Departing Siem Reap at 5am, we climb into the loading area of a bashed up
pickup truck and head for the river ferry.
The ride is dusty, and increasingly cramped as more and more tourists and
their baggage are loaded into the already full cargo area. However, I'm thankful
for the baggage pinning me down as we bounce along the 'superhighway' (a
cratered dust track) for the river.
Beating
our way past the bread and cheese sellers. we teeter up a dodgy plank over scum
filled waters to the 'boat terminal' (a floating shack) and climb aboard an elongated speedboat.
Descending into its interior, we discover that it is already
full. On instructions from the driver, we shove people along and squeeze in... then another 20 or so join us.
Realising that the propeller is now firmly embedded in the mud, the driver moves
a dozen people onto a smaller boat - and we're off.
We blast across the Tonle Sap lake, heading right at its mouth and on towards
Battembang - the journey was said to take five hours, but its looking like we'll
arrive in three. That is, until we stop for a pit stop in a small floating
village an hour into the journey.
Here we're transferred onto a number of smaller boats since the water level
will not allow our original boat to continue. Ours is last - and the only wooden
one (the rest being modern fibreglass numbers). Fortunately, I get the front
seat - on the bow! One of our fellow passengers, Jason (mk 2), is less fortunate
- he gets shunted behind the bus engine and gets a mouthful of exhaust fumes
before fighting his way forward a little - only to have the engine give him a
cracking headache, and almost claim his fingers (who needs a cover for a
flywheel?).
We set off again, and promptly stop a few hundred yards on where one of our
boatmen proceeds to plaster mud and grass into a gaping hole at the front. When
he's done, he takes his seat beside the driver, and proceeds to bail the boat
out - a task he continues for the five hours it takes us to arrive at Battambang.
Along the way we pass numerous villages, and countless fishermen each of whom
has a stretch of river to fish. Some have huge bamboo cranes with drag nets,
others boats with nets and yet others with just hand nets - we discover that
they are limited to an area and method of fishing according to the amount of
money they bid in an annual fishing rights auction.
The river got so shallow in places that our bailing man and the driver had to
get out and drag us upstream - a job I would not relish myself given the amount
of flotsam and sun bloated dead fish floating past...
The other memorable sight, is children. As we pass villages, or solitary
houses, or schools near the river bank, we invariably hear the sound of children
shouting "Hello, Hello, Hello" as we pass. We all feel like royalty - and wave
back with gusto.
We eventually arrive (safely) at Battembang, somewhat sunburnt and haggard
but intact.
We're met by a sea of waiting touts on motos - all clamouring to get our attention.
Oddly, they are only advertising two hotels. And little did we know that we'd start
a war by choosing the less popular of the two...
