Siem Reap: Is it Cambodia or Las Vegas?

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Siem Reap, home to the famous Angor Temples and bus loads of Japanese tourists. Its actually quite amazing the number of Japanese group tours, vastly outnumbering any other foreign group. Siem Reap is quite an interesting place as all types of travelers make this necessary stop. Young and old, rich and poor, solos and groupies, Asian and European (and the occassional North American). You get the drift. Accomadations in town follow suit as there are a slew of high end, extravagent Vegas style hotels with all the fixins and an equal number of budget accomadation starting as low as $1-2 per night. My place was $4 a night and I must say for the price it was a pretty nice place.

Ok, the temples themselves are actually worth the trip. Amazing structures have you walking around in wonder at times. And there are quite a few people walking around. We visited Angor Wat, the most well known temple, on the first morning here for the sunrise. A 5am wake up and an arrival at the massive temple by 5:45. Crossing the moat in darkness we entered the temple. It was actually a great place to watch the sunrise, though the only downside was that hundreds of others had the same idea and so even in this massive temple complex we were pretty much surrounded by people even at this early hour.