Siem Reap - Tuk Tuk to Ta Keo Temple

 We used the Grab app to book our first ever tuk tuk ride out to Ta Keo Temple. The plan this morning was to tick off a couple more temples from the 13 available through our pass.

Chim pronounced 'Shim' was outside to pick us up within minutes of ordering. I forgot to take a picture of it as I was so keen on videoing the ride. It was certainly an exciting experience. Chim was a good driver and seemed to know when you could fit 3 or 4 vehicles safely across the 2 lane road. We paid him USD $10 for the ride out. The Grab app said $7 but he then waited outside the temple for us so we could use his service again. $10 seemed fair and he was more than happy with that.

Ta Keo Temple was simply amazing. It is actually older than Angkor Wat. It's construction started around 975 AD approximately 200 years before Angkor Wat. However, for an unknown reason this temple was never finished. It's much smaller than Angkor Wat and Bayon that we visited yesterday but feels taller with death defying steps up to the top of it. It is shaped a little bit like a pyramid. Sarah wisely opted out of ascending the top set of steps as they were crazy steep and very narrow. She had already done well in clambering up the stone steps to the second level which were super scary. Especially once you looked back down them from above. Hopefully the photos do them justice.

While up on the temple we met an American man who we had a chat with. He had immigrated to Christchurch just prior to the earthquakes. He is now retired and had spent the last 6 months traveling. A nice guy to chat to. We explored the temple for around 40 minutes or so before carefully descending back down and meeting Chim outside.