Visiting the Angkor Temples in three days

Here go some tips for those who want to visit the Angkor Temples without a tour group !

There are several options when purchasing a ticket for the Angkor Temples :

- 1 day (clearly not enough !) : 20USD

- 3 days (good compromise, you can see most of it) : 40 USD

- 1week-pass : around 80USD

We didn't have three full days on site but it turned out pretty well. For those who have the 3 full days, the best option is probably :

- Day One : Rent a Tuk Tuk for the whole day (12USD small tour and 15USD big tour) who will show you the way to the temples and wait for you while you visit them. Do the big tour on the first day and ask the tul tuk driver to finish with Angkor Wat as it is better to visit it in late afternoon (or at lunchtime when all the groups head back to Siem Reap for lunch, but then it gets extremely hot). It will be a pretty long day, you can stick around the temples for lunch or go back to Siem Reap.

- Day Two : Have a super-early start today ! Rent a bicycle from your hostel/hotel and plan to be at Angkor Wat by 4:30am for sunrise ! You definetely won't forget the experience. You will not be alone but it's absolutely worth it !

After that, head for the remaining temples you haven't seen in the big tour and ride the 17km to end up at our favourite temple : Ta Prohm, where nature merges with buildings...

If the weather is good enough you can go for sunset at Phnom Bakeng (entrance closes at 5:30pm), where you can even climb up the mountain on an elephant for the laziest amongst you ! This is meant to be THE temple to enjoy sunset : ours was not extraordinary and ended up leaving in advance : cloudy and too many people but you can probably be luckier than us !

- Day Three : You've been around the small tour and the big tour already. Ask a tuk tuk to take you to the farthest away temples today. We didn't do it due to lack of time but they look awesome ! You'll tell us how they are ;-)

Enjoy !

Overall, I would highly recommend early starts as from 8am the sun starts hitting very very hard !