this entire Temple is the perspective and the
measurements they are so precise that they match our own laser guided systems which
is absolutely incredible considering this was built in the 11th century
this is an apsara and apsara means a beauty a phenomenal beauty and most of them were dancers
and these were King's concubines which he had in thousands and they are beautifully adorned
throughout the temple they're so delicately carved that you can even see the print on their clothing
now they were only dressed with silk waist down nothing above bare breasted and they only had this
beautiful necklace and they had a lot of different hairstyles which you can see in a lot of different
um carvings around but if there's one thing that you will see most of in the
temple even on the highest tower is these beautiful ladies
I am on the third floor now which is represented heaven and it was reserved
for the royal family King and his wives and this is also a great place if you want to
see that hint of a color which adorned this beautiful building during its
glory years and every single inch has been decorated beautifully around us
you have an amazing time but getting here requires 46 steep steps
angkor wat is still a place of worship so make sure you are not loud the shoulders are covered
you're not wearing your hat when you come to the third floor and don't touch any walls any reliefs
and especially this is heartbreaking but luckily they're doing something about it now
the relief work in angkor wat is absolutely beautiful detailed and if you look at the wall behind me this
is one of the eight reliefs that you will see at this beautiful temple on
the other side I got to see the one chapter of the story from ramayana
and this behind me is a relief where 21 Hindu gods are fighting the Demon King
and this is Shiva right behind me to which the temple was originally dedicated you could spend hours just looking at and tracing the details through these
incredibly beautiful but intricately carved release
I am seriously seriously in love with this place
this is the beautiful pond on the western side which will show you that amazing reflection
of Angkor Wat and its beautiful remaining five Towers but as you can see it's windy
and there is no reflection it is a little beautiful in my mind because it represents
your mind if it's too windy you won't be able to see the beauty and Its reflection together
what a beautiful thought this place gave me
so there are monks who still live here be respectful when you're taking photos do ask them
first and if you're a woman don't get too close to them if you're a
man you're still not allowed to touch them be respectful
do you know how important Angkor Wat is to Cambodia just enough that it's placed in the
middle of their flag if you look at that building in the middle of Cambodian flag
that's angkor wat for you so we're gonna move on to the next Temple and we're not abandoning Angkor
Wat yet because we have a beautiful sunset to see here so let's continue on to the next Temple
don't forget to subscribe if you want to see some more exciting travel destinations
and I am here at the second temple it's called ta prohm temple and this is the same
Temple they use in the Tomb Raider movies and yes Angelina Jolie did come here yes
you really like Cambodia so much that she donated to the government and she actually
has Cambodian nationality so this is really nice because it's different from Angkor Wat
and can see that tree coming out of it let's go check out because you can actually see the
roots inside and the older name of this place is Raja vihara let's go
so the legend has it that this used to be the richest of all the temples at the time and
you can clearly see that in all these decorations on these beautiful Towers they used to be around
36 but there's only 15 16 of them left and it's obviously not in as good a condition as Angkor Wat
but it's an absolute delight just walking around experiencing its beauty and its intricate detail
for today is the last Temple and this is Bayon behind me Bayon means magic
you can look at it and it screams magical so that's not the old name the old name is
jayakiri which means the mountain of King Jaya and it had 54 Towers 49 of whom still
remained and if you look at the main tower from above it looks like a lotus flower
it's really beautiful and I'm really excited to explore it so let's go check it out
if it was up to me I would just call it the temple of faces see how many you can count I
just couldn't count so many so it's time to see that magical angkor sunset I sat outside its pond
and saw the most beautiful sunset but not only that I also got to see the sunrise next morning
welcome to our second day in angkor wat archaeological park and while I could spend months here and not
get bored of these beautiful buildings I am short of time so I have selected
two more beautiful temples to visit today and this is the first one called pre rup
and this used to be a crematorium for the king and it also has a lot of towers
which sadly a few of them remain but it is absolutely beautiful let's go check it out
throughout the Khmer Kingdom there were 38 different Kings who erected
the temples not just for themselves but also for the relatives like the
teprom temple or the Tomb Raider Temple was erected in honor of the mother of the king
all right so I am at banteay srei which is the last Temple and before I take you to the temple I want
to tell you about how to get around so this is Lee and Lee has been taking me around not just angkor
but also around siem reap as well he's really good he has his tiktok and
he's really patient as well so if you want to reach out to him you can check on trusty
tuktuk.com I will leave the website and his number down below so let's go see the temple
banteay serei is a little far from other temples but honestly it's definitely definitely worth
a visit you can look how beautiful and how delicately carved the whole place is and the
best thing for me is there are statues that are still around and it is incredibly detailed and
I mean the carvings are just so beautiful it's absolutely worth it so the older name of this
place is farapura and it used to be a temple for Hindu god Shiva all right guys this is all from
angkor unfortunately I wish I had more time to explore but I really hope you enjoyed these five
beautiful temples that I took you around they're all very different and they're all beautiful and
special for their own little reasons so I will see you in another beautiful destination another time