HUASCO VALLEY SEPT 2016

We went to the Norte Chico for a long weekend. From Vallenar up the Huasco river valley to Altos del Carmen, where we stopped to look at the church despite a band of evangelist christians playing electric guitars in the square! Then on up the ever narrower valley with contrasting coloured rock and bright green vines and other plantations in the irrigated flat bottom and climbing the sides. We stopped for lunch in the hamlet of San Felix - comida típica (chicken and peas!), followed by a sietsta outside in the square. Then down the valley again to the coast. A few miles short of Huasco is Freirina, famous for a C19th church and a slightly earlier classical style wooden house named for Diego Portales. Both were undergoing major restoration. We diverted south on 40 km of dirt road (seeing a burrowing owl on the way) to see some industrial archaeology - one of the earliest copper foundries in Chile (1846), with two elegant, slender chimneys built of bricks imported from England. On the road there were a couple of abandoned villages and a cemetery. Also several little farms with herds of goats. Supper in a fish restaurant in Huasco. The next day we went to Llanos de Challe national park some 40 km north where we walked on the trails. We saw some ancient corrals, a lot of dried up vegetation but no flowering desert which was our aim. However we saw two guanacos, which was quite special, and ate our picnic lunch beside a wetland at Carrizal Bajo where we saw coscoroba swans. There was a charming church with the town library beside it. On the way back we stopped at an olive farm where they have 400-year-old olive trees, brought in by the Spanish in the 16th century to compensate the natives for having virtually enslaved them under the encomienda system...

TEMPLES 2

In our last few days in Siem Reap we returned to Angkor Wat and looked at the wall carvings which we had skipped on our earlier visits. They are a mixture of Hindu mythology and (semi-)historical battles. There is a naval battle with the ocean full of fish and crocodiles, as well as scenes of city life, hunting etc. We went up to the temple of Preah Vihear on the Thai border. In fact it was part of Thailand for a couple of centuries but recovered by the French when they colonised Indo-China in the C19th. Thailand seized it again in the 60s, leading to a brief war. The International Court of Justice eventually gave it back to Cambodia. As a result it has a strong (if not very convincing) army presence. The Thai border is only half a mile away. We also went to Banteay Srei. Built by a senior minister in the C10th, it is smaller than the royal temples but beautifully carved. The harder stone used not only meant that the carving could be finer, but also that it is better preserved over 1,000 years later! It is amazing what the carvers managed to do with bronze tools. It is thought that the stones were polished by rubbing them against their neighbours to get the very tight fit. No mortar was used, although apparently a vegetable glue assisted in the construction process. Another remarkable feature is that the Angkoreans never discovered the arch, which is one reason the temples have fallen down. Also they were not always good at foundations, and in later years (2nd half of the C12th) they became lazy about overlapping the courses of stones, making the walls much weaker.

BATTAMBANG & SISOPHON

From Siem Reap we travelled some 3 hours west and then south via Sisophon to Battambang, a pleasant provincial town with some French colonial architecture including the Governor’s residence. It is easy to imagine it with a couple of pre-war Citroens outside. The "patron saint" of the city is the Black Man - legend says that he had a magic black stick which caused rice to turn black, and eventually his skin! Also it was supposed to come back like a boomerang... We spent a day here, visiting a small temple to the north (Wat Ek Phnom) which was not very interesting and rather badly damaged, mainly by the Khmer Rouge who stole many of the stones to build a new bridge! We then went to ride the Bamboo Railway, run by a young entrepreneur with whom I would not like to cross swords. The trip takes you 7 km down a bumpy stretch of the line to Phnom Penh 300 km away, closed since the 1970s. The track is uneven and twisted but more or less safe for the light wagons used – basically a wooden frame with a bamboo platform mounted on two axles with 8”diameter wheels! Propulsion is provided by a small 2-stroke engine driving the rear axle by a fan-belt. The clutch consists in sliding the engine aft until the fan-belt grips… At the end of the trip you can buy a cold coconut as well as the inevitable T-shirts and other souvenirs before rattling back again We dined in a very pleasant restaurant in another French colonial house, with menu offering Cambodian and European delicacies and properly kept wine. We closed with chocolate mousse! We also visited the old railway station where the time is forever 8.02... The next day we returned to Sisophon since the whole purpose of this expedition was to visit a remote temple, Banteay Chhmar. It was a large temple in rather bad repair, but has some magnificent bas-relief carvings round the outer wall colonnade – similar to Angkor Wat. Most have fallen down which has helped to preserve them. Some have now been restored and others will be in the coming years. Three particularly splendid and symbolic figures were stolen in the 90s by the troops posted to guard them… Sisophon itself had very little to offer, being dusty, dirty and poor in facilities. The new (prison-like) hotel had neither a bar nor a restaurant (never mind a swimming pool) so we had to go next door to one of two passable restaurants which we found in the city.

TONLE SAP

Tonle Sap Lake is the agricultural heart of Cambodia; the surplus food production which the region allowed was the economic basis on which the Angkorean Empire was constructed. The huge lake forms part of the Tonle River which is a tributary of the Mekong. They join at Phnom Penh in the south of the country after flowing across the flat, low-lying plain of west-central Cambodia. Every year in the rainy season, when the level of the Mekong rises, the flow in the Tonle River reverses to fill the lake, more than doubling its size. The Angkoreans created water management systems with huge tanks many hectares in extent which allowed them to grow two or even more rice harvests in a year, and the fish teeming in the lake provided a ready source of protein. It is also a biosphere reserve, rich in bird-life, and a bird sanctuary has been created at Preak Toal which we visited, although the water level was rather low as the rainy season had not yet broken. We left Siem Reap at 05:00 and travelled by tuktuk to the point from which boat services into the lake departed. After climbing on board our launch, we set out down a narrow channel in which the water was a toxic sludge of mud, oil and nameless residues left by the water buffaloes which wallowed along the banks, laced with plastic bags and other litter. Not very attractive! After half an hour we came out on another waterway which took us up through a floating village (one of 170 around the lake’s shores!). The church... We arrived at the park information office (deserted) and were transhipped onto another boat for the trip to the bird sanctuary. Our boatman spoke not a word of English but could help identify some bird species by pointing in the bird book… We saw plenty of water birds, including painted storks, a lesser adjutant(!) and herons. At one point a portage was necessary. Unfortunately much of the area we visited was choked with water hyacinth. We never saw the open lake at all, but stuck to waterways – some quite wide where people were standing in water up to their necks fishing. It was a great way of having a break from temples!

CAMBODIA MAY 2016

I visited Cambodia with an old university friend, Christopher, who has travelled extensively in the region. A 24-hour flight took me to Singapore where I spent a night with cousins Harry and Claire Taylor. Chris and I met the next day at the classic Raffles Hotel, and flew on to Siem Reap in north-western Cambodia. We stayed in a delightful hotel which was almost empty, it now being low season - hot and steamy and threatening the start of the rains. Temples 1 Angkor Wat lies 20 minutes north of Siem Reap by tuktuk (motorcycle taxi.)

It was the centre of the Angkorean Empire which flourished more or less from 802 to 1431 AD, extending at its zenith to much of Indo-China and parts of Thailand. Angkor Wat (temple) itself, dating basically from the C12th, is the largest religious complex in the world and a UNESCO world heritage site.

It is mainly the work of two kings, Suryavarman II and Jayavarman VII, but the earliest surviving temples in the area date back several centuries further. Just north of the temple is the old walled city of Angkor Thom, approx 3 km square! This still contains a few temples and the ruins of the royal palace complex, but most of the city would have been constructed of wood so nothing remains and the forest has flowed back in. No doubt much more can be learnt from archaeological digs across the city but as a tourist one is directed to the enormous sandstone ruins which do remain. We spent over a week here in total, visiting the ruins in the immediate vicinity and going further afield on day excursions. The earliest temple which we saw – Baksei Chamkrong – dates from the C9th.

It is Hindu, as were all the dedications up to (effectively) the reign of Jayavarman VII, who followed his short-lived father in being a Bhuddist. After his death there was a Hindu reaction and a lot of Bhuddist iconry was destroyed or defaced.

The temples have also, of course, suffered extensive looting over the years, or simply collapsed. Angkor Wat is in extraordinarily good repair, although some restoration has been necessary. Within Angkor Thom is a temple called the Bayon, constructed by Jayavarman VII and containing numerous towers with multiple faces on them, possibly dedicated to Bhudda but apparently portraits of the king himself.