Carpe Temple

It was an early one again today.  Being accustomed to pre-dawn waking, Mack popped up out of bed pretty easily.  Fiona, the future coffee drinker, was not as easily convinced.  We made it to the tuk tuk by 5:00 and found Chey, our driver, waiting for us with our breakfast all boxed up for us.  

Tuk tuk sisters. Only fitting for it to be a fuzzy picture at that time of day.

It takes about 10 minutes to get to Angkor Wat from our hotel.  It was nice and cool this morning.  The girls were wrapped in a sarong for the drive while Brian and I enjoyed the breeze.  There was a long line of headlights from the tuk tuks headed where we were.  We seem to have the slow, cruisy tuk tuk, so many others were passing us.  It was funny to see us all racing there to get the exact right spot for that picture we were all hoping to snap.   

In the bumpy excitement of our approach, Mack's iPad went flying out of the tuk tuk and I can't tell if it was run over or not, but it shattered.  Yes, it did.  It was not a pleasant way to start our day, but it happened.  Fear flashed through me as I envisioned the rest of our trip without it, however, we are very blessed to have access to another one.  It is what it is. Or was. 

Once we shook off the bad feelings from that moment, we started our pilgrimage to the temple with the hundreds and hundreds of other people.  It's a bit of a trek over the water and through the gates.  Add in a tired little girl with a hungry tummy and it's even longer.  It's funny because she runs exactly hot and cold.  Not warm.  She loves this trip, or she hates it.  I'll let you guess how she felt about this daybreak adventure. Regardless of our crying child, we made it with plenty of time to spare.  We wiggled our way into what seemed like the perfect spot near the pond to get our photo.  It was a lot of people waiting for the magical moment together from all over the world.  It is a powerful place and that was a powerful moment.  I've seen lots of sunrise photos of this marvel.  The sunrise was subtle in color today, but no less beautiful. It was our sunrise here.  One we will probably never see again but will always remember.  Enjoy.

Once the sun was up, we left our pond spot and went inside to catch the different magical sunshine spots all over the temple. 

Chey was helpful in planning where to go after we left Angkor Wat.  There is so much to look at in this area.  So many furnace hot temples for our children to appreciate and enjoy.  And we did.  The rest of the pictures come from our adventures after our sunrise treat.  

There really was so much to take in today!  I don't remember the names of all the places we visited.  I could get the map out and list all the temples I suppose.  I think I might be too tired.  I think that tonight I will wind this down, get some sleep, and get ready for our journey back to Thailand tomorrow.  We have one night in Bangkok (I can't say that without singing the song) before our Tokyo fun begins. I really loved Cambodia.  This is a really special place and someday maybe we can travel and see more of it.  This was a really eye opening experience for Fiona.  She has seen poverty and has a better understanding of how fortunate she really is.  

Before I sleep, some random pictures of the day and us enjoying Pub Street's night time festivities.  

The well deserved swim after our scorching hot temple run.

Religiously appropriate behavior.