Today our tour was to begin at 9:30am with a visit to the Floating Village on Tonle Sap River. We were almost blocked by a herd of cows in the middle of the road.

It’s amazing how these homes are put on stilts and some of them are floating with barrels and large hollow bamboo rods. They have everything they need on the water as well: schools, provision shops, mechanics, churches, basketball courts, etc.

The only thing that was kind of sad were the children. Kids are all over Cambodia trying to sell things. On the water, kids are with their parents on boats trying to sell drinks and fruits. They would jump onto our boat and attempt to sell us sodas then they would hop back onto their parents’ boat. Rather daring. This cute kid was in a large metal bucket and spinning round and round and using a paddle to move forward.

There are catfish and alligator farms on the water as well. The alligators are kept on a mobile cage and sold to other countries for leather and meat.

There are dogs and cats that live on the water too. This curious puppy was checking us out while we were at the farm.

After the boat ride, we headed to the old market for some souvenir shopping before going for lunch. We had fried frog legs!

Our tour guide ordered for us so we got to try some other Cambodia dishes like Amok Curry, Red Chili Pork, and fried Giant Snakehead (a local fish).

The first stop after lunch was Preah Kahn, aka The Sacred Sword. Ta Prohm (on the first day) was built by the king Jayavarman VII for his mother. Preah Kahn was built for his father. You could tell he loved his father more than his mother because Preah Kahn is humongous! Well, I guess we can’t really conclude that, maybe Preah Kahn is just more well preserved and was less destroyed by the trees.

One of the unique features of the temple is the continuous doors. The doors are built smaller and smaller so that worshippers will bow and look at their feet as they enter each door, as a sign of respect.

At Ta Prohm, the trees are untouched. Here at Preah Kahn, they tried to remove them but were largely unsuccessful as our tour guide said that they grow back.

We decided to try to visit one more temple before we headed to dinner. It started storming with thunder and lightning but we’d come all this way and didn’t want to miss it.

Even the chicken and her chicks were scared of the rain, they hid under this sign:

The temple is known as Neak Poan (aka Sacred Island) and around it is Veal Reach Dak (plain of the royal reservoir). It has a large center temple surrounded by a moat-like area. Surrounding it are four other reservoirs where the water flows into the middle.

Neak Poan

Veal Reach Dak

We went to have a buffet dinner at Amazon Angkor and a show of traditional dance. These girls train when they’re very young in order to be flexible enough to bend their fingers the way they do.

We ended the night at the Angkor What? Bar and this “tuk tuk” took us back to our hotel.

All pictures from Day 2 of our trip:

To view directly fromm Picasaweb, click HERE!