The Tonle Sap Lake in Cambodia is the largest freshwater lake in Southeast Asia and along its shores are villages that are highly dependent on its ecosystem for their food supply. Two of these villages, Kompong Khleang and Kompong Phluk, have now become major tourist attractions because of the houses built on stilts to stay above water and also due to their proximity to Siem Reap. Our tour guide took us to the floating village of Kompong Phluk, which was the closest at around 15 kilometers from Siem Reap. This was a nice change of scenery after all the trips to the temples. The village sits alongside a river that is snaking its way towards the Tonle Sap Lake and our boat took us to the very heart of this village sailing past humble homes and friendly villagers. We continued sailing towards the lake and passed by a mangrove forest, which I will feature in another post. I’m glad I brought my DSLR with me during this tour for better quality photos as at one point I was so dependent on my iPhone for travel photography and has since regretted doing so. Here are some of the photos I took of the floating village of Kampong Phluk. The muddy water was a beautiful complement to the earthy tones of the wooden stilts and houses. Thankfully, the sun was out that day creating beautiful shadows with the stilts as well as saturating the colors of the water, the houses and the vegetation around the village. I hope you guys enjoy these series of photographs and don’t forget to like and leave a comment. Till my next post…stay safe everyone!
A visit to Siem Reap means hopping from one ancient temple to another, however, there is another noteworthy visit nearby…the floating villages of Tonle Sap Lake. The village of Kompong Phluk is the most visited and just a few kilometers from Siem Reap. It offers a very good contrast once you finally had your fill of temples. Our private guide took us there on our last day in Siem Reap. The drive through the Cambodian countryside was truly a humbling experience. Watching people go about their lives in simplicity made me reflect on my life and how I’d like to live it moving forward.
I can no longer recall how long the drive was but I remember us parking beside a river and then hopping on a wooden boat that was to take us to the village. The water was muddy and looked like milk chocolate but with the sun out and bright I thought it provided an earthy and rustic tone to my photographs. As we sailed into the village I saw all these houses on stilts, although I didn’t expect to see a lot of human activity assuming that people stayed indoors to evade the prying eyes of tourists. Instead, we found ourselves cruising through a busy village. People busy with household chores, children playing, women paddling boats with stuff to trade, men fixing fishing nets and families just busy working together. It was fascinating to see all these people living in such an unusual environment. Of course I immediately got busy with my camera. I took a lot of photos of the houses, the river and the edge of the lake but for this post, I am featuring the many faces of Tonle Sap Lake.
Reymon de Real Photography
Reymon de Real Photography 