Wat Phou, stunningly sandwiched between mountains and the Mekong, is the most famous Khmer temple site in Laos. Undergoing restoration today, the temple site dates back to the 5th century. Wat Phou takes up a huge area and was relatively deserted when we arrived on our rented bikes. Despite its size the temple is actually well hidden in the mountainside and tree line and seeing the whole temple demands a lot of stair climbing. Even 1500 years later, it is easy to see the grandeur that must have been Wat Phou at the height of the Khmer empire.
Near Wat Phou is another Khmer temple, Wat Tomo, which genuinely feels like a scene out of an Indian Jones movie as it is completely deserted and far off the tourist trail. We wandered for several hundred yards through the jungle until we stumbled upon the ruins. There was some evidence that someone had attempted to develop the area for tourism but everything else about the temple revealed an abandoned and neglected site (the man who collects the fee to visit the temple had to run from the nearby village after other villagers alerted him that a car had parked near pathway).
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