IRRAWADDY DOLPHINS

Mr. Phuht drove us north of Kratie to the place where you catch the small fishing boats which will take you out to see the endangered Irrawaddy dolphins (otherwise known as freshwater Mekong dolphins).  As these dolphins are endangered we were a little skeptical as to whether we would actually get to see them – but we did!  There are only about 70 of these cute guys left and they’re dying off faster than they reproduce – probably in part because of river conditions as there are giant sand dredgers in the area and the river has been overfished.  Anyway, they’re adorable…. They don’t have bottle noses like our dolphins  but have rounded faces sort of like Pac Man.  We saw about eight of the elusive critters – and were glad that  our boat boy cut the engine and stayed a respectful distance away from them as we took what photos we could.  The sun was glaring down so brightly on the water that we couldn’t really tell if we were getting the dolphins in our shots or not…. but as you can see, we did catch a few and we had lots of fun.  The legend of the Mekong dolphin is that there was a very beautiful girl who lived on Koh Trong island and her father married her off to a snake because he’d had a dream he would have riches if she married the cobra king.  But after she was deceived into marrying the snake he ate her!  Her father realized that he’d been duped so he killed the snake and cut it open to save his daughter.  She was still alive but now was covered with scales from being in the gut of the snake.  Now, everyone rejected her and gossiped about her because she had scales, so she threw herself into the Mekong to end her misery… and the Irrawaddy dolphins are the girl. 

A typical dolphin-watching boat

 We actually saw the dolphins much more clearly and up close than these photos represent... we just weren't quick enough to catch them with the camera.  To give you an idea of what the dolphins look like I snagged the photo below off the internet: