On 28 January trail runners, Canadian, Natalie Samson and American Jeff Dean , mid 40s, will start their run to the famed temple of Preah Vihear, located some from the famous temple of Angkor. They will run is a total of 250 kms, along wide dirt roads from Siem Reap to Beng Melea temple to Koh Ker temple, once the capital of the Khmer empire to Kulen district to the stunning temple of Preah Vihear, now an UNESCO Heritage site and located near the Cambodia Thai border in north Cambodian.. Preah Vihear sits on a ledge on the sandstone Dangrek Mountains and ends dramatically on a cliff overhanging the Cambodian plains. The mountain is 547 metres high and translated from Khmer means ‘Mountain of the Sacred Monastery’; know too many as the ‘Temple in the Sky’.ne Filter One Family Progra
Running through the very heart of Cambodian and ending this is such a special Cambodian temple has been in their plans for some time. Jeff visited in Cambodia in 2008 and was struck by the people and the history of the country. Both are every day people, living in Kempville, south of Ottawa.
They are running to raise awareness for the need of water for Cambodian in Rural areas and will filter their own water each day from local wells, rivers and ponds etc as they run. They are open to donations which they plan to then invest in a program they have called ‘One Filter, One Family’, providing water filters and wells to families along this route. They chose Hidden Cambodia Adventure Tours, located in the shadow of Angkor Wat in Siem Reap and well established in remote areas and adventure travel, to provide all support and logistics for them during this grueling run. Paul Hay, director of Hidden Cambodia will travel with support staff (security, guide, cook and driver) to provide accommodations in tents each night where they stop, all food and all provisions and logistics. They will also stay at Hidden Cambodia’s own Eco lodge, located in Koh Ker village along the way, behind the massive Pyramid temple in Koh Ker. Jeffrey says “We wanted to work with Hidden Cambodia because they understand this part of the country, have established contacts and the humanitarian tours and efforts of past Hidden Cambodia guests has already been focused around building wells in this very area we will run through. We, like them and their past guests are very interested in accessto water for Cambodian people.
Each day they will run between 40 to 50 kms, stopping for water at leas every 5 kms.
Natalie and Jeff will start running to Preah Vihear temple from Angkor Wart at 8am on Jan 28th, 2010 and expected arrived at the mountain temple is February 2nd or latest February 3rd, 2010
You can keep up with the runners’ progress on their blog:
http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/One-Filter-One-Family/
