Day 2: Angkor Wat Masterpieces and Erik's Discovery

We awoke at 4am this morning, grabbed our bagged picnic breakfast and a quick cup of coffee and headed out into a dark and quiet Siem Reap streetscape on our rented mountain bikes. 

Our destination was the premiere Southeast Asia temple, Angkor Wat, at dawn.  

We arrived just as the horizon was brightening and the temple itself was silhouetted in a way that mimicked the famous Cambodian puppet shows we've yet to see.  

After wandering around the exterior of the temple for a bit, we arrived at the back of the temple and spotted a garden structure that was a perfect location for our well earned breakfast.

Back on our bikes, we soon encountered the masterpiece pictured above.  

Eric and I agreed this to be the most "artistic" of the structures we'd seen, with its circular foundation and smiling statuary faces.  Very Disneyesque!

The next masterpiece we encountered was Angkor Thom, a massive affair with an almost contemporary feel to it. 

To give a sense of its scale, note that if you enlarge the photo you can spot Erik on the top level, midway along the structure.

Our most exciting discovery of the day was a temple that was, apparently, almost unworthy of having its name placed on our map, and not even deemed worthy of its own signage.  

But oh, what a "find" this turned out to be!

We stumbled upon "Angkor "Erik" (we've a pact to refuse to share its name), after following a mile plus long series of paths that attempted to lead us to something labeled a Botanical Garden; a place Erik felt a strong need to visit.  

We never found the garden but did stumble across the truly magical-seeming Angkor pictured above.  

We, and the multitude of insects and other noisy jungle creatures that were abundantly and obviously present, had this place entirely to ourselves...

I have to admit to being just a bit spooked by the whole thing; this was the real deal!

After capturing some other photos and a priceless (to us) video of this setting, I was relieved to be back on my bike headed back toward "civilization."

Our last stop of the day is an apparent favorite, Ta Prohm, where there were a series of great opportunities for photos like the one below.  

Erik was later able to confirm that this was the site where a movie that included a pre-Brad Angelina Jolie was shot. 

It seems that some portions of Angkor Wat, at least, have now been fully discovered...

But not "our's!"