Lucky Tours and The Green Carrot: Hidden Secret Jungle of the Virachey Forest

Option 2: Trek inside Virachey National Park 4 Days/ 3 Nights

Panoramic Views

Highlights

Beautiful panoramic view.
Submerge in the semi, evergreen dry forest.
Amazing boat trip on SeSan and O’Lalai rivers.
Waterfalls, creeks and small streams. Enjoy a swim.
Jungle camping, lush old and dense forest.
Engaging indigenous communities

Short description

Giant trees of the Virachey Forest

Close to Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia triangle, a beautiful forest awaits you. It’s named, "The Enchanting Virachey Forest".

In this forest we conduct an interesting and adventurous from 3 day up to 7 days trek.

A boat trip on the Sesan and O’Lalai rivers take you to Kolark community forest . Trek through pristine forest, follow the tracks of local hunters, crossing some rivers and engaging indigenous communit .

Trip length : 30 km.

Introduction

In this unique adventurous trek, a lot of highlights will pass along your way. Starting at the bank of Ton Le San river, visit small settlements, engage with indigenous communities, learn about local farming, fishing and hunting techniques.

Stay overnight in the jungle, submerge in a very beautiful forest where you can meet ‘The Giants' of the Virachey forest. You will follow tracks that varies from small tracks leading from one small settlement to another, hunting tracks, wildlife tracks and some totally off-beaten tracks.

Different sceneries will be presented to you like beautiful panoramic views, mixed forest , secondary and primary forest. Numerous small creeks, streams and a river meander through this beautiful region. This trek is not for the faint hearted and gives a high expedition experience. We go into the forest, have a great adventure and educational time. Living and surviving in deep dense jungle. No fixed itinerary and off beaten tracks!

The trek through the primary forest is really off beaten where some areas, the only paths available are the wildlife tracks. Your foot prints mix with the foot prints of the now vulnerable Giant Gaur ‘a wild buffalo’ is as primal as it gets.

The Kavet people are very friendly and will often invite you into their homes. Depending on the season you can watch their daily activities. We spend three nights during this trek. One night, camping near a scenic creek, second night camping close to a waterfall and final night with a tribal family. Each has its own charm!

Relaxing Boat Ride along the Sesan River

Day 1:

You assemble at the office (Lucky Tours) at 8:00 am
Departure time is at 8:30 which gives you half an hour to arrange your backpack.
At 8:30 we leave by car, minivan or truck in a northern direction to Veunsai district (It takes 90 minutes to drive there).
At Veunsai, we take a small local boat a short distance upstream along Sesan river.
Before long we reach the mouth of O’Lalai river. The O’Lalai has its spring further to the north inside the Virachey NP. It’s clean and unpolluted water. This very beautiful natural river with its both banks flanked with all kinds of vegetation. This river will be used for boat transport to bring you to Kok Lark Kavet indigenous community which is 7 km upstream (approximately 40 minutes ).
Once you arrive at Track village, we need to register at the village chief’s house as a sign of respect to the local tribe.
After that we continue a little further north by boat until we get to the shore at the east of O’Lalai river.

***Please note that during the dry season from 1st February until the mid of June the route Veunsai Track village will be on a motorbike due to a too shallow river.

Beautiful Lush Paddy Fields

We start walking through various landscapes. Patches forest alternate with rice paddy fields. Some giant trees dot the small patches of forest.
Around noon we’ll have lunch at a small farm house.
The further north you get the denser forest. Soon we’ll enter the primary forest. It goes a little up and down hills.
During the trek we take a regular breaks to enjoy the surrounding and to rest a little bit.
We’ll arrive at the campsite next to a very nice river around 4:00pm. Your guide and ranger will start boiling water for coffee or tea, while you can refresh in a nearby stream.
The hammock and mosquito-net will be set up and the campsite prepared for the night.
You can enjoy a nice dinner at the campfire.

Day 2:

In the morning you rise early. You enjoy a hot coffee or tea. Breakfast will be prepared on a wood fire.
After breakfast, you organize your backpack while the team untie hammocks and prepare for the day.
This next part of track is mainly off beaten track, so you can expect dense, lush and old jungle where a path is often cut by a machete. You will be delighted with the sight of many ‘Giant Trees of the Virachey Forest’. Beautiful forest with lush vegetation. At some viewing points (this can vary by the season because of the tree canopy) there are some panoramic views to enjoy.
At noon you’ll get to a nice spot and take an hour break for lunch.
If the small stream has enough water, you can enjoy a refreshing swim.
After lunch, we change direction and loop in a southwest direction. Again, wonderful nature awaits you. At some point, you might see the evidence of the Asian black bear trying to get some insects or honey out of a big tree. It’s always nice to discover new detailed things that is part of the whole.
Around afternoon you get to the campsite close to a wonderful waterfall. You can cool off your body in this clear water, enjoy an invigorating dip to ease those muscles.
Your guide will hang hammocks, put up mosquito net, make fire to boil water for coffee or tea.
Dinner will be cooked on a wood fire while you can take it easy.
After you enjoy your dinner, we start to go on an exciting eerie night trek.

The Night Trek

Armed with only a headlight, we spend one hour trekking around our campsite so we are familiar to what is 'out there' while you sleep.

What can we see during our night trek? We are looking for the native nocturnal species. The quieter we can walk, the higher the chance we spot the wildlife. You get the chance to spot some lories Pigmy (a very small primate) some jungle cats, wild boar, deer and night birds. Sometimes you see birds sleeping on tree branch. Though the chance to see wildlife during the trek in the day is fairly small, the chance increase dramatically during the night trek. Even if we don’t see any wildlife, the atmosphere during

a night trek is really much more impressive, exciting, scary and eerie. The jungle literally comes alive at sunset, when you flash your torch around, hundreds of eyes of insects like grasshoppers, spiders, worms and others appear glowing.

After 1 hour of night walk we return to our campsite and you can make yourself comfortable by sitting near the campfire, enjoy the jungle sounds and starry sky if it is a cloudless night before going to bed.

Day 3

You will also rise early today and enjoying witnessing how the crickets and other insects are silenced and the birds talking over the orchestra.
After breakfast, we trek through the jungle for three hours. We then reach a small local farm house of the Kaveth ethnic minority people where we stop for lunch.
Afternoon: Continue trekking to a beautiful rapid and river. There are a few families of the Kaveth indigenous people there and so you will be introduced by the guide to the family before to stay an overnight with them.

Share a Jar Wine
There is a mountain approximately 700 meters high next to the tribal house, before spending the night with these jungle ethnic minority family, we climb up this mountain for a wonderful view of this huge jungle which is bordered to 3 countries (Cambodia, Lao, Vietnam) and enjoy and amazing sunset over the jungle.
Come down after sunset to have dinner with the tribe.
At night we make a little party by drinking traditional home-made jar wine of the indigenous people. You can enjoy with them and talk about their lifestyle, livelihood, culture and traditions. How they live in the forest rely on hunting fishing and their own farming.

Day 4

After breakfast we say “Good bye” to the family and we trek pass through patch forest, crossing from one farm house to the other until we reach to the village from Day 1. We stop for lunch and we observe the village and activities of the local people who live there.
At the afternoon we take a boat back to Vuernsai.
Our transport will bring you back to Banlung. You are estimated to be back in town around 4 pm. Treat yourselves to a well deserved cocktail at The Green Carrot.

***Important note:

This itinerary is written based on our research expeditions. It should be read in order to get a good impression and NOT as a detailed hour by hour itinerary.

Lucky Tours Adventure Trekking Ratanakiri, Cambodia has the right to change parts, or divert the route of the trek due to extreme weather and terrain conditions for your safety and /or in order to follow guidelines of the indigenous rangers without any prior notice.

Things to bring for trekking:

Clothes: Long trousers, T-shirts, Bathing suit, a set of clothes for the night.

Footware: Sturdy boots, socks, flip flops

Toiletries: Insect repellent, Suncream, Towel

Sun Hat or Cap

Head-torch

First Aid Kit

Purified Water pills if you have, optional

Backpack

Note : We can use a porter if you have a lot of stuff with you. How we sleep? For Camping, we make a shelter and we use hammock attached mosquito-net and blanket for sleeping.

The price includes:

Professional, Good English speaking guide

Indigenous ranger expert tracker

All necessary Transportation (Car, Moto, Tuk-Tuk, Boat, etc)

All Meals (Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner)

Beverages (Water, Coffee and Tea)

All sleeping Equipment: Hammock, Mosquito-net, Blanket and Tent

All Entrance Fees

Lucky Tours and The Green Carrot