Families in wooden boats passing below the tall stilt houses of Kampong Phluk at high water

Siem Reap · Since 2013

Tonlé Sap Tours
from Siem Reap

Your own boat on the biggest lake in Southeast Asia, out for sunset at Kampong Phluk. One afternoon on its own, or the last day of a temple trip. No Angkor Pass on any of them.

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4.9★·319verified reviews

Half day Multi-day

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Every boat we run carries two guides. Yours from Siem Reap, and Kiri , who lives here.

Half day

The Tonlé Sap on its own. One private afternoon on the lake, timed so you finish on open water with the light going. No Angkor Pass, and every fee already in the price.

Looking down the Kampong Phluk village channel from the bow of a private boat, stilt houses on both sides

Half day · Jeep · Private

Kampong Phluk Floating Village Private Sunset Tour

Out to the stilt village by Jeep, then onto your own boat through the middle of it. Sunset on open water, with drinks and snacks. No Angkor Pass needed.

Details

$ 95

Multi-day

Temples, then the water. Three itineraries that finish on the Tonlé Sap instead of on one more temple. The lake sits outside the Angkor park, so on the two 3-day trips the extra day costs nothing more on your pass.

Buddhist monk in orange robes tying a blessing bracelet onto a visitor's wrist during a pagoda ceremony in the Siem Reap countryside

5 days - Jeep, Vespa or E-bike - Private

Angkor and Siem Reap 5 Day Signature Tour

Discover Siem Reap and Angkor: A perfect holiday! Temples, City and Countryside Life

Details

$ 790

Photographer captures Angkor Wat reflected in the north pond at sunrise.

3 days · Sunrise start· Private

3-Day Angkor Sunrise & Grand Circuit + Tonlé Sap

Angkor Wat before the light comes up, the Grand Circuit the next morning, and a boat on the Tonlé Sap for the last of it on day three.

Details

$ 295

A woman rides the bow of a green boat toward Kampong Phluk under a storm sky

3 days · Jeep or Vespa · Private

3-Day Angkor Small & Grand Circuit + Tonlé Sap

Day 1 the Small Circuit, Day 2 the Grand, Day 3 free until the boat goes out. Your last evening ends on open water, drinks in hand, the sun going down.

Details

$ 285

Storm light over stilt houses and trees on the Kampong Phluk shoreline

An afternoon lived at the village's own pace.

What is special about the Tonlé Sap?

What is special about the Tonlé Sap? It behaves like no other lake in the world. Once a year the river that drains it turns around and fills it back up instead, and everything here is built around that fact. The houses stand high on stilts, and close to four thousand people live in Kampong Phluk alone; when the water rises, their boats moor at the front step. That is the village we run our tours to, about an hour from Siem Reap, with two guides on every boat. One of them is Kiri, who lives there.

A Tonlé Sap lake tour is really a boat tour with a drive on either side, so the hour you choose matters more than anything else. We go in the afternoon, when the village is living its own day around you, and no two afternoons look alike. Some days the water is busy with boats; some days everything happens up on the platforms. The one fixed point is the ending: out past the last houses, drinks open, and the sun going down over open water. Mornings exist on request.

Wooden boats pulled up on the Kampong Phluk shoreline under heavy monsoon clouds

Why the lake with us

Built so the money lands in the village.

Anyone in town can sell you a boat ticket. What we built is an afternoon where the people who own the lake do the work and keep the wage.

A second guide, hired in the villageEvery tour we run on this lake carries two guides. Yours from Siem Reap, who stays with you all day, and Kiri, hired in Kampong Phluk itself and paid tour by tour the same way the boat is. On every departure, not an optional extra.

A private boat, and a driver whose turn it isThe boats at Kampong Phluk belong to the families who live there. Work goes round on a queue: we hire a boat and its driver, take a ticket, and that boat goes to the back of the line. Buying our own would take a turn off a household.

We tell you which village you are gettingThe water changes so much across the year that Kampong Phluk looks like two different places. Most poor reviews on this lake come from booking one version and arriving at the other. Tell us your dates and we will tell you which one you are booking.

Tell us your dates → we will tell you which version of the village you are getting.

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Logistics.

Where: Kampong Phluk, about an hour from Siem Reap by Jeep. The drive is part of the afternoon: rice fields, villages, and the road narrowing as the lake gets close.
When: Afternoon, with the start set by that day's sunset, usually somewhere between 2 and 3 PM. Back at your hotel around 7:30 PM. Mornings on request.
Who's in your group: Just your party, never merged with strangers, with your own licensed Cambodian guide all day and a second guide from the village on the water.
The boat: A covered wooden boat hired, with its driver, from a Kampong Phluk family. Private to you. When the water allows it, a smaller paddled boat goes into the mangrove.
Angkor Pass: Not needed for the half day; on the 3-day trips only the temple days use the pass.
Best day of the week: A weekday if you can. Weekends and Cambodian public holidays run busier, especially with domestic visitors out for their own day on the lake.
Phare Circus: Not on the same evening as the lake. Phare's show starts at 8 and they want you seated well before it; a boat that lands you back in town at 7:30 cannot make that, and we will say so if you try to book both.
Included: Your guide, a second guide from the village, the Jeep and driver, a private boat and its driver, the community entrance fee, the mangrove paddle when the water allows it, drinks and snacks on the water, photos taken by your guide, and hotel pickup and drop-off in Siem Reap. Not included: meals (you are back in time for dinner) and gratuities. No Angkor Pass needed at all.
Cancellation: 14+ days before: full refund. Less than 14 days: 50%. Less than 5 days or no-show: no refund.

Three floating villages. They are not the same trip.

← swipe to compare →

	Chong Kneas	Kampong Phluk	Kompong Khleang
Drive	About 20 minutes	About an hour	A long one: about three hours in the car, round trip
What you see	Floating houses on pontoons	Tall stilt houses and the mangrove	Stilt houses; no equivalent of the famous flooded-forest paddle
Fits an afternoon	Yes	Comfortably, sunset included	Barely; the drive squeezes the light
Reputation	The lowest rated of the three, with years of poor reviews	Consistently well reviewed	Good
Known problems	Boats diverting to overpriced floating restaurants, pressured donations, a crocodile farm	Drive-by shared-boat traffic, which is what a private boat solves	The distance, and a long dry-ground approach in the low months
Do we run it?	No, and we will not	Yes	No; the extra drive does not buy a better afternoon

We chose Kampong Phluk because it has the stilt houses and the mangrove, it fits an afternoon comfortably, and it is where we have a standing relationship with the boat families. We do not run Chong Kneas at any price.

Akim Ly sitting down with members of the Kampong Phluk boat community

Why us

I did not start this tour with a boat. I started it with a visit.

Before we sold a single afternoon on the Tonlé Sap, I went to Kampong Phluk and sat down with the people who live there. On this lake the boats already belong to the families, and the work already goes round in turns. The fairest thing a company from town can do is join that queue, not jump it.

I would rather give a lake family steady work than put one more boat of our own on the water.

That is why Kiri, our second guide, is from the village, and why we support the NGO2 BambooShoot Foundation and its work against single-use plastic on this lake.

Akim Ly · Founder, Adventures Cambodia · Read Akim's full story →

The questions private guests actually ask.

Yes, on one condition: choose the village and the hour deliberately. The lake is the other half of what Siem Reap is, the water half, and after two days of temples it is exactly the change your eyes are asking for. Done lazily, from a twenty-seat boat at midday at the wrong village, it earns every bad review it gets. Done properly, it is the afternoon guests talk about at dinner.

Kampong Phluk, if you want the stilt houses and the mangrove in one afternoon. It is about an hour from town, and it is the one we run. Chong Kneas is closer but has years of poor reviews behind it: boats diverting to floating restaurants, pressure to donate, that sort of thing. Kompong Khleang is much further round the lake, about three hours in the car for the same afternoon on the water, and the famous mangrove paddle is not there. We looked at all three and stayed with Kampong Phluk.

Sunset, for most people. In the afternoon the village is living its own day around you, and nobody can tell you in advance what that will look like, which is the point. What never changes is the ending: past the last houses onto open water, drinks out, and the Tonlé Sap sunset with nothing on any side of you. Morning is quieter, with flatter light. We run it on request, and it suits an evening flight, the birds, or the hottest months.

From around $20 for a seat on a shared boat, to about $100 for a fully private afternoon. The gap is what it looks like. A shared tour sells you a seat, and the extras tend to appear once you are on the water. Ours is $95 with the boat to yourselves, two guides, every village ticket, the mangrove when the water allows it, and drinks on the lake. Nobody asks you for anything once you are out there.

A different place, and worth seeing either way. When the water is high, boats moor where people's front steps end and the mangrove is reachable by paddled boat. When it drops, the same houses stand on bare stilts you could walk under, and the mangrove trip is usually off. Neither version is the wrong one. What we will not do is let you book the high-water village and arrive at the dry one, so tell us your dates and we will tell you which you are getting.

Private, on every tour we sell. On a twenty-seat boat you cannot stop, cannot ask a family before photographing them, and cannot decide when to leave. A private boat is also the only way the photography rules we ask guests to follow can actually work.

No. The lake sits outside the Angkor park, so the half day needs no pass at all. On our two 3-day trips the lake day is also free of it, which is why they use two pass days instead of three.

No, and we would not recommend it. This is a working lake with whole villages living directly on the water, and everything from daily life goes into it. We stay dry, and so do the families who live here.

Three ways, and you can check each one from the boat. The boats belong to the families of Kampong Phluk, every family has one, and the work goes round in turns; we take a ticket like everyone else. Kiri, our second guide, lives in the village and is paid the same way. And the entrance tickets we buy for you go to the community itself, which runs tourism on this stretch of the lake, over a thousand village boats taking their turns. It has even been written up in the national press.

Yes, within a policy your guide will explain before you get on the boat, and it is the village's own rule as much as ours: ask first, every time, and your guide asks for you. Photograph children with their family rather than alone, no close-ups of children you have not met, and nothing of a child undressed. Do not buy anything from a child and do not hand out money or sweets, because buying from a child is what keeps that child on the water tomorrow instead of at school.

It gets called a human zoo, and that is worth taking seriously rather than arguing with. The criticism describes drive-by tourism: a big boat going through at speed, nobody stopping, nobody speaking to anybody. What changes it is a boat small enough to stop, a guide who can introduce you, somebody from the village on board, and a rule about asking before you photograph. Whether that is enough is your call, and if it is not, we would rather point you at the countryside afternoon instead.

A weekday if you can. Weekends and Cambodian holidays run livelier, with local families out for their own day on the lake. Not a problem, just busier.

Everything from your hotel door and back to it. The Jeep and driver, both guides, the private boat with its driver, the community entrance fee, the mangrove paddle when the water allows it, and drinks and snacks on the lake. The photos your guide takes along the way are sent to you afterwards at no charge. There is nothing to pay at the village and nothing sold to you on the water; the only things not in the price are any tip you choose to leave.