Spirit zone: The sun rises above the famous Angkor Wat Temple in Siem Reap province northwest of Phnom Penh, Cambodia. Photo: AFPMay 18 2006
Phnom Penh - Almost one and a half million foreign tourists flocked to Cambodia last year, with most of them passing through the country's famed Angkor Wat temple complex.
This sprawling national park dotted with towering stone structures, all intricately carved and for the most part intact, is Cambodia's biggest tourist draw.
But while Cambodian officials hope the temples will attract more people, and their money, to the impoverished country, they acknowledge the increasing strain these swarms of visitors are putting on the monuments.
Tourists are largely free to wander in and out of temple ruins, probing dark corners, climbing over fallen stones or tracing the delicate base reliefs with their hands.
'We are very worried about the effect on the temples'
This intimacy is part of the appeal of Angkor, but when multiplied over millions of visitors, the effects can be alarming.
"We are very worried about the effect on the temples," said Soeung Kong, deputy director general of the Apsara Authority which oversees Angkor's upkeep.
Some 1,4 million tourists visited Cambodia in 2005, marking a 35 percent increase of the previous year.
In the first three months of this year, tourist arrivals in Angkor had already topped 40 000, jumping 20 percent from the same period last year, said Thong Kong, secretary of state with the Tourism Ministry.
"We estimate that the tourist arrivals will increase between 25 to 30 percent every year ahead," he told AFP.
"At the moment, we need to attract more tourists, but we need to conserve the temples as well."
Authorities have already introduced a few measures that they hope will lessen the impact of so many people on the temples.
Visitors can be seen touring the park on rented battery-powered bicycles, and large cars will be banned in the future to cut down on pollution that corrodes the temples' stone facades.
Small, battery-powered buses and horse-drawn carriages are also being considered as a way to ferry visitors from temple to temple.
Wooden stairs have been built over many of the worn stone steps in some of the larger sites, where tourists are also prevented from touching the base reliefs.
"We are taking tough action to conserve our temples," Soeung Kong said, but added that many of these measures were not in place in most of the smaller temples.
"But we are working hard to try and manage this and avoid damage to our temples," he said. - AFP
This sprawling national park dotted with towering stone structures, all intricately carved and for the most part intact, is Cambodia's biggest tourist draw.
But while Cambodian officials hope the temples will attract more people, and their money, to the impoverished country, they acknowledge the increasing strain these swarms of visitors are putting on the monuments.
Tourists are largely free to wander in and out of temple ruins, probing dark corners, climbing over fallen stones or tracing the delicate base reliefs with their hands.
'We are very worried about the effect on the temples'
This intimacy is part of the appeal of Angkor, but when multiplied over millions of visitors, the effects can be alarming.
"We are very worried about the effect on the temples," said Soeung Kong, deputy director general of the Apsara Authority which oversees Angkor's upkeep.
Some 1,4 million tourists visited Cambodia in 2005, marking a 35 percent increase of the previous year.
In the first three months of this year, tourist arrivals in Angkor had already topped 40 000, jumping 20 percent from the same period last year, said Thong Kong, secretary of state with the Tourism Ministry.
"We estimate that the tourist arrivals will increase between 25 to 30 percent every year ahead," he told AFP.
"At the moment, we need to attract more tourists, but we need to conserve the temples as well."
Authorities have already introduced a few measures that they hope will lessen the impact of so many people on the temples.
Visitors can be seen touring the park on rented battery-powered bicycles, and large cars will be banned in the future to cut down on pollution that corrodes the temples' stone facades.
Small, battery-powered buses and horse-drawn carriages are also being considered as a way to ferry visitors from temple to temple.
Wooden stairs have been built over many of the worn stone steps in some of the larger sites, where tourists are also prevented from touching the base reliefs.
"We are taking tough action to conserve our temples," Soeung Kong said, but added that many of these measures were not in place in most of the smaller temples.
"But we are working hard to try and manage this and avoid damage to our temples," he said. - AFP
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