For New Years 2007, we took a four day trip through the Sundarbans jungle, organised through an NGO that one of the VSO volunteers works for.
Tom and Georgia both took some stunning photos. Here’s a little story of our trip, cartoon style. For my full write-up, you can go here. (All photos by Tom Wipperman unless otherwise stated).
We started the journey from Khulna, travelling on this boat, operated by Rapuntar Eco-Tourism.
The Sundarbans are a littoral Mangrove forest, stretching across the South-West coast of Bangladesh. Covering over 3000 sq km, over a third of the area is water.
Almost no-one lives there all year round, but you might see the occasional fishing village, and boat-trains of fisherman, or supply boats. The boat-train and banana boat pictures were taken by Georgia.
There is an astonishing variety of birds, reptiles and mammals, which you would be hard-pressed to find anywhere else in the world, due to the Sundarbans unique environment. The Sundarbans are also home to the Royal Bengal Tiger, which we all were desperate to see. Although it also meant we had two guards, who also were incredibly knowledgable about the area. The guard’s photo was taken by Georgia.
In the early mornings, we were able to go on a small boat up the small channels. The dawn breaking through the mist was spectacular.
The days were spent enjoying the scenery, reading books, and wrapping up against the cold!
We were also able to walk across the some of the plains, and on New Years day itself we reached the Bay of Bengal and hit the beach.
We also went on land later in the afternoon, when dusk was setting in, and the barren scenery was spectacular.
The Sundarbans also gifted us some incredible sunsets.
We said goodbye to the guards on the fourth day, which meant we were now back in civilisation and safe from Tigers. We never saw one!
We were lucky though, because we travelled back to Dhaka from Khulna on the ‘Rocket’.
The Rocket is a paddleboat that dates from 1929, was of the few surviving relics of Bangladesh’s colonial legacy. We left the docks at about 2am, for a 30hr journey up through Bangladesh.
We were very fortunate to be able to travel first class, and spent the morning enjoying tea on deck, and exploring the boat, which still has many original fittings. As the journey went on, more and more people crammed on to the boat. Unfortunately, the Rocket also had preserved its steerage section, which was right next to the huge engines.
Eventually the next morning we arrived in Dhaka, coming in through the fog back to an urban jungle, all too different from the one we had left behind.
the sunderbans looks like another world. the photos are amazing as well, they have a surreal quality on some of them, esp the sunset ones.
Hya Tom I was looking for the Rapuntar Boat address and came accross these. They are great. Well done. Can you please mail the link for this page so I can send it to my son who is coming out in August and wants to go to the sundarbans.
Love
Fi
What about the famous animals and birds?
photos are very attractive & interesting.it is also very good guide before going to sundarban.travel agent name is not mention which start from priya cinemain the morning,which is to be mention so that we can contact them for tour.best wishes & bye.
I have already committing social work through an NGO namded Mayurbhanj Joint Citizen Centre(MJCC)since 1996. I want to join such like trip. It is nodoubtely an excursion not only enjoy but also a new experience scope to gather.
I therefore cordially requested that you will kind enough and you will take me and thereby oblige.
Very nice & touchy photographs. Close to the nature.
B.R.Roy
very nice ……………natural school in the sundarban …………..
THE SUNDARBAN IS BEST PLACE FORTRAVELING.I LIKE SO MUCH SUNDARBAN.BECAUSE THE SCENERY OF SUNDARBAN IS VERY NICE.
I loved those pictures.I would request other turists if they got such as photos of nature of BANGLADESH,to put them in net.
Its just a heaven!just feel the silence and darkness of the another world..
Its a different world,can’t explainable,just go and feel the beauti of jungle,its out of imazine,plz save our tresure.save tiger…love u sundarban
We proud of sunderban.its unexplanable beauti…go and stay at the deep of the jungle,and gather the proper knowledge of silence
Incredible.
vary nice sundarbans
Hi! I’m at work browsing your blog from my new iphone! Just wanted to say I love reading through your blog and look forward to all your posts! Carry on the fantastic work!
I’ve been surfing online more than 4 hours today, yet I never found any interesting article like yours. It’s pretty worth enough for me.
Personally, if all web owners and bloggers made good content as you did, the net will be much more useful than
ever before.
I’m not that much of a internet reader to be honest but your blogs really
nice, keep it up! I’ll go ahead and bookmark your site to come back in the future. Many thanks
Gday! My name is Lourdes and I personally just wanted
to say your blog rocks! It’s surprising because I use to have a web site that practically had an identical url: https://deepinthedesh.wordpress.com/photos/sundarbans-photos/ mine was only a few letters different. Anyhow, I’m a big fan of your blogging site and
if you ever would like a guest post you should email me
personally at: lourdesfincher@gmx.net. I love writing!
ame eid jabo but kissu cenena to kau ki help korba amay,
i have another experience at sundorbon that’s realy dream world if you don’t visit that then u miss a lot………………………………………………..
……………………………………………….. shahidul islam from khulna.
This is very attention-grabbing, You will be an overly specialist doodlekit. We have become a member of your own feed as well as sit up with regard to seeking even more of a person’s fantastic posting. In addition, I’ve contributed your blog inside my social networks
Very beautyful