Place
Kampong Phluk
Kampong Phluk, also written Kampong Pluk, is a fishing commune of stilt houses by the Tonle Sap lake, in Siem Reap province.[1][2] It lies in Prasat Bakong district.[1][2] Its boat trips through the village and the flooded forest draw large numbers of visitors.[2]
The commune
Cambodianess put the village 30 kilometers (19 miles) south of Siem Reap in 2024, and the commune about 40 kilometers (25 miles) from the city in 2025.[3][2] A road links the commune to National Road 6.[2] The commune takes in the villages of Tnaot Kombot, Dey Krahorm and Kok Kdol.[1]
Along the road, the houses stand high on stilts. In the rainy season the lake floods the villages and turns their roads into canals.[1] Cambodianess calls Kampong Phluk a floating village.[3][2] A flooded forest of 48 hectares (119 acres) surrounds the village.[3]
Fishing and the flood
Life in Kampong Phluk follows the lake's yearly rise and fall. In 2024 the director of the Kampong Pluk Tourism Community, Sang Kung, said the community put tourism first while the lake was up in the wet months, and turned to fishing once it fell in the dry months. He gave its income that year as 30 percent from fishing, 50 percent from tourism and the rest from small businesses such as boat rides and souvenirs.[3] Villagers also make dried fish from their catch.[3]
In 2022 fishers in the commune told CamboJA News that the floods had come late or unevenly for several years, and that their catches had fallen. Researchers and community members blamed upstream hydropower dams. An official of the Fisheries Administration said that a growing population and illegal fishing did more harm to the catch.[1]
Visiting
Sang Kung recommended visits from August to January, when the water is at its highest.[3] Visitors take boats across the flooded forest and out onto the open lake, and floating restaurants serve those who come to watch the sunset over the water.[3][2]
In 2025 the community's vice chief, Poy Pa, said the community had started in 2015 with 30 motorboats and had grown to 826, of which 685 were small boats for groups of fewer than eight. Between 300 and 500 visitors came each day.[2] Sang Kung had dated the founding of the tourism community to 2013.[3] Poy Pa named three groups within the community that visitors can see: one of fishers, one that runs the tourist motorboats, and one of women who row the boats.[2]
Groups from other ecotourism sites in Cambodia visited the commune during the National Ecotourism Forum of November 2025, on a tour that also took in Kampong Khleang, another tourism community on the lake.[2]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 CamboJA News, Try Thaney, Fishers Struggle With Declining Fish Catch, Citing Irregular Water Levels (September 22, 2022)
- ↑ 2.00 2.01 2.02 2.03 2.04 2.05 2.06 2.07 2.08 2.09 Cambodianess, Isa Rohany, Ecotourism Representatives Visit the Kampong Phluk Community (November 29, 2025)
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 3.6 3.7 Cambodianess, Meng Seavmey, August to January, Best Time to Visit Kampong Pluk Floating Village: Director (April 2, 2024)