More than 1,000 years ago the Angkor Empire rose to huge proportions and each successive King built his own temple masterpiece, each king trying to out do each other.
Since it's so big, today we focused on a small area that we could easily bike to, and leave the biggest for tomorrow. 
The first temple we visited was a great warm up to what we would see throughout the day, with pretty carvings jumping out of the wall in a 3-D display.Then we stopped in at Prasat Kravan, which despite being in a sheltered forest, was nothing but a ruin supported by wood bracings.
For lunch we stopped beside Sra Srang, a temple with only its base left behind, and a massive lake in the background where the King and his wives came to bathe, and no one else was allowed.
Afterwards we went across to Banteay Kdei, the first major temple complex of our day. Here we got our first look at the giant, ever-watchful stone faces that look done on all who enter.
From here we went to Ta Prohm, an amazing complex of stunning temples that have been taken over by the forest so that now it appears that trees are the foundations, but actually they are causing the temples to collapse creating natural booby traps in the process. 
One of the temples here is now named the Tomb Raider temple after it featured in the Hollywood blockbuster of the same name.We spent ages wandering around here, and just as long perched in one spot gazing at the details of these masterpieces.
With hopes of catching the sunset we biked off to Pre Rup, where we performed a balancing act as we climbed the steep and narrow steps to the top of a tower and got caught in a storm while waiting for the sunset. 
Despite the rain, we had to get home somehow - our bodies were already exhausted from countless kilometres under the hot sun, as well as the many miles we walked in and around the temples. So back on the bikes we got and pedalled our way home.Adlibing terrific temples.
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