The last day in this eventful but most enjoyable – well apart from the chilli affair and the tummy upset – seems to have come round far too quickly but there was one last, and very rewarding, adventure to be had this morning and that was to ride an elephant around the Bayon Temple in the Angkor Wat complex.
So not quite such an early start this morning but once ready we were quickly loaded into motorcycle rickshaws for the final visit to Angkor Wat. It was rather nice to be in the open sided rickshaw rather than an air-conditioned bus in the cool air of the early morning. By the time we arrived there was already a long queue for the elephant rides but with 6 or so elephants and with two passengers to each elephant the wait didn’t seem so long. You could always for a small charge buy some food to feed to the elephants when they took a well-earned rest. (See photo)
Although mounting the elephant from the steps was neither very easy nor elegant the ensuing ride was regal and exhilarating. The slow pace gave me ample opportunity to take more photos of the Bayon. More surprising were the ‘coconut service stations’ en route for the elephants; the elephants deftly picking up the opened fruits in their trunks and draining the milk with great precision into their mouths.
The ride lasted 20 minutes or so but for me this was a defining memory of this adventure through Vietnam & Cambodia.
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