Mekong boat cruises | Taking a slow boat down the Mekong
As far as Mekong boat cruises go, Southeast Asia’s longest river offers some 5,000 kilometres to choose from. The Mekong originates high up on the Tibetan Plateau and after passing through, or past, six countries, eventually emerges into the South China Sea. In between, it flows through China’s Yunnan Province, then south where it forms the borders between Myanmar and Laos followed by Laos and Thailand, after which it traverses the width of Cambodia before splitting into the myriad channels and labyrinthine waterways of Vietnam’s lush Mekong Delta.
When it comes to exploring the Delta – we’d say the smaller boat the better. The upper section of the river, in Yunnan, is known as the Lancang River and is relatively narrow as well as featuring a series of dams while most of the scenic Laos section is lined by rugged mountains. A series of rapids in Laos and along the Thai/Lao border stretch, renders certain sections unnavigable and culminate in the huge Khone Phapaeng Falls on the Lao-Cambodian border. There are additional rapids at Sambor, in northern Cambodia – still home to the River’s last remaining pod of Irrawaddy dolphins – after which it’s plain sailing south past Phnom Penh and into the Delta.
Despite Jacques Cousteau’s spectacular 1992 odyssey much of the course of the river is impractical for anything other than short hops. The most feasible, and hence popular, stretches of the Mekong for longer style boat cruises of one or more days are then the lower, Delta area as well as the section between Lao’s Huay Xai, (right up in the Golden Triangle, opposite Thailand’s Chiang Khong Town), and Luang Prabang. Although the extremely noisy speedboats complete the latter in a day, the slow boat cruise is two days, with an overnight stop in Pak Beng.
Not too shabby. Riverside lodge in Pak Beng, Laos Delta cruises, on large craft with overnight cabins, may continue into Cambodia where they’ll take you as far up the Mekong as Kratie Province and/or up the Tonle Sap River and across the eponymous lake to Siem Reap. These can last a week or so. While Mekong cruises may sound great on paper and are a popular draw, we’d say the reality doesn’t always meet expectations.
As with any boat cruise, scenery, however picturesque, can quickly become monotonous. With the 2 day Huay Xai to Luang Prabang trip, views on day 2, (with the exception of the Pak Ou Caves which are easily reached from Luang Prabang anyway), are more or less identical to day 1. Winding one’s way through the Delta on a comfortable craft sounds great but the landscape is almost universally flat and of course the large boats have to stick to the wider channels. While your itinerary will undoubtedly include plenty of interesting stops, most of the time on board will be spent staring at ubiquitous nipa palm lined banks through binoculars. The bottom line is that you’d see far more countryside and village life from an a/c bus than a boat plus you can, of course, make the same stops.
The Mekong at Pak Ou, near Luang Prabang, Laos There are plenty of equally scenic but lesser-known rivers to cruise along plus there’s always a lot to see in what would inevitably be a short space of time. This is precisely why Mekong boat trips included on our various Southeast Asian small group tour itineraries tend to be short hops. In our opinion, kind of a ‘best of’.
Our north Lao and Thailand tour (the Golden Triangle) compromises with a one day cruise from Huay Xai to Pak Beng while south Lao itineraries feature both a boat trip down the Mekong from Pakse to Champassak, as well as a day on small boats weaving in and out of the 4,000 Islands. (Note, we do still offer 2-day Mekong boat trip as an extension to our north Thailand tour.) Cambodia includes a short trip in Kratie to see the Irrawaddy dolphins, as well as taking the public boat up river from Vietnam’s Chau Doc to the capital Phnom Penh. While a great way to arrive in Cambodia, the 6 hour journey is generally enough for most passengers but does give an idea of what you’d see for 6 days on a full Delta cruise.
Houseboats on the Sangkar River Our Vietnam itineraries involve plenty of ‘messing around on boats‘ on small craft in narrow Delta channels while Cambodia also includes the spectacular day cruise across the Tonle Sap lake and down the Sangkar River to Battambang. (In our opinion, by far the most fascinating and scenic river cruise to be had in Southeast Asia.)
