In the course of my work, I’ve been able to visit some exciting out of the way places, but I’m invariably on my own. This means that I tend just to see the conference centre or guest house where I’m staying. After a week or two away from home, I generally just want to get on a plane home, and so I rarely visit any of the exciting natural or cultural sites in the countries that I visit. However, Sue is with me on this trip to Bangladesh and we set aside a few days to make a trip down to the Sundabarn forest in the south of the country – a UNESCO world heritage site. Sadly, our trip didn’t quite work out as planned and our leisurely river cruise turned into two long (and I mean long) days in the bus, with a day on the river sandwiched between them.
For me, the most exciting thing was seeing river dolphins. I’ve always wanted to see dolphins or whales and have never managed. Unfortunately, they wouldn’t stand still for photographs – but here are some of the other highlights.
The boat was very pleasant – a sort of floating front room with chairs and settees – though the river view was better than most TV in the UK.
We had to have an armed guard as we walked through the mangrove swamp. Though, to be honest, I’m not sure the guard could have protected us from tigers as he was too busy stopping Sue from falling into the mud!
We did see evidence that a tiger had passed by in the hour since high tide.
The only wildlife we saw was distinctly less threatening – but beautiful all the same!
The peaceful river traffic of the traditional fishermen in the mangroves contrasted with the industrial rumblings of the ferry port half way home. Our coach is the one with ‘Exclusive’ on the windscreen. It wasn’t a bad coach – but 11 hours is a long journey in any vehicle.
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Awesome. Beautiful photos.
Nice photographs Eddie. I always find it fascinating, the back stories that so many missionaries have in their travels. Thanks for sharing.
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