Floating Village Tour

The Great Tonle Sap Lake – Kompong Khleang Lake Community

In the wet season, the water rises toward the floor boards. Families must travel by wooden canoes, boats and other makeshift watercraft. Children paddle to school. Life revolves around fishing.

From:
US$ 60.00

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Kompong Khleang floating community is a 1 hour drive from Siem Reap and is generally accessible all year round. Just before turning off National Road No. 6, we stop at a small local market, Phsaa Thnal Jaek, where you can see piles of fresh vegetables, local breakfast restaurants, tasty snacks and of course, fish fish fish! — freshly caught and salted and sun-dried all from the nearby lake.

We drive another 20 minutes before reaching the boat station, but before we do, we take a short walk in the village to see some of the stilted houses and local shops up close. There are very few tourists in the village at this time, so it’s a great time to get some photos, meet the people and wander around.

We board the boat and take a drive through the village to see some of the houses from water level, and to see some of the fishing methods up close. Houses are soon replaced by mangrove forest and open water. As the water recedes and the land starts to dry out, some fishing families become farmers, growing snake beans and watermelons.

Eventually you will reach the floating houses made up of Khmer and Vietnamese fishing families; you can easily tell the difference between their nationalities by the decoration of their houses. When the water is low, they relocate their floating abodes further out onto the lake.

Finally we arrive on the main body of the Great Tonle Sap lake; the guide will explain about what makes the lake so special and why it is so important to Cambodian and the whole region.