Cambodia by River - From the Mekong Delta to the city of Angkor

Rooms are available in Ho Chi Minh City from 3.00pm on 6th March (flights from London are not included – see Practicalities). The tour begins with lunch on 7th March in the hotel and a guided walk to see the Opera House, Notre Dame Cathedral – a red brick edifice constructed from materials imported from France – and the Central Post Office, completed 1891. Overnight Ho Chi Minh City. 

Drive to My Tho to join the ship in time for lunch (c. 70km). Journey by sampans through mangroves and bamboo forests to the fruit orchards of Ben Tre, an area rich in birdlife. First of seven nights on the ship.

The tranquil waterways fed by the Mekong Delta are known for a slower pace of life, revolving around tropical fruit gardens, rice cultivation and coconuts. Despite the seemingly unhurried existence of the local people, the area is a hive of activity: these swamplands produce more than a third of Vietnam’s annual food crop.Continue sailing to Chau Doc, near the border with Cambodia.

Visit Chau Doc and pass floating houses. Take minivans up to Sam Mountain, location of Phuoc Dien Tu or the Hang Pagoda. Return to the ship and continue across the border with Cambodia. Sail up to Phnom Penh: located at the confluence of the Mekong, Tonle Sap and Bassac rivers.

Explore the Royal Palace complex, including the Silver Pagoda. The Khmer Rouge left a shadow over the city for may years; visit Tuol Sleng, a high school turned interrogation prison known as S-21 and now a genocide museum; and Choeung Ek, the harrowing memorial at the Killing Fields to the 17,000 people who died there under Pol Pot. 

The National Museum of Cambodia houses artefacts dating from prehistoric times to the present. It was looted when the city was emptied by the Khmer Rouge but subsequently restored – four galleries surround a peaceful courtyard. Join the ship at Kampong Tralach.

Travel to the ancient capital of Cambodia, Oudong. Re-join the ship at Prek Kdam before returning to the Mekong. After lunch sail to Koh Nghe Tei (Silk Island) known for the manufacture of exquisite silk products. The village is a centre of the ancient martial art of L’bokator which roughly translates as ‘pounding a lion’. 

Sunrise cruise to Angkor Ban village. In the afternoon sail north to Wat Hanchey, an important centre of worship during the Chenla period located on top of a hill with some of the best Mekong views in Cambodia. Visit 8th-century structures, some destroyed by American bombings during the Vietnam War. Moor mid-lake near Siem Reap.

Disembark in the morning and transfer to Siem Reap, where in the 16th century the Khmer empire returned to its former capital having defeated (‘reap) the Thais (‘Siam’). A busy hub, it retains its small-town charm. The Roluos group consists of some of the earliest temples of the Angkor period. Visit three: Bakong, Lolei and Preah Ko. First of six nights in Siem Reap.

As water patterns are unpredictable there is a chance the ship may not be able to reach Siem Reap. If this is the case, you are transferred by coach (c. 3 hours).

Dominated by its quincunx of corncob-shaped towers, Angkor Wat is exceptional for both its scale and astounding detail. Visit after the sunrise backpackers have left but before most other tourists arrive. In the afternoon enter the 12th-century walled city of Angkor Thom. The Bayon state temple features the supreme tantric Buddha’s face on 59 towers, another massive pyramidal temple was erected to the glory of Shiva over several decades (Baphuon). The Terrace of the Elephants, with a staggering bas-relief frieze, supported the royal reception hall.

Travel northeast of Angkor to the atmospheric jungle temple of Beng Mealea, made accessible by wooden walkways raised above the crumbling ruins, of grand and elegant architectural design. Loop west to Banteay Srei (‘citadel of women’), a small and exquisite pink sandstone temple covered in pristine carved reliefs. Return to Siem Reap late afternoon.

Visits this morning include Ta Prohm, once an administrative hub for a chain of hospitals (famous for the strangler figs that straddle the walls); Pre Rup, the archetypal ancient Khmer temple mountain; and Neak Pean, unlike anything else at Angkor, a single tower rising from a reservoir. Return to Angkor Wat to study in detail the sandstone carvings enclosing the central sanctuaries. See areas usually not open to the public (subject to confirmation).

Drive north to Banteay Chhmar Temple (c. 3 hours), the last great ancient temple to be rescued from the obscurity of a tropical forest. The scale of its construction, the hydraulic engineering required to sustain it and its long gallery of superb relief carvings suggest that it was the twin hub of the empire.

Free morning in Siem Reap; the Angkor National Museum is worth a visit. In the afternoon travel by boat across the West Baray, a man-made reservoir which was once integral to the complex Angkorian rice irrigation system (constructed 11th cent.). Continue to a private dinner at a villa surrounded by rice paddies and landscaped spice gardens.

The tour ends after breakfast.

Participants are divided into two groups for some visits, each accompanied by a guide.