In my previous post that I had written about our cruise and life on the Mekong river – http://wp.me/p29z7S-ix . However during this cruise we also managed to click some pics of the setting sun and it’s amazing colors. I am sharing the same in this post –
1. Contemplating –
Sunset and the silhouette
On our trip to Phnom Penh we booked and went on a short cruise on the Mekong River, to see the ways of people who make a living on this vast river.
There were a couple of options available for a cruise, like you can visit some other local islands that are only linked by ferries, or the silk island (this is extremely touristy), or a normal 2 hour cruise, etc. We just booked a regular cruise as we didn’t have much time and we were on a budget; but this too was super fun. This river was also quite a bit of a surprise to us. For starters, it is huge more like a sea than a river and this size was just in the dry season so I fail to imagine how it will be after the rains. Additionally, we learnt a lot about the local life on the river here and below is a glimpse of the same through a black & white lens.
1. There is an entire community here that lives on boats as the one in the pic below and fish for a living. They only dock for selling the fish, going to markets for shopping and to the places of worship. Else the entire families live on the boat.
The house boat on the Mekong river
Before our Cambodia visit, I believed that loads of things can float on water but I had never heard or imagined that an entire village can float on water. We were introduced to this concept and place by my cousins and once we heard about it, we had to see this. So we started our trip in Siem Reap with a visit to the Floating Village on the Tonle Sap Lake.
The Tonle Sap Lake is the largest freshwater lake in South East Asia and its pretty unusual as its flow changes direction twice a year and the portion that forms the lake expands and shrinks dramatically with the seasons.From November to May (Cambodia’s dry season) the Tonlé Sap drains into the Mekong River but after the rains the Tonlé Sap backs up to form an enormous lake wherein water flows from the Mekong river back into the lake. Another fascinating thing about this lake is the floating village on it. Many Vietnamese people live on this river on a floating house and fish for a living.
Boats for the cruise
getsetandgo 
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