Mekong to Phnom Penh

The border crossing on te Mekong from Vietnam to Cambodia was straightforward, for $20 US for a visa on arrival into Cambodia + $2 for the guide to do all our visas at once.


We then boarded the bizarre noisy Capitol guest house slow boat for another three hours of river to the ferry crossing at Nek Luong. The scenes along the river in Cambodia were different from those in Vietnam in the previous posting, the former developed to a limit and the other rural.

On th Vietnamese side there were fish farms, craft operations and farms along the river bank. In Cambodia these gave way to villages with a lot of small farms with Brahmin cattle, and hay stacks.




Everywhere people had TV aerials ...

The were and endless stream of Buddhist temples along the river
contrasting with the relative poverty of the villagers

Several places the river divided into multiple channels with swampy islands between

Brahmin cattle and haystacks

Regular tributaries led into the river

Some of these led to vast flood plains or flooded paddies behind the river banks

People were generally friendly and a lot of people waved out to greet the boat

Kids about to jump in the water from the tree

We eventually reach the road crossing at Nek Luong, where we transferred to a bus.

Aerial view of boats along the river nearer Phnom Penh

Views of the vast flooded plains along the side of the road into Phnom Penh

Arriving on the outskirts of Phnom Penh in the evening