Exploring The Klongs of BangkokPrepared by Harold Stephens
Travel Correspondent for Thai Airways International
Joerg Kohler at the Old Maps & Prints in River City has literally stacks of old prints that depict what Bangkok looked like years ago before the coming of the automobile. The City of Angels was one klong after another and when I first saw the city in 1961, I recall Sathorn Road had a klong down the very center while a couple of water buffaloes grazed along the banks. Wireless Road, where the some of the embassies are today, was much the same. Then came the automobile and to make room for motorways most of the klongs were filled in. Bangkok has never been the same since.
Much of the transportation in the City of Angels was by river and klongs, and that included the marketplace, a floating market. How convenient it was if you lived in a Thai house on stilts and peddlers came by in their tiny sampans selling fresh produce, meat, flowers, and some of the best coffee in the world, poured with great theatrics from what looked like old socks.
Of course, visitors didn’t live in houses on stilts but, nevertheless, klongs were an attraction, much like the canals of Venice are in Europe. One that every visitor wanted to see was the famous Float Market. I have to admit, it was exciting. It was alive, real and genuine.
Then, soon after when ten-wheel lorries brought their produce to town, the floating market saw its last days. Oh, for sure there are floating markets but they are only shadows of the original market. Even Trader Keith went out of business. Keith was an expatriate American who had a bar on one of the klongs. It was very popular but like the hula-hoop it went out of style and vanished.
But that doesn’t mean a klong tour isn’t worth it. On the contrary, it’s a very exciting way to see Bangkok. And remember, many residents still use the klongs as a means of transport, so we can safely say klongs are still in use and not mere museum pieces. But what really is a klong?
The name “klong” is the Thai word for “canal” in English and klong is one of the most important words in the Thai language. A klong is as fundamental to Thailand as the Chao Phraya River—The River of Kings—is to the country. For visitors, the klongs of Bangkok can mean an exciting adventure.
Thais began digging klongs when their history first began but it was during the Ayutthaya period when international trade increased that the need to shorten transport distances between the capital and the sea was recognized. Between 1522 and 1722, the monarchs dug six major klongs, many which eventually not only shortened travel on the river but became the main streams themselves.
In the year 1522, King Chairachathirat of Ayutthaya commanded a short canal to be dug down river to eliminate a sweeping bend in the river, thus saving his boatmen and foreign merchants much time when they worked the river. The cut shortened the journey from nine to six kilometres and straightened the channel for easier passage.
The site where the cut was made is present-day Bangkok. Back then, 200 years ago, Bangkok was a fishing village and custom check point guarded by a fort on the left bank. The cut was made from Bangkok Noi to the mouth of the Bangkok Yai Canal. In time this new canal actually became part of Chao Phraya River. Today it is the section which flows from Thammasat University to Wat Arun. The part of the Chao Phraya River which formerly ran through an area of Bangkok then became known as the Bangkok Noi and Bangkok Yai canals. It may sound confusing but, once you get aboard a canal boat, you will see the significance of the cut.
When the area was the part of Chao Phraya River, the banks of Bangkok Noi Canal were an agricultural zone and the lifestyle of the community was simple. Changes came after the digging of the new canal; the area became more accessible and this led to an increase in the population of the canal side community known as Thonburi. It was here, after Auytthaya was sacked and burned by the Burmese, that King Taksin moved his new capital. Several years later, King Rama I, the founder of the present dynasty, moved the capital from Thonburi to its present location, which is now Bangkok proper.
It wasn’t until 1972 that Thonburi Province was combined with Bangkok to become part the nation's capital. This brought more roads and public utilities to the Thonburi side and to the canal area. Improved conditions attracted more and more people and, from a small agricultural community, it grew into a residential area with industrial and trading zones. Both these canals, and Thonburi itself, are quite interesting to explore. There are still places around the banks of the Bangkok Noi Canal where the Thais maintain their old traditions and lifestyle. Among them are Wat Suwannaram, Wat Srisudaram and the Ban Bu Community.
After 1636, Klong Bangkok Yai was superseded by still another canal, Klong Lat Muang Nonthaburi. This second canal changed the course of Thai history for it was responsible for the creation of present Bangkok.
At Ratburana, just south of the Port of Bangkok at Klong Toey, a 600-metre-long canal called Klong Pak Lat was cut across a narrow neck, effectively cutting 19 kilometres from the journey. Unfortunately, because the River of Kings is tide-affected, the klong had to be dammed shortly after it was dug to prevent salt water from flowing up river and killing both marine and plant life farther upstream.
Any visitor who cruises the klongs is certain to wonder about the people who live on the water. There’s more to it than meets the eye. When you look at a map of Bangkok, you have a hard time finding Klong Ong Ang. Dug in 1783, it became, until this century, home for the boat people of the river, much like the typhoon shelters in Hong Kong are for the Chinese boat people who live there today. Another place on the river, crowded with floating homes, was the wide expanse of the river below Bangkok near Klong Toey. Many of the klongs, aside from a means for transportation, became urban dwellings. By 1900, both sides of the river were floating habitations resting on rafts of bamboo moored to the shores, occupied by two, three and four families each.
Today the picture has changed. Aside from boat families who live aboard their barges, as they have done from one generation to another, municipal law prohibits living aboard any vessel or raft on the river.
Houseboat communities began to be phased out in the 1920s and, by the 1950s, only the barge families survived. In the late 1970s, legislation was passed to clear the canals of boat dwellers as well. Some houseboat communities do survive farther to the north on the Nan River just above Nakhon Sawan and at Phitsanulok—but their days are numbered. Environmental activists are claiming that they pollute the river, which obviously they do. I was fortunate to have experienced, first hand, the klongs and river when I lived for a year aboard my schooner. I wrote about that period of my life in my book The Last Voyage. It brings back some fond memories.
The storeboat trade has vanished from the klongs and river as we have seen from the demise of the Floating Market. But would you believe, you can do your banking on a boat on the river? To encourage saving and to serve people living alongside waterways, the Government Savings Bank started this boat service in 1958, the only waterborne bank in the world. At first, the boats were used to serve people in country districts such as Ban Paew, Damneonsaduak, Bangyai and Khonti. The bank later established permanent shore branches and discontinued the boat service when land transport improved. But not altogether. Pak Klong Talat Branch (Mobile) is still afloat on the river.
The boat has a staff of six tellers and a policeman. It starts from Rajini (Pak Klong Market) Pier at 8:30 in the morning and goes along the Chao Phraya River and Bangkok Noi Canal to Bangyai. When it reaches Nonthaburi it begins its return journey. People waiting for service fly a flag with the bank's logo in white on a blue background in front of their houses. All banking services are available. Two boats, Omsin 33 and Omsin 42, take turns in serving their waterside customers.
The effectiveness of river and klong travel has been greatly increased by the use of modern dredges. The sandbar at the mouth of the Chao Phraya River was once a major handicap to transportation and boats had to wait for high tide to cross the bar. Now, no new klongs are being dug. With steam replacing wind- and oar-powered vessels, the need to cut new klongs is no longer necessary.
But still, without klongs history would have been different and Bangkok would not have been dubbed “Venice of the East.” For those readers who want to see the klongs, Royal Orchid Holidays has several options, ROH2 and ROHS1. There is also an optional tour, Rice Barge Canal Tour, BKKOP4, in which a long-tail boat takes you to see the klongs and life along the klongs before returning by converted rice barge.
Next week, in answer to the letter below, I will tell more about what Royal Orchid Holidays has to offer.
QUESTIONS & ANSWER
Q. Dear Harold Stephens, I read with interest your enthusiastic report on ROH holidays.
I've noticed descriptive info online but no pricing. Are prices available anywhere online or only phone/snail mail booklet? Would like to just sit down and fiddle with some options
Thank you,
Helen, Sonoma CA
A. Dear Helen, You bring up a very interesting question. I will do a full report and make it the subject of my topic next week. Thank you –HS.
Harold Stephens
Bangkok
E-mail: ROH Weekly Travel (booking@inet.co.th)
Note: The article is the personal view of the writer and does not necessarily reflect the view of Thai Airways International Public Company Limited. | 
