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Meandering on the Mekong
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By: Gary Walsh, Issue 35 – Winter 2008
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(Cruising the Mekong River – Vietnam to Cambodia)
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CRUISING THE MEKONG RIVER GIVES YOU A CLOSE EXPERIENCE OF SOUTH EAST ASIA’S PULSATING ENERGY AND DEEP MEDITATIVE CALM.
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The bleak Yorkshire moors seemed an awfully long way from the dusty Cambodian village of Peam Chhykaung, which baked slowly in the unforgiving May sun. But within the timber and corrugated iron walls of the village’s Domestic English School the dark mysteries of 19th-century England were on a young boy’s mind. “Do you come from Wuthering Heights?” he asked, emphasising each word carefully, his brow creased in conversation. The visitor, stunned by this opening gambit, replied, in just as measured a manner, “No, I come from the United States of America.”
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Satisfied, and clearly relieved that Heathcliff hadn’t arrived in his village, the boy moved onto less exotic but infinitely safer ground as he practised his conversational English. “What is your name?” “Are you married?” “How many children do you have?” There were 10 of us being interrogated in this gentle and guileless manner by students at the school, all passengers on the luxury river vessel the Mekong Pandaw, en route from Vietnam’s Mekong Delta to Siem Reap and the wonders of Angkor. The Mekong is the lifeblood of south-east Asia, flowing from China through Burma, Laos, Thailand and Cambodia before spilling into the South China Sea in the lush delta.
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Once, the Mekong was the conduit for all commerce in the region and the means by which most people travelled. Now there are roads filled with raspberry blowing, smoke-belching trucks and buses for transporting goods and people; over-stuffed tin cans that rumble remorselessly through the towns and the countryside with no pretensions to charm or to romance. And this is where the Mekong Pandaw comes in. The vessel and its sister boats that cruise on the Mekong and the Irrawaddy in Burma, are built in the style and with the materials of the passengers ships that operated on the Irrawaddy in the 1940s. The decks and interiors are made of teak and the trim is gleaming brass. In the spacious staterooms there are infinitely comfortable beds, private facilities and, praise Buddha, air-conditioning.
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Planters’ chairs sit outside each stateroom, and on the broad sundeck there are more chairs and lounges in which to sit while sipping a gin and tonic, or a 333 beer as the world goes by. The vessel sails from the nondescript port of My Tho and spends the next seven days making its way in measured fashion along the river and across Tonle Sap Lake to Siem Reap. While it is the fastest large vessel on the Mekong it travels only at the pace of a so-so marathon runner, and there is always time to enjoy the activity on the river and its banks. In southern Vietnam, the activity is relentless. We pass huge barges almost submerged under their cargoes of rice, brick or sand; fishing boats with haunting eyes painted in red, black and white on their prows for good fortune; family junks with pots of flowers next to the wheelhouse and washing flapping on the afterdeck; rowboats bobbing precariously in the wake of bigger craft.
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This is the great joy of travelling on the river, experiencing both its pulsating energy and its deep meditative calm, with the chance to visit communities not normally on the tourist map. Chau Doc, one of the biggest towns in the delta, is not one of these undiscovered places, but an opportunity to explore its wonderful market, to take a cyclo ride through the back streets and to visit a Cham Muslim village and haggle for scarves and trinkets is to be savoured. As if by magic, once inside Cambodia the frenzied industry of Vietnam disappears.
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There are long stretches of water empty of all but the occasional canoe with a fishing line strung overboard, and on the banks there are timeless scenes: a bare-chested farmer leading an ox to the river, tractors cobbled together from bits of expired trucks and random spare parts hauling massive piles of hay; naked children leaping about in the shallows, and rickety bamboo houses leaning unsteadily over the water. In Cambodia the boat stops for passengers to visit an orphanage sponsored by Pandaw Cruises, where officials place adorable and photogenic five-year-old twins front and centre when the children line up. It stops to explore a weaving village far from any main roads in which a toothless old woman cackles with pleasure, her eyes alight, as she poses for photos and extorts dollar bills from those entering her simple hut.
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We visit temples – both ancient and sublime, and modern and garish – and fish farms, markets selling everything from skinned frogs and trussed ducks to mounds of chilli and motorcycle spare parts, and everywhere we encounter beautiful children keen to practise their English skills. For them, every visit of the Pandaw is like a holiday. On board we eat well, especially when the chefs explore their Burmese, Cambodian or Vietnamese heritage and cook up great curries and stir fries, and excellent staff pamper us.
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On the last day we reach Heart of Darkness territory. Gone are the broad horizons as the river narrows so that the banks nudge the boat and trees are close enough to touch. We are like a blind man, feeling our way along the river to a soundtrack produced by rural Cambodia. There is the blare of rinkydink Khmer pop music from houses hidden in the trees, the wail of unhappy babies, the thrum of pumps extracting water for the fields, the lowing of oxen and the excited shouts from children as they run or ride creaking bicycles full-tilt along dusty paths to try to keep up with us.
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And at the end of it all – at the end of this transport of delight – there are the marvels of Angkor.
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Details:
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Pandaw Cruises is represented in Australia by Active Travel
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