To Battambang with boat

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From Siem Reap to Battambang with boat

The route from Siem Reap to Battambang with boat is said to have beautiful scenery and worthwhile trip if you have time. Bus is cheaper and takes only two hour. Boat takes 3 hours in high water time and up to eight hours during low water time.

Now is really low water time! The rain season is starting and the river is really low and narrow! This means small boats without any comfort. Only wood benches on both side of the boat. And boat was full of people so no much room to stretch your legs.

Most time the boat went up the narrow river to Battanbang. The river was less than 10 m wide and my guess is that the depth was something between 50 cm to 1m. River passes a lot of local communities who live in their boats or in floating homes. The houses are kind of drafts that float when water level raise.

Many times you really can feel that boat struggles to go on and you feel that boat slides over mud. Luckily we got stuck properly only once. It took about 15 minutes that crew get us moving again.

The river was so narrow and had serpentine type of turns all the time. And you really could not see what is coming after the curve. I was wondering why skipper slow down the speed before curve so much, and I though it had something to how you can steer the boat. Until in one corner there was other boat coming towards us and we were just in the curve when this happened. Luckily the skipper had good reaction and he opens throttle and accelerates to get boat turning in time. There was less than 20 cm space between the boats! Good driving!

The scenery was beautiful and it was interesting to pass locals houses and boats where they lived really close. For people who live here the river is: transportation, food source, play ground for kids, washing place, toilet and drinking water.

Our trip lasted 8 hours + 1 hour break. The break should have been only 20 min but they fixed the boat propeller with sledge hammer, so the break too about an hour.

If you have time and it’s high water season, you should definitely take the boat trip. During low water time it is just too long time to sit in a small boat like we had. After few hours you are too tired to concentrate the view, you just want to trip to end.

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Photos

Boat
Not much additional comfort in this boat

Curve
Not much visibility what is behind the curve

River
Not too wide river during the dry season