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Published: July 17th 2006
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The dock at Siem Reap
What a shame smellyvision does not exist yet. Ladies all around our boat were busy gutting fish... Answer ? In Cambodia ! Let me enlighten you...
We booked some tickets a couple of days before to catch the "Angkor Express" (oh, the irony) from Siem Reap to Battambang. This boat departs from the Siem Reap River (a few miles out of town, bus trip included), sails down it for a few miles before entering the Great Lake, the Tonlé Sap, which occupies a large part of the country. It then enters the Stung Sangker (Sangker River), and sails along that to Battambang. The journey is only possible from June to November, when the water is high enough, and the lady selling us the tickets told us it would take about five hours. The guidebook sort of corroborated this (sort of) so we gladly bought the tickets - the trip is reputed to be beautiful, passing through protected wetlands and small floating communities populated mainly by the Muslim Cham people.
We were picked up promptly at 6am by the minivan from the front of Sala Bai. The bus was a rickety old thing, and we proceeded to do the rounds of Siem Reap to collect other passengers. The bus should had seats for 8 passengers, but the
La Vache Qui Rit
Breakfast, monsieur ? This cow wouldn't be laughing if she knew what was in store... pick-ups went on, and on, and on, and on (shall I go on ?) until there were no less than fifteen people on board ! Horrifically overloaded, we trundled to the boat dock. We had to fend off local youths to prevent them from getting their hands on our bags, loaded them on our backs and walked over a thin gangplank onto the boat, a long wooden vessel which could take, at a guess, 30+ people (not counting the other 30 sitting on the roof !). The dock was chaotic, filled with fishermen, boats, baskets of fish (not so pleasant to wake up to), floating houses, noise, mud and dirt. It reminded me a lot of coastal Gambia (dearest Mother, Father and Claire - do you remember
the smell ?).
Local women tried to tempt us with fresh baguette and Laughing Cow cheese (Laughing Cow cheese !). We bought a bottle of water and a baguette (which turned out to be an exceedinly good idea) to sustain us,
for our five-hour trip.... We set off down the Stung Siem Reap, having picked up a second minibus load of passengers and a handful of local passengers. We passed small boats
Floating kitchen
This lady has a gas stove on board to rustle up breakfast for hungry people on the bank. laden with vegetables, houses on stilts, petrol stations on stilts, garages on stilts, pig-pens on stilts (yes, and yes, they did poo straight into the water). At times the waterway was nearly completed invaded by water hyacinth, which made progress slow at times as the weed snagged the propellers and rudder.
We broke free onto the Tonlé Sap, where we had the first of our minor breakdowns (this wasn't the worst of it). This was quickly fixed and we chugged across the muddy lake, passing floating fish farms and small fishing craft on the way. The lake is so large you cannot see one shore from the other. We headed southwest, towards the mouth of the Stung Sangker, which we entered some two hours later. This area is a bird sanctuary so is very undisturbed. We didn't see much by way of birds, as these mostly come here during the dry season when there is little water elsewhere. We passed numerous small villages by the water's edge - at each of these the boat driver loudly honked his horn (bye, bye, peace and quiet) to attract more local passengers. These paddled up to the boat in small dugout-taxis and
Logjam !
The water hyacinth seriously slowed the boat traffic ! We inched past. hopped on board. This carried on for the first 3 hours or so of the river section, until we were heavily loaded (not unsafely so, I think, but not far off). Note that 2+3=5 and I said the journey would last about 5 hours. Well it didn't. It didn't take 6. Or 7. Or 8. Or even 9. We were stuck on that boat for
ten hours.
The water was quite low, and the river meanders very tightly for most of its length to Battambang. The boat was so long we could barely corner these and for an agonising 3 hours, we systematically crashed into alternating riverbanks, beaching ourselves in the mud each time. Two Khmers were employed full-time in the bows, equipped with large paddles. These they used at each corner, desperately trying to steer the bow round more sharply round the bend. On the 90%!o(MISSING)f occasions when this failed they used these paddles to lever us out of the mud. The boat lurched every which way, we ploughed into biting-insect laden vegetation at each turn, and on several occasions the motor spluttered and stopped. About 7 hours into the journey the skies opened and all the
Sea of Coffee
The huge Tonlé Sap. passengers on the roof had to rush inside - standing room only. We battened down the plastic hatches and ploughed on, corner after frustrating corner. We thought it would never end. And we were the lucky ones. A French family we befriended (two parents and their two 12 and 15 year-old boys) had woken up at 4am to be picked up by the minibus at 5 (which hadn't turned up until 6), and had not had breakfast. Needless to say everyone was getting a bit restless by hour 7. We thankfully made a brief stop at a small shop (on stilts, as always) by the river - the passengers nearly came to blows over the few packets of crisps and cans of drink the bemused owner had for sale.
Slowly, slowly, slowly, the river widened and the villages began to coalesce on the banks. Temples appeared, then a path, then a road. Could this be Battambang ? We were mostly too tired to care. Then began the drop-off phase, as the boat ploughed into the banks to drop off locals on their doorsteps ("Angkor Taxi" more like). Well, we had expected to arrive at about noon. We hopped off,
River Life
All the children on the bank and on boats waved frantically as we passed. Others did a little dance... everyone tired, hungry, thirsty, dirty (and
dying for the loo). Some touts for our intended hotel (
never have I been so pleased to see a tout) loaded us onto a minivan and drove us to the hotel. Which turned out to be lovely !
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