MangoVine
Adventures in East Asia
Stone Carvings and Waterfall at Kbal Spean
08 December, 2009Tuesday
On our second day of touring in Cambodia, we went further away from the two main temple circuits to visit Kbal Spean and Banteay Srei. Kbal Spean was another Angkorian era site that was about twenty five kilometres away.
Kbal Spean is commonly known as the valley of 1000 Lingas as it consists of a series of stone carvings in and around the Stung Kbal Spean river.
Above, Linh touches one of the types of stone carvings, a series of lingas depicted as neatly arranged bumps covering the surface of a rock, which in this case, was under the river. From my hazy memory, touching them was to give some kind of fertility luck. More photos below of the lingas.
Other stone carvings included various Hindu mythological motifs, including depictions of gods and animals.
At Kbal Spean, there was also a small, cool waterfall where Linh and our guide refreshed their feet.
Some of the local wildlife.
A cloud of yellow butterflies that were fluttering around next to the river, sometimes settling on the ground.
Some local teenagers sat on this large rock next to the waterfall for a picnic.
To get to the carvings and waterfall at Kbal Spean, we had to walk a long, uphill path from the car park where our tuk-tuk dropped us off. It was quite pleasant however, since the path took us through shaded groves of trees, past large interesting boulders and along hills overlooking the nearby landscape. Here's what we saw.
This cauldron is actually a rubbish bin.
A large rock. There was a wasp nest which you can see as the little reddish sphere stuck to the rock, on Linh's left.
Signs indicated the distance walked. This was near the beginning!
Back at the car park, our tuk-tuk driver pointed out these small fern plants to us. When we touched them, they instantly recoiled. A bit like venus fly traps, but without the trap.
This entry posted in : Cambodia. Tourism.
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In February 2009, Mark and Linh moved from the UK to the Far East to spend 16 months living in Hong Kong and traveling around East Asia. This website documents their journey.
Find out more on the MangoVine About page.
There are 435 entries on MangoVine.
East-Asian places visited so far:
Hong Kong (Throughout 09)
Vietnam (March 09)
Tokyo (May 09)
Macau (June 09)
Taiwan (July 09)
South Korea (July 09)
Singapore (September 09)
Malaysia (September 09)
Thailand (December 09)
Cambodia (December 09)
China (April 10)
