Enjoy the Uniqueness of Lok Baintan Floating Market

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Footage Nusantara - South Kalimantan Province is blessed with beautiful rivers that connect one region to another. The existence of these rivers influences the activities of its residents. One of them is the emergence of many traditional markets on rivers known as floating markets, namely the Lok Baintan Floating Market in Martapura.

The Lok Baintan Floating Market or Martapura River Floating Market is a traditional floating market located in Sungai Pinang Village (Lok Baintan), Sungai Tabuk District, Banjar. In general, the Lok Baintan Floating Market is no different from the Floating Markets located at the mouth of the Kuin River or Barito River. The Lok Baintan Floating Market has existed since the time of the Banjar Sultanate.

This floating market is one of the most popular tourist attractions. You can see the buying and selling transaction activities on the river using unique and distinctive jukung (boats). The boats jostle each other, looking for buyers and sellers who are always jostling. Most of the traders are women. They usually wear tanggui or wide-brimmed hats made of reeds. Interestingly, in this floating market, the barter system or bapanduk in the Banjar language still applies.

Trading activities in the Muara Kuin and Lok Baintan floating markets are busy from early morning and reach their peak at 6-7 am. The types of goods traded are generally agricultural and plantation products of the local community. When the harvest season arrives, traders in the floating market will exceed the number of usual days. Apart from the harvest season, activities in the floating market are busy on market days, namely every Friday.

In addition to fruits and vegetables, local cakes are often traded by traders. There is also a heavy breakfast with the mainstay menu of soto banjar and ketupatkadangan. In order to make it easier for traders and buyers to transact, each kelotok usually provides a stick with a wire hook so that their boats can approach each other.

To get to this location, visitors can use the river route which takes 30 minutes from the city center using a jukung or klotok (motorboat) that can be rented around the Martapura River. In addition to the river route, visitors can also use the land route. However, it takes more time, around 1 hour using 2-wheeled or 4-wheeled transportation.