Along the Mekong - aboard the Jahan

The first time I read about the Mekong River journey between Vietnam and Cambodia, it was in Jon Swain's book, River of Time. Swain, a Brit, worked as a journalist in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos during the Vietnam War. He was portrayed in the 1984 film, The Killing Fields and his personal account of that time remains one of the most memorable and moving I've read.

Back in the 1960s and 1970s, the Mekong River was at the heart of the conflict tearing Indochina apart. And Swain's journey from Vietnam to Cambodia during those years was potentially lethal.

The end of the Vietnam War in 1975 didn't improve things along the Mekong much. Cambodia continued to suffer Khmer Rouge violence until the mid 1990s. So it wasn't until 2002 that the river crossing finally opened to travellers.



I first made the four hour trip from Chau Doc in Vietnam to the Cambodian capital Phnom Penh back in 2002, soon after the border opened. There was something very exciting about crossing a newly opened frontier that was at peace after decades of strife. And while the views were interesting, if not spectacular, the symbolism of the journey more than compensated.

Ten years later, Mekong River cruising between Vietnam and Cambodia is booming. A number of ships, ranging from luxurious to just comfortable, are now plying the river on trips that include the Vietnamese delta towns of Cai Be and Chau Doc, the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh and Kompong Cham before winding up at the temples of Angkor in Siem Reap. The Mekong's mostly sedate waters provide a wonderfully evocative theme for exploration of Vietnam's south and Cambodia, with a sensational conclusion at Angkor Wat. (NB. Boat access to Siem Reap is seasonal and dependent on river levels - otherwise the final leg of the journey is covered by bus).



Last August, I spent a couple of days aboard the Jahan - a recently launched luxurious recreation of a classic 19th century river cruiser. We travelled north from Phnom Penh to Kompong Chhnang along the Ton Le Sap River.

I'm probably not the best person to judge a cruise experience. While I often find group travel rewarding, the additional time pressures of cruising and the unavoidable sense that you're travelling in a bubble have less appeal. But that's me. And despite being a cruise skeptic, I had a superb time aboard the Jahan.

I suppose all travel occurs in a bubble of sorts. The extent to which you surrender to the bubble depends on you. The 60 or so mainly Australian travellers aboard the Jahan were delighted with the experience and said they were surprised by the quality of the boat, the meals and the crew. And they very much liked returning to the bubble at the end of each shore excursion. That was the whole point - a luxury holiday punctuated by brief incursions into real, remote Vietnam and Cambodia.

Cruise travellers have a devotion that is cult-like. Most of my travel companions were very experienced cruisers. For them, the boat is more than half of the travel experience.

Memories of growing up during the Vietnam War were on the minds of a good many of the baby-boomers aboard as they cruised the once war torn region. Decades of conflict have only increased the Mekong's lure.

River cruising avails travellers of access to remote places that are rarely if ever visited by other travellers. From the Jahan we managed to visit small remote villages that prior to the commencement of these cruises, would never have spotted a foreign tour group. And it can be a little disconcerting moving from a craft of luxury that is unimaginable to the locals in villages we explore, where life has barely changed in centuries.

Such are the dilemmas of all luxury travellers in the developing world. And many of my travel companions were conscious of them.

During my day aboard the Jahan, we took two excursions. The first was to a small village in lush green countryside outside of Kompong Chhnang. We had a brief and fascinating brush with unvarnished local life.



Mekong River cruising is still in relatively early days. And there are big expansion plans with new and larger boats.
But the Mekong is a very finite resource. Its capacity for further development is limited. The travel offerings work well today only because of their remoteness and the fact that there aren't many other travellers. It doesn't really have the capacity for endless expansion of the kind that has occurred with varying results in other cruise destinations. So cruise travel here will need to be carefully managed or it will lose all meaning and whatever benefit it's bringing to these communities will quickly evaporate.

But there are bigger issues on the agenda for the Mekong River. With controversial dams planned for Laos and Cambodia that threaten downstream agriculture and food production, and the Mekong Delta facing significant risk from global warming, tourism management is understandably likely to be a lower order issue.

For now, travellers have a unique opportunity to experience the mighty historic river and the vibrant communities that live off it. And the Jahan provides a very agreeable way to do it.

The Jahan is operated by Vietnam based Heritage Line. You can find out more at www.heritage-line.com

Good reading
Milton Osborne, Mekong: Turbulent Past, Uncertain Future
Jon Swain, River of Time



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