Bayon and Angkor Thom: The Faces, the Gates and How to Walk It (2026)

Angkor Thom is best seen on foot, in one direction, in about two hours: the Bayon first, then the Baphuon, the Phimeanakas and the two royal terraces, with the tuk-tuk waiting at the far end. The Bayon at the center is the reason to come, and its stone faces are worth timing carefully, because between 8:30 a.m. and 10:30 a.m. they look down on several hundred people.

Search results tend to treat Angkor Thom as one temple, the Bayon, with a list of extra sites to tick off. They miss that it is a city of 9 square kilometers with five gates, monuments from four different centuries, and a logical walking line that drivers know and visitors rarely ask for. They also skip the timing that matters: the Bayon has faces on all four sides of every tower, and which faces are lit depends on the hour.

Prices, hours and transport times below were checked against the Angkor Enterprise ticket pages, the APSARA opening hours and operator websites in October 2026.

A City, Not a Temple

Angkor Thom, “great city,” was the royal capital built by Jayavarman VII at the end of the 12th century, after the Cham sacked the previous capital in 1177. It is a square about 3 km on each side, roughly 9 square kilometers, enclosed by a laterite wall 8 meters high and a moat. Roads run from its gates to the Bayon at the exact center.

Inside are monuments from different eras. The Baphuon dates from the mid-11th century and the Phimeanakas earlier still. Jayavarman VII built around them, added the Bayon and extended the royal terraces. The wooden palace, houses and markets have gone, so what stands is the stone: temples, terraces and walls in a forest. The city was eventually abandoned, sometime before 1609.

This matters for the visit. The Bayon is the one building everybody comes for, but the walk from the Bayon to the terraces passes three other monuments in a straight line, and the route works only in one direction without backtracking. A driver who drops you at the Bayon and collects you at the Bayon wastes half the city. The order is below.

The Gates

Angkor Thom has five gates. Each is a tower about 23 meters high, carved with four faces looking out in the cardinal directions, over a passage about 3.5 meters wide and 7 meters high. The passages are wide enough for an elephant and are now one-lane bottlenecks for tuk-tuks, cars and the occasional bus.

The south gate (Tonle Om)

The one most visitors see, because it is on the road from Angkor Wat, about 5 minutes by tuk-tuk north. It is the best preserved, and its causeway across the moat carries a row of gods on one side and a row of demons on the other, each holding the body of a serpent, a scene from the Churning of the Ocean of Milk. Many of the heads are replacements, and some originals are in museums. The gate area is open from 5:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m., earlier and later than the temples inside. The limitation: from 8:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. the causeway fills with groups and the gate with traffic. Stop on the way in at 7:00 a.m., or on the way out after 4:00 p.m.

The Victory Gate and the Gate of the Dead

Two gates on the east side. The Victory Gate, about 500 meters north of the east gate, lines up with the royal square and the Terrace of the Elephants, and is the one the small circuit uses to leave the city toward Ta Keo and Ta Prohm. The east gate, called the Gate of the Dead, is on the axis of the Bayon and is reached by a quieter road. The limitation: neither has the south gate’s full causeway of figures in the same condition.

The north and west gates

The north gate is the exit for the grand circuit toward Preah Khan. The west gate is the most remote, at the end of a straight road through forest from the Bayon. Both are quiet. A walk along the top of the wall from one gate to the next, on the dirt track, is one of the calmest hours in the park and needs a few kilometers of energy. The limitation: there is no shade on the wall track after 9:00 a.m. and no water.

The Bayon

The verdict: the most original building at Angkor, and the one that most rewards a guide. The Bayon was Jayavarman VII’s state temple, conceived as a Mahayana Buddhist monument and later adapted to Hindu and then Theravada worship. At one point it had 49 towers. Thirty-seven remain, most carved with large serene faces, about 200 in total, often identified with the bodhisattva of compassion and often said to resemble the king himself.

Open 6:00 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Covered by the Angkor Pass, scanned at the entrance. Allow 45 to 60 minutes. The Japanese Government Team for the Safeguarding of Angkor has led conservation here since 1995, and parts of the temple are under scaffolding at any given time.

The outer gallery

The ground-level gallery carries bas-reliefs that are the other half of the Bayon’s interest, and the half most people walk past. Alongside the battles between the Khmer and the Cham, including a naval battle on the Tonle Sap, the lower registers show ordinary life in the 12th century: a market, people cooking over open fires, hunters, a cockfight, fish in the lake. The east and south walls are the richest. These are the reliefs that a guide reads aloud and a book cannot, which is why hiring a licensed Angkor guide is worth considering for this morning above all others.

The upper terrace

The faces are on the upper level, reached by steep stairs. Up here the towers crowd together and the faces look at you from every angle and distance. This is the part that empties least well: by 9:00 a.m. the narrow terrace is a slow procession. The limitation: the stairs are steep, worn and slippery in the rainy season, and the upper terrace is fully exposed to the sun by 10:00 a.m.

When to be there

• 6:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m.: nearly empty, with the east faces lit. From November to March, when sunrise falls after the 6:00 a.m. opening, the Bayon works for dawn.
• 8:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m.: the peak, as tour groups move from Angkor Wat toward Ta Prohm.
• After 3:30 p.m.: the western light reaches the north and west faces, which spend most of the day in shadow, and the groups have gone.

The light at each temple is matched to the hour in the best time of day for each Angkor temple.

The Baphuon

The verdict: the most remarkable restoration story in the park, and a short climb with the best view inside the city. The Baphuon is a temple-mountain from the mid-11th century, the state temple of Suryavarman I, about 34 meters high without its lost tower. It stands about 200 meters northwest of the Bayon, a 5-minute walk.

In the 1960s the École Française d’Extrême-Orient began dismantling it to rebuild it on stable foundations. The civil war stopped the work in 1970, and much of the documentation that recorded where each stone belonged was lost, leaving hundreds of thousands of numbered blocks in the forest. The EFEO restarted the project in 1996 under the architect Pascal Royère. Restoration was completed in April 2011, after 51 years, and the temple reopened with a ceremony on July 3, 2011.

The approach is a long raised walkway of sandstone on short pillars from the east. On the west side of the second level, a reclining Buddha about 70 meters long was built into the temple, probably in the 15th or 16th century, and is easiest to see from the ground on the west side as you leave. Allow 30 minutes. Shoulders and knees covered. The limitation: the stairs to the upper level are steep, and after the Bayon many visitors have less appetite for another climb than they expected.

The Phimeanakas and the Royal Palace

The verdict: a short walk through the shaded palace grounds, more atmosphere than monument. Behind the Baphuon to the north is the walled enclosure of the Royal Palace, whose wooden buildings have vanished. In its center stands the Phimeanakas, an earlier temple-pyramid of laterite and sandstone, incorporated into the palace. Around it are the stone-lined royal bathing pools, the larger of them still holding water in the rainy season.

Allow 15 minutes to walk through from the Baphuon side to the east gate of the palace, which opens onto the Terrace of the Elephants. The upper level of the Phimeanakas is reached by a very steep stair, and access to it varies, so look at the foot of the stair before planning a climb. The limitation: there is little carving left to see, and the interest is the shaded walk and the pools.

The Terrace of the Elephants and the Terrace of the Leper King

The Terrace of the Elephants

The verdict: 15 minutes, and the natural end of the walk. The terrace runs about 340 meters north to south along the east side of the palace, facing the old royal square, and was the platform from which the king watched parades, games and armies. Its retaining wall is carved with elephants and hunting scenes at close to life size, with three-headed elephants at the stairs. Walk its length at ground level for the carving, then climb onto it for the view across the square toward the Victory Gate. The limitation: it is fully exposed to the sun from mid-morning, and much of the carving is worn enough to need a second look.

The Terrace of the Leper King

Just north of the elephants, a smaller terrace about 25 meters on each side and 6 meters high, named for the statue on top, whose lichen-stained surface reminded early visitors of leprosy. The statue on site is a copy, and the original is in the National Museum of Cambodia in Phnom Penh. The interest is the walls: restorers found an earlier, inner wall behind the outer one, carved with rows of gods, nagas and sea creatures, and a narrow passage now runs between the two. Fifteen minutes. The limitation: the passage is narrow, and it is the one place on the walk where a crowd queues.

Beyond the Leper King, Preah Palilay and Tep Pranam, a quiet temple and a Buddhist terrace in the trees, add 20 minutes for anyone with time. The tuk-tuk parking area is at the north end of the terraces.

How to Walk It: The Two-Hour Order

1. South gate. Stop for 10 minutes for the causeway at 7:00 a.m., or drive through and save it for the way out.
2. The Bayon. The tuk-tuk drops you at the east side. Walk the outer gallery first, the east and south walls, then the upper terrace. Forty-five to sixty minutes.
3. The Baphuon. Walk 5 minutes northwest, up the raised walkway, climb if you want the view, and come down on the west side to see the reclining Buddha. Thirty minutes.
4. The Royal Palace and the Phimeanakas. Walk north through the palace grounds past the pools. Fifteen minutes.
5. The Terrace of the Elephants. Out through the palace’s east gate, walk the terrace’s length. Fifteen minutes.
6. The Terrace of the Leper King. At the north end, walk the inner passage. Fifteen minutes.
7. The tuk-tuk. Waiting at the north end of the terraces. From here it leaves through the Victory Gate for Ta Keo and Ta Prohm on the small circuit, or through the north gate for Preah Khan on the grand circuit.

Tell the driver the plan before you get out at the Bayon. Every driver knows the north-end parking area, but some wait at the Bayon unless told. The whole loop is on flat ground except for the stairs at the Bayon and the Baphuon. How this fits into the day’s loop is in the small circuit versus grand circuit guide.

Heat, Rain and Dress

Shoulders and knees must be covered at the Bayon and the Baphuon, and guards turn people away at the stairs. The full rules are in the Angkor dress code guide.

The Bayon’s upper terrace and the royal terraces have almost no shade. In December, the walk is comfortable until about 10:30 a.m. From March to May it should be finished by 10:00 a.m., or started after 3:30 p.m. The palace grounds and the Baphuon’s west side are the shaded parts.

From May to October the moat around the city and the palace pools are full, the stone is dark and the crowd is about a third of January’s. The Bayon’s stairs are slippery when wet, and an afternoon storm on the open upper terrace is a reason to leave. Morning is the safer slot. More on the season is in Siem Reap in the rainy season.

By Situation

You have one day at Angkor

Arrive at the south gate at about 8:45 a.m. after sunrise at Angkor Wat, walk the two-hour order, and leave by the Victory Gate for Ta Prohm at about 10:45 a.m. The crowd at the Bayon will be at its peak, which is the cost of one day. Siem Reap in one day puts it in sequence.

You can choose the hour

The Bayon at 3:30 p.m., then the terraces in the late light, then sunset at Pre Rup 20 minutes east. Or the Bayon at 6:00 a.m. from November to March, before the sunrise crowd reaches it.

You want to understand the carvings

Hire a licensed guide for this morning and give the Bayon’s outer gallery 45 minutes on its own. Read a short history of the Khmer Empire the night before.

You are traveling with children

Children count the faces at the Bayon and like the elephants on the terrace. Skip the Baphuon climb, keep the walk to the Bayon and the terraces, and finish by 10:00 a.m. Under-12s enter free. More in Angkor with kids.

You are cycling

Angkor Thom is the best part of the park by bicycle: flat, shaded roads between the gates and the wall track. Ride in at the south gate, lock up at the Bayon, and leave by the west or north gate.

What It Actually Costs

Item	Cost	Notes
Entry to Angkor Thom and all its monuments	Included in the Angkor Pass	$37 one day, $62 three days, $72 seven days
Children under 12	Free	Carry the passport
Tuk-tuk, small circuit day	$18 to $25	Whole vehicle, Angkor Thom included
Licensed guide	$30 to $50 a day	Most useful at the Bayon reliefs
Bicycle or e-bike	A few dollars, e-bike about $10 a day	E-bike price from a May 2026 report

There is no separate ticket for the Bayon, the Baphuon or the terraces. Pay drivers in US dollars, with change under $1 in riel. The Siem Reap daily budget prices a full temple day.

What Other Guides Get Wrong

1. Treating Angkor Thom as the Bayon. It is a walled city of 9 square kilometers with five gates and monuments from four centuries. The Bayon is its center, not its whole.
2. Dropping off and collecting at the Bayon. The walk runs one way, from the Bayon past the Baphuon and the palace to the terraces, with the driver waiting at the north end.
3. Skipping the Bayon’s outer gallery. The bas-reliefs of daily life in the 12th century are the half of the Bayon most visitors miss on the way to the faces.
4. Visiting the Bayon at 9:30 a.m. That is the peak. Go at opening or after 3:30 p.m., when the western light reaches the faces that spend the day in shadow.
5. Calling the Leper King statue an original. It is a copy. The original is in the National Museum of Cambodia in Phnom Penh.
6. Describing the Baphuon as a ruin. It was dismantled, lost its records in the civil war and was rebuilt stone by stone. It reopened in 2011.

Where to Go Next

Angkor Thom is the middle of the small circuit, between Angkor Wat at sunrise and Ta Prohm beyond the Victory Gate. Entry is on the Angkor Pass, and how many mornings to give the city and the rest of the park is settled in how many days Angkor needs.