Vietnam
Tra Su Cajuput Forest
Wooden boats sliding silently across a swamp carpeted completely in neon-green duckweed.
The duckweed is so dense it looks solid. The rowing boat pushes into it and the green surface parts reluctantly, closing behind the stern as if the forest is sealing itself shut. No engine now — just the paddle, cajuput trees rising from the water on stilted roots, and, when the day is kind, painted storks watching from the canopy.
Tra Su is a flooded cajuput forest in An Giang Province, part of the Mekong's flood-pulse world, transformed by the seasons: in high water from roughly September to November the forest floor drowns and the surface wears its carpet of brilliant duckweed. The managed circuit runs a motor boat through the outer channels, then hands you to a paddled sampan for the silent inner forest, with raised walkways and an observation tower for the flood's height. More than seventy bird species nest in the canopy — painted storks, oriental darters, cormorants — with the flooded forest as their larder. Around it all stretches the delta, one of earth's most productive wetlands.
Couple
Gliding in silence across a neon-green swamp beneath the nesting colonies — surreal, slow and unforgettable.
Family
Children scan the canopy for nests and take-offs — the forest keeps them guessing, and that is the fun.
- Paddled sampans push through a solid carpet of duckweed that parts and closes behind you.
- More than seventy bird species nest in the cajuput canopy — storks and darters among them.
- The cajuput trees stand in the water on stilted roots — a forest afloat for a season.
- In flood season the walkways and tower lift you over chest-deep water.
Bông điên điển — sesbania flowers — stirred into sour soup, the delta's flood-season green.
Cá linh — the little fish that arrives with the rising Mekong, fried crisp or simmered sour.
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