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I arrived in Siem Reap, Cambodia, on Sunday afternoon, and after consulting the maps and advice of my Lonely Planet guidebook, I opted to rent a mountain bike for the next couple days to motor myself around the sights. In retrospect I won’t say it’s the optimal way to make the rounds in Cambodian August, but I really enjoyed the freedom to explore areas inaccessible to tuk-tuks and cars, not to mention the exercise. And there is something undeniably magical in approaching one of the vast, crumbling relics with little but your thoughts, the breeze, and the whirring of bike wheels scoring the scene.

Everyone who’s seen it says the sunrise at Angkor Wat is something to behold, a must during a visit to Siem Reap. That’s why, subduing the pull of my sluggish brain to fall back asleep, I tugged myself upright on Monday morning at 4:30, showered and tossed a couple bottles of water and some cookies into my backpack, and cycled across the river bridge and down the linear temple road, its chewed pavement lit only occasionally by the headlights of a passing car or tuk-tuk. Six-plus kilometers (and a $40 three-day pass) later, I pulled up to the entrance as first sunlight began to dissolve the predawn darkness. Across the moat, the looming towers and eight-meter high stone wall were silhouetted black against the sky, offering no glimpse of the immense temple behind them.

It wasn’t until I got beyond the wall that I saw it. At a distance of a few hundred meters, I could make out three jagged bullets rising up from the horizon. The sun was still submerged, but it shone a warm, orange light on the swirling clouds above the towers. I felt my way down the long, uneven, cobbled path, only looking down every few steps when I’d stumble over a proud stone. I paused for a few moments at the lotus pond on the north side of the walkway, where a couple dozen other gawkers were already camped out, some of them staring out from plastic chairs that lined the bank at the water’s edge. The view was mesmerizing: the striking figure of Angkor Wat, still in shadow and bathing in fluorescent sky, married to its perfect, inverted reflection on the serene surface of the pond. It’s one of those rare visions that, even as you experience it, you’re aware of its being indelibly etched into your memory.

As I traced my way around the halls at the perimeter, the accumulating sunlight began to wash over the epic works in bas-relief on the walls. Starting at the eastern entrance and walking clockwise around the palace, the elegant carvings relate the story of the gods creating heaven and earth by churning a sea of milk and follow with depictions of Khmer history, featuring frenetic scenes of war with the rival Chams and of a later civil war among themselves. Most of the carvings, now well into their ninth century in the open air, are remarkably well preserved.

At the interior of the palace, the five conical towers make a quincunx pattern – four towers form a square with the fifth tower, the tallest, at the center of the square. The size and complexity of their design and the intricacy of their detail are even more impressive viewed from up close. Each of the corner towers is accessible by a couple of narrow, worn staircases, but all the entry points were roped off on this particular day. Also, renovations were being undertaken on the middle tower, evidenced by scaffolding left in place on its south side.

After more than three hours at Angkor Wat, and with the sun now beginning to assert itself, I decided to push on toward Bayon, the spectacular and decaying ruins at the southern end of Angkor Thom, just a few kilometers up the road. Bayon is one of the more photogenic sites you’ll ever visit. Everywhere you stand inside its walls, sanguine-looking stone faces peer out at you from contoured towers. Each of the 59 towers features four Buddha images (said to resemble Jayavarman VII, the Khmer king who ordered Bayon’s construction) facing north, south, east, and west. The stonework of has been for centuries completely exposed to the elements, and the erosion of the towers and reliefs has given them a kind of grotesque charm. Gaudí would have loved Bayon, pictured below.

A couple hundred meters north lies Baphuon, an enormous temple that will be extremely impressive when it’s put back together, but which is currently scurried over by men in hard hats and overseen by a crane. Whether it will be rebuilt to its former glory is another issue altogether. A restoration project undertaken decades ago saw Baphuon deconstructed and its building blocks carefully catalogued for later re-assemblage, but then the Khmer Rouge came to power and laid waste to the plans. Of course, during the reign of the Khmer Rouge, the Cambodian people had bigger fish to fry than reworking some ruins. Among the items on the their to-do lists were avoiding starvation, escaping the arbitrary terror of the ruling party, and burying the millions of their countrymen who hadn’t been able to accomplish the first two.

You could spend an entire day visiting the various temples, terraces, and walkways within the walls of Angkor Thom – it’s nine square kilometers of fascinating history –- but it was nearing lunchtime, and I wanted to make just one last stop before

heading back to Siem Reap for some vittles. I was looking for Preah Palilay, a stupa at the northwest corner of Angkor Thom whose base has been shot through by the growth of several immense trees. On the way I met a wheelchair-bound painter who beckoned me to browse his work.

His name was Kim Leung, he said, and he sells his hand-painted canvases and postcards to support himself and his family. Besides having a personal story that makes you want to fork over your cash, his paintings were quite good, and I left with a sleeve full of postcards.

[Slightly off subject, there are an appalling number of people in Siem Reap – and the rest of Cambodia, I’m sure – whose missing limbs and appendages attest to the existence of leftover landmines in the Cambodian countryside. To learn more about it, visit the Cambodian Landmine Museum or its website.]

Over at Preah Palilay, I tromped up and down the ruins for a few minutes – one of the wonderful things about the Angkor Wat experience is the ability to interact with history, to climb over and run your fingers along it, rather than just stand before it and squint at a placard from ten paces – until my empty stomach gave a loud growl, signaling the end of the morning’s activities. Riding back by Kim Leung again, my front wheel caught on a stubborn tree root and I was flung awkwardly over the handlebars. I got up, mystified and mildly embarrassed, and began to brush myself off. His reaction was polite, even concerned, unlike that of a nearby worker, who’d fallen to his knees, weak with heaving laughter. I pulled the bike upright, climbed on, and hurried off, giggling to myself. It seemed like a good time for a lunch break.

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Please pardon this rant, but I’ve just left the longest and most excruciating two-hour flight of my life. Was it rough air, you ask, that made it so miserable? Did the flight attendant unload the newly brewed contents of a coffee carafe in your lap? No, it was worse than either of these. Misery was two-and-a-half feet of mobile terror, cleverly disguised by a seraphic face and a copse of platinum hair. Misery sat right behind me, a sugar-fueled fiend in a yellow jumper.

I’ve come across, and sat within an ear poke of, every possible kind of kid in my travels. There have been plenty of complete angels, of course. But that’s not the kind I’m concerned with. I’m talking about kids with vocal cords of solid titanium. Burgeoning kung fu masters engaged in mortal combat with the back of my seat. Children gifted with the ability to project bodily fluids over great distances and with frightful precision. But this one had a knack for chaos clearly imparted from on high.

He was a bonanza of irritating noises: from the brash clacking together of plastic toys and seat belt parts with his havocking little hands, to the soul-wracking squeals that would outdo a stuck pig in a sack, to the favored electronic game whose sole redeeming qualities seemed to be its ability to mimic an ambulance siren and its eternal battery life.

Where were his parents? Across the aisle, leaving the monitoring and reigning in of this viking-in-the-making to his overwhelmed grandmother, whose meek castigations were rebuffed with the glee of a defiant dictator. And speaking of dictation, midway through the flight he filled our collective ear canals with a tantalizing taste of his in-progress work of literature, surely the first to be composed entirely of ‘goos’, ‘ghees’, and ‘ghaas’, and punctuated exclusively by exclamation marks!!! He ended the oratory with a wholly unexpected and murderous scream. As with all great art, my reaction to it was a visceral one.

OK, I understand that it’s developmentally important to let kids express themselves and exercise their creativity. But I also think it’s necessary, just as a precautionary measure for a select few tyrannical tykes, that airplanes, restaurants, and theaters be equipped with sound-absorbant pods, lockable from the outside, in which these kids can be placed when the “creative” urge strikes. This way, they can develop the expressive aspects of their personality and their sense of independence. Everybody wins. I’m only one-eighth serious, of course. The other seven-eights of me thinks the parents should be thrown in there with them.

I was still fantasizing about my idea as we began our descent, when a pointed jab caught me in the underarm. I turned to peer through the gap between seats, catching brief glimpses of a whirling, yellow column of air and, behind it, a resigned look on his grandmother’s face, as if to say, “Oh well, what can you do?” I responded with a look that said, “Get a pod.”

Thanks for reading. See you next week…

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Cook something in a clay pot and I’m pretty much sold. That’s how Khmer cooking first hooked me, but I have to admit it’s the highbrow authentic and fusion restaurants in Cambodia that keep me coming back.

Malis is an all-around favorite — from locals to the New York Times Travel section to Lonely Planet’s food blog, everyone loves this place. It offers a range of dishes, most of which would fall into the tapas category, so you best bring along some buddies to share. Bonus points: the digs are gorgeous (reflecting pools, silk cushions, Khmer statues, etc.) and it’s not even expensive.

Romdeng’s tag line is “a taste of Cambodia’s provinces.” Now, you might ask, “Why not eat provincial food in the province? Or in the street for that matter? Why a fancy restaurant in a French colonial house?”

Well, the thing about traditional foods is that they often come cooked in 3 inches of pig grease. Or the “authentic” experience now includes a recipe with half a can of condensed milk. That’s the real province these days, so don’t look down on fusion cooking. Embrace the flavors and enjoy the lovely villa. You can get an authentic experience with a bus ride alone. And, truth be told, eating fried tarantulas takes guts anywhere, posh ambiance or not.

Romdeng is also part of the “Friends” empire, which runs training programs for street youth to work in restaurants, handicraft stores and even a salon.

“K” is a newcomer. Serving Khmer and Vegan cuisine in a renovated house, you might be tempted to raise one eyebrow and walk on by, but stop by instead. The food is really, really good, if slightly odd. It does serve meat (while I thought they meant Khmer vegan, they meant Khmer and vegan) and a great selection of creative vegan food. The sweet potato, pepper, and peanut stew was a nice change up from the normal pan-Asian bistro fare. The juices, cocktails, and desserts are worth mentioning too. Also, if you like your fish amok in a super sleek setting, this is the place for you. Just watch out for the music selection. They like Thriller. A lot.

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My experience in Vang Vieng is only worth recounting for how singularly unsuccessful it was. Even before I left Luang Prabang, I should have sensed that my travel stars were misaligned or something.

Having arranged for the Vang Vieng-bound bus to pick me up at my guesthouse at 9 a.m., I was surprised to be summoned from the shower, dripping wet and partially covered, by the driver’s knocking on my door at 8:10 a.m. He hadn’t come to pick me up, only to tell me that he’d be back in 15 minutes to retrieve me. So I hopped back in the shower, performed my hygienic obligations, packed in a flash, and ignored my hunger pangs so I wouldn’t hold him up. I spent the next 90 minutes in the lobby of my guesthouse awaiting him, sipping Nescafé through gritted teeth and daydreaming about the delicious, steaming cup of coffee I could have bought to douse him with.

Fast forward six hours. With just twenty kilometers between us and Vang Vieng, and as the gorgeous karst mountains outside my window began to hint at the beauty to come, it started to rain. No big deal, but from the resigned looks on the faces of cows we passed, I figured that either this town was on a beef-only diet or that the storm front wasn’t going anywhere. The latter proved to be true; the rain wouldn’t cease, even momentarily, for the entirety of my (admittedly brief) two-day stay.

Dropped off in the center of town, I immediately encountered a strange Vang Vieng phenomenon I’d read about but didn’t want to believe: a succession of bars where backpackers lounged about glassy-eyed, drinking cheap Beerlao and laughlessly watching “Friends.” It was a bit creepy how docile they were, as if they were all plugged into the Matrix and unaware that life had more to offer than decade-old sitcoms. It’s quite possible that a few of them had swallowed blue pills, at any rate. But more on that later.

Determined not to be thwarted by the weather — or sucked into the vortex of must-see TV — the next morning I rode ten miles (and a couple extra, thanks to some illegible kilometer markers) out of town to see two guidebook-recommended caves. Due to the unrelenting rain, however, the river was too swollen and the current too powerful to safely cross. So back I rode, soaking and cold, to my guesthouse, where I retired with a book until dinner.

I’ll mention here that my room, one of Le Jardin Organique’s sparsely furnished riverfront bungalows, was the one high point (literally, fortunately) of my stay. The picture above shows the view from my porch of the Nam Song river after the first night’s rains. This being the low season (and I was beginning to understand why), the room only cost $9 per night.

When my grumbling stomach finally forced me back out into the rain that evening, I found my way to the Organic Mulberry Farm Café, a restaurant operated by the farm of the same name that lies just north of town. I sat down and asked for a mulberry shake, a specialty of theirs, hoping mulberry and ice were the only ingredients. Which brings me to another of Vang Vieng’s well known quirks (and backpacker attractors): the widespread availability of drugs to anyone with half a mind and a few thousand kip to try them. Blend ‘em up in a fruit shake, bake ‘em onto a pizza, whatever you want, just order it ‘happy’ and let it take you away. In case you’re wondering, I ordered all my food ‘cynical’.

Between courses and nursing a glass of the farm’s own mulberry wine, I contemplated this strange town. That’s when its brutal logic hit me. Only a brain massaged by the kneading fingers of psychotropic drugs could find watching a repetitive loop of “Friends” episodes to be a worthwhile diversion. And as “Friends”-with-no-end is one of the only viable activities here in a marathon rain, why not depolarize your brain with a substance some guy you don’t know can stir into your smoothie?

The saving stroke of the trip was to be a kayaking excursion, already booked and paid for, down the Nam Song to Vientiane, which I’d been looking forward to all week. I had a bad feeling when I opened my front door after the second rainy night to this:

After waging an escape from my bungalow through a thigh-deep soup of river water and rubbish, I went to meet the kayaking guide, who told me that, although the river had been perfectly navigable the day before, today the water level was too high and the trip had to be canceled. Naturally.

With the proceeds from my refund I paid for the last remaining seat on the next minibus to Vientiane. Even in such dreary weather, this place was undeniably beautiful, but I was definitely ready to move on. I climbed into my seat and watched the rivulets of rain glide across the window for a while after we pulled out of town. And then the sun came out.

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Ten hours after my bus left Vientiane, and with Luang Prabang mercifully near, there was an explosion in the undercarriage directly beneath my seat. “Was that a sniper?” begged the girl in the row ahead of me. Unless we’re all unwitting extras in a forthcoming Tomb Raider movie, it was probably just a tire blowout, I thought.

Having braked the bus to a stop on the right-hand shoulder, the driver and his two attendants climbed down to inspect the damage, and were followed out by a stream of curious passengers. Sure enough, one of the rear, interior tires had blown. Long strips of tread lay like discarded fruit peels in the distance behind us. The attendants got to work loosening the outer wheel’s fist-sized lug nuts as we, the road-weary audience, looked on. Just fifteen minutes later we were back en route. We pulled into Luang Prabang’s bus station about an hour before dark.

On a map Laos resembles a palm tree leaning left, and Luang Prabang sits right in the middle of the crown, at the meeting of the Mekong and Nam Khan rivers. Home for centuries to Laos’s ruling monarchs, Luang Prabang fell under French protection in the late 19th century, though the royal family remained nominally in power. The French made Vientiane the new capital but maintained a presence in Luang Prabang until the 1950’s, leaving their footprint on the town in the form of countless colonial villas that intermingle with its grandest attractions — more than two dozen majestic Buddhist wats. Oh, and they still make a mean baguette here, too.

After a short tuk-tuk ride from the bus station, I set off on foot with my guidebook in hand to find a room for the night. The first three places I tried were full, and as the last traces of daylight disappeared, the rain started to fall. In another minute it was coming down with vigor. Getting doused and desperate, I ducked under the arch of the next guesthouse I found, sprinted up its open-air stairs, and put my name on its only available room, a triple that would cost me $30 for the night. More than I wanted to pay, yes, but worth it to escape the monsoon.

I fell onto the smaller of the room’s two beds, tuned the TV to the BBC, and let the cold a/c dry me off. After an hour’s vegetation I saw that the rain had moved on, so I shuffled over to Nisha Indian Restaurant, where only the atmosphere was flavorless. I polished off a delicious chicken tikka masala, garlic naan, a garden salad, and two Beerlao Darks for less than $8. Recommended.

The next morning I packed up and found a new place to stay, the Ammata Guesthouse, where I dropped off my stuff and rented a bike for the day. [I should mention that my room that night would cost $25, not the $15 quoted by my guidebook, which was printed less than a year ago. And in the low season to boot? Inflation seems to be the rule in Luang Prabang these days.] I’d have two full days to see the sights, and the bike would allow me to cover most of the town on the first day.

I found and crossed the gapped pedestrian bridge that straddles the mud-colored Nam Khan river, then pedaled out to a tiny village past the airport. The paved road gave way to a dirt path cratered with puddles and serrated with rocks. Fearing another tire puncture and a long walk back, I got down and pushed the bike on foot. A half dozen incredibly cute kids followed me down the road for a few meters, shouting “Sabaidee!” and giggling amongst themselves when I tried to reply in kind. I kept walking until the path narrowed and became thick with growth on both sides, when tomorrow’s newspaper headline flashed through my head: “Disoriented tourist, inexplicably pushing perfectly sound bike, gobbled up by jungle cat previously thought extinct. Town celebrates jungle cat.” So I turned back.

As I approached the Nam Khan again, I caught sight of a gleaming, golden-spired pagoda up in the hills and decided to pay it a visit. The sign spanning the entrance read ‘Wat Pa Phon Phao’. I rode up the driveway, parked and locked my bike, and removed my shoes before entering the wat’s Peace Pagoda. Inside I met a few Buddhist nuns who invited me to have a look around. The octagonal pagoda has four levels, each one smaller than the last as you climb, with walls covered 360° with vibrantly painted panels

that depict “Buddhist stories and moral admonitions,” according to Lonely Planet. Apparently none of the admonitions addresses bike theft, because when I walked outside again, mine had disappeared.
I combed the area around the pagoda, finding nothing but a groundskeeper at work and a few pumpkin-robed monks lazing in their bunks. Quite annoyed, but fearing the karmic implications of casting accusing eyes upon monks and nuns, I started the long walk back to my guest house under a baking sun, hoping it might turn my vexation into muffins. (to be continued….)

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