All language subtitles for 1 1 The.Worlds.Most.Beautiful.Landscapes.S01E04.480p

Right across our planet, there is an
incredible variety of astonishing

landscapes.

One of the most beautiful anywhere in
the world is the Mekong River.

It stretches from Tibet for 2 ,700 miles
to the South China

Sea.

The Mekong crosses great mountain
ranges.

It cascades through waterfalls.

It gathers in incredible lengths.

And the Mekong nourishes one of the most
diverse regions on our planet.

The river's fish are counted in their
billions.

And it

sustains the lives of over 60 million
people.

The mighty river faces great challenges.

So now it's time to appreciate the value
and celebrate the wonders of the

Mekong.

The Mekong River begins its great
journey to the sea in an area that's

called the roof of the world.

The Tibetan Plateau lies just north of
the Himalayas.

It's over 600 miles long and over 1 ,500
miles wide.

The largest plateau on Earth.

still rising.

The movement of a great tectonic plate
below it, the Indo -Australian plate, is

pushing it slowly upwards.

Known as the Third Pole, the Tibetan
glaciers are, after the polar ice caps,

largest source of fresh water in the
world.

They bring water to seven major rivers
and well over a billion people.

According to Tibetan folk stories,
Buddha created the rivers by taking a

sword to the mountains, slicing them
open to release the water.

Tibetans use sacred prayer flags to
bless this life -giving landscape.

Here, the slowly gathering Mekong is
known as Dachu, or River of Rocks.

As it courses down through mountainous
southwest China, the river descends over

4 ,000 meters, carving a long, narrow
valley through rock over 2 billion

years old, and gathering huge volumes of
water along the way.

Until it reaches the border between
Myanmar, Thailand, and Laos, the so

Golden Triangle.

Here, mountain ranges intermingle with
hills in a younger landscape, formed

millions rather than billions of years
ago.

The uplands are no longer barren.
They're covered densely with trees.

Forest surrounds the Golden Triangle for
thousands of square miles, collecting

water and sending it towards the rivers.

vast areas remain, despite the damage
done to the forests by opium cultivators

and loggers.

Much is ancient forest that took shape
after the last ice age.

For thousands of years, the greater
Mekong has been a haven for a mind

array of species.

This is one of the most naturally
diverse regions on the planet.

The Greater Mekong is home to 20 ,000
different plant species.

To 800 species of reptiles and
amphibians.

There are a thousand bird species, like
the great hornbill, fruit -eating lovers

of a densely forested habitat, and
hundreds of different mammals,

including

rare and endangered species like the
white -handed gibbon, which can leap

metres.

It's thought they never come down to
ground level.

And there's another mammal species that
once trod this landscape in their

thousands.

Elephants.

Most of the elephants are gone, the
victims of poaching and habitat loss.

But in Laos, on the banks of one of the
Mekong's many tributaries, is the

Mandalao Sanctuary, where a few can
still be found.

Khun Duan Chang is a former mahout. He
was trained to ride and care for

elephants from boyhood.

Every day, we will bring all of our five
elephants, come down to the Nam Khan

River. They do a bathing, they drink the
water, and they just clean.

Water is very important for the
elephant.

They drink a lot, and they don't have
the stress. They drink at least... 100

150 liters a day of water.

The water at Nam Khanh is very important
for the elephant and for the local

people living here.

These five elephants are among just 800
remaining across Laos.

Five years ago, this sanctuary brought
up 400 hectares of jungle for them to

roam. So this tiny group could live the
same way as their ancestors.

Now we were working with the elephants
to let them go out and eat fresh food in

the jungle.

In the morning, we bring elephants up to
Hue Cane Stream to our 400 hectares.

Big piece of land.

They have a lot of wild jungle ginger
and the vine and a lot of bamboo.

And this is elephant favorite.

The sanctuary wants to help the elephant
population begin to grow once again.

And they have a chance to having a baby
and to increase their population for the

future. They need the big space and big
piece of land and no people

go around them and no poaching and no
hunters.

And the elephants, they have a chance to
go and meet and to breed and have a

baby.

Around half of the elephants left in
Laos survive in the wild.

One day an elephant raised here could
even join them.

I'll go.

We're going to lead the elephant back
into the wild.

But we have one baby bull here.

His name is Kit.

He's four years old.

So he cannot survive right now to send
him back into the wild.

We need more elephants from other
places.

And with Mandalao, we're working with
the Belgium Zoo.

They have baby elephants.

They're going to send back to Mandalao.

At the same time, we're going to lead
them back together into the wild. At

least he has two or three of his
friends, and they can survive, and they

increase their population for the
future.

As the Mekong travels through Laos, its
strength grows as it absorbs a host of

other rivers and collects rainwater from
over 70 ,000 square miles of higher

ground.

The water's path towards the Mekong can
be astonishingly beautiful.

At the Quang Si waterfall, the waterfall
of the deer, the water drops down tiers

of limestone towards a series of
turquoise pools.

Legend has it that the water here was so
beautiful, a golden deer decided to

make the fall its home.

The natural beauty of the area has
inspired human spirituality.

At the meeting point of the Mekong and
the River Nam Khan sits the ancient

capital of Luang Prabang, a spiritual
center for over 600 years.

The city's Buddhist temples are home to
an active community of monks.

Every morning before dawn, they set out
in their saffron robe to collect alms.

Towering over the city is the sacred
mountain, Mount Fusi.

And a little along the Mekong is an
unexpected place of pilgrimage.

Riverside caves with thousands of images
of Buddha.

Next, we follow the mighty Mekong to a
land...

where its water dominates the entire
landscape.

We're following Southeast Asia's great
river, the Mekong, as it travels through

the country of Laos.

Along this part of the river,
traditional cast net fishing is still a

sight.

By the riverside, you might see water
birds, like Asian openbills.

Or even, with luck, the critically
endangered giant ibis.

Incredible birds that grow over a metre
long.

Or water buffalo that are kept to plough
the surrounding farmland.

The Laos stretch of the Mekong connects
to a lake, which is large enough to

stand out from space.

Nam Nguong is also known as the Laos
Sea.

Despite every appearance of a natural
paradise, this is actually a man -made

reservoir, created at the end of the 60s
when Laos built its first.

hydroelectric dam.

The Nam Nguong Dam still generates a
major slice of the country's power.

But the Mekong then tracks its natural
ancient course for hundreds of miles as

it crosses between mountains along the
low -lying plains of the Korat Plateau.

At Sam Phan Bok, the Mekong reaches its
own Grand Canyon.

In the dry season, from December to May,
Sam Phan Bok, or Three Thousand Halls,

reveals a pockmarked landscape created
by the river itself, as whirlpools of

water, loaded with sediment, twisted
into the sandstone riverbed over

of years.

Scientists believe that 800 ,000 years
ago, an area close by on the Bolivian

Plateau was struck by a great meteorite
over a mile wide, throwing debris across

a tenth of our planet.

As the mighty Mekong is just about to
leave Laos, It reaches the widest point

its entire journey, spreading out over
eight miles from shore to shore.

The extraordinary force of this river
has carved out a maze of seven channels

and countless islands.

And just downstream,

is the largest complex of waterfalls in
asia the cone falls

created by an upper layer of hard basalt
rock that resisted erosion by the

water nearly 10 million liters of
waterfall here every second

that's almost double the niagara

falls

Beyond the waterfalls, the Great River
reaches new territory and flows into a

country that lives on the Mekong's
water.

Cambodia.

Here, the Mekong can unleash incredible
force.

When the rains come, floods can overcome
vast swathes of the country.

Overwhelming villages and devastating
crop.

The overflowing water can be seen from
space.

Near the centre of Cambodia, the Mekong
connects to another major river, the

Tonle Sap.

The Tonle Sap naturally changes course.

In monsoon season, the Mekong swells so
much that the Tonle Sap is forced to

flow backwards, away from the sea.

And this river, whichever way it's
flowing, connects the Mekong to the

Tonle Sap Lake.

The Tonle Sap Lake is the largest
freshwater lake in the whole of

Asia.

The life force of the entire Mekong
River system.

Even in the dry season, it covers nearly
1 ,000 square miles.

In the wet season, it expands to four or
even five times that size.

Three million people live on the vast
floodplain of this lake.

Nearly all rely on it for their
livelihood.

From October to March each year, the
lake has always seen one of the greatest

animal migrations on Earth, with fish
arriving here in their billions, making

this the biggest inland fishery in the
world.

Fishing communities here live in stilt
houses or floating wooden homes, able to

cope with any flood.

My job is here.

I don't know if I'm doing it right or
wrong, but I'm still here.

My job is here. I like it here.

My job is here.

I want to stay here and talk to you.

But in recent years, the negative impact
of human activities has begun to be

felt.

Sailor Chayar studies the lake.

She's the project manager for Wonders of
the Mekong, a collaboration between

international universities and the
Cambodian government.

To her, the key to this wonder lake lies
in the surrounding forest, which floods

in the wet season.

But this flooding is benign.

When the forest is under water, fish
hatch and thrive here.

This is Damreng. This is one of the
flooded forest species in the Talay

Normally, in the dry season, you can see
until the roof of the tree.

And in wet season, when the water rise
up, it can go to three meters or to five

meters.

The flooded forest is important for the
fish because they can eat some leaves

and some insects inside the branch of
the tree.

But most parts of the flooded forest are
cleared and converted to the farming

land.

Today, Sailor and her team are meeting
up to analyze how the reduction in

breeding ground is affecting the fish
with the help of local fishermen and

they

fish using traditional giant arrow trap

After collecting the fish, the team
heads back to the floating village to

measure the haul.

Recently,

less water has been flowing into the
lake, the result of more dams upstream

climate change, with lower rainfall
during the rainy season.

Before 2019, the fishermen can catch the
bigger fish between 2

to 3 kilograms per head of fish in the
flooded forest.

And currently, last year, 2020, 2019,
the

water is shallow and not flood the
forest.

It affects the fish. The amount of fish
has declined.

And the number of the big fish also
declined.

The Tonle Sap faces an uncertain future.

The lake also has an extraordinary past.

For just a few miles from here, an
ancient civilization grew to greatness.

Using the water, from these shores.

Our journey along the Mekong River has
brought us over 2 ,000 miles from its

source to Cambodia.

We've now reached a lower lying land,
not too far above sea level.

Butterflies thrive here, like the
swallowtail and nymphalidae.

And plant life changes too. You might
see the red hibiscus.

Or Cambodia's national flower, the
fragrant rumdul, used by Cambodians to

treat dizziness.

Deep in the jungle, not far north of the
great Tonle Sap Lake, lie the remnants

of a civilization of extraordinary
genius.

For centuries, many ruins were abandoned
to the jungle, wrapped in vines, banyan

and silk cotton trees.

In the 19th century, the French rulers
of Cambodia began to push back the

and uncover...

the ruins.

This is the vast ancient city of Angkor.

Angkor was built around a thousand years
ago by the rulers of the ancient Khmer

Empire, which stretched across much of
Southeast Asia.

It's estimated that Angkor was once
bigger than modern -day New York City.

Its greatest temple is known as Angkor
Wat.

Measuring over 400 acres, it's the
largest religious site in the world.

It's no accident that Khmer rulers built
their capital close to the Tonle Sap

Lake.

Experts believe that their civilization
gained its immense power from its

mastery of water.

Angkor is based on a complex system of
canals leading from the Tonle Sap to the

city.

When the Mekong and the Tonle Sap
flooded, water would flow down the

into a series of reservoirs to be stored
and used during the dry season.

It meant that the Khmer could triple
their rice harvest.

Other canals were filled with fish to
feed their people.

All this enabled this great civilization
to flourish for hundreds of years.

But eventually it overreached itself.

Experts think a big factor was the
collapse of Angkor's ingenious water

Overexploitation of the land, combined
with successive droughts and floods,

meant the system couldn't cope.

And when the water ran dry, life here
became unsustainable and its great

were abandoned.

Angkor may have collapsed, but 75 miles
away by river, a modern city uses many

of the same principles.

Cambodia's capital Phnom Penh is also
built on water.

Phnom Penh began life as a village on
the Mekong riverbank, with houses built

wooden stilts or floating on the great
river.

When the French colonized the country in
the mid -1800s, they built on the

marshy floodplain, draining the water
with a system of canals not unlike

The city has always flooded during the
monsoon season.

And that is a challenge for every
building across the city, small and

Architect Tomi Urafal is an expert in
Phnom Penh's unique architecture.

We are here at the Olympic Stadium.

This is one of my favorite places, as my
dad told me when I was young.

This is a public space that's really
important for the people in the city in

1960s and until now.

The place is still used for the people.

They just come to hang out.

They can come together, meet, and
exercise.

The stadium, known as the Olympic,
though it's never staged the Games, was

designed in the 60s by the great
Cambodian modernist architect Van

Van Mollivan came up with the natural
solution with the lights and

The sitting areas open the gap
underneath the sitting place of the gap.

And if we look at the back, we can see
the vertical panel. It brings the

light from outside to inside.

Van Mollivan was a pioneer of what's now
known as green architecture, using

design to adapt buildings to their
environment.

The stadium includes features which
protect it from Phnom Penh's annual

Here is a favorite spot.

We can see the pond is around the
building.

The pond collects the water from the
roof.

You can see the big roof just brings the
water from the top to the ground by the

column inside.

During the late 50s and mid -60s, Van
Molivan built more than 100 buildings in

watery Cambodia.

Two of the best are at the Royal
University of Phnom Penh.

We are at the Institute of Foreign
Languages. The building designed by Van

Molivan in 1965 and finished in 1972.

And here too, managing the flow of water
is key.

Using ponds.

is one of the unique features in Van
Mollivan's master plan.

It's inspired by the Angkorian temple,
what we call the Khmer hydraulic system.

The Angkorian temple, we build the ponds
around the temple and collect the water

from the building.

Van Molivan also built his own concrete
equivalent of Cambodian wooden stilts.

To avoid the flooding, Van Molivan tried
to make the building to raise up the

column. We can see the sitting area of
the students raised on the

cantilever of the beam and the column.

There are fears that Phnom Penh, like
Angkor before it, is developing so fast

that one day it won't be able to absorb
the Mekong's waters.

Land has become so highly prized that
the city's lakes and canals, crucial

sponges for the annual floods, are now
being filled in.

Even parts of the Mekong itself are
being filled in with sand.

But it's generating power for cities
that is an even greater threat to the

river.

The Mekong and its tributaries are being
harnessed, bit by bit, by hydroelectric

dams.

Hundreds of them.

China has built 11 dams on the upper
Mekong.

Across the whole of the Mekong region,
537 dams have been built, and

152 more are planned for the future.

The effects of blocking the flow of the
river alongside drought is even visible

from space.

The river's normal healthy color is
brown.

from the nutrient -rich brown sediment
needed by both farmers and fishing

communities.

In 2020, a NASA satellite observed that
in the dry season, the Mekong had turned

blue, the color of a less healthy river
with shallower flow.

There's a danger that the great Mekong
fish migration will become a thing of

past.

and fields could be starved of nutrients
and water.

On the final leg of its great journey to
the sea, the Mekong River reaches

Vietnam.

Here there is a different type of
forest, mangrove forest, which is found

swamps or coastal salty waters.

Much has been lost to farmland, but
there are protected areas, like the

Flooded Forest.

Here, the most prominent tree is the
Kajaput, a twisting tree unusually tall

such a watery environment.

Trasou is also a sanctuary for 70
species of birds, like oriental

darpers.

spot -billed ducks, and a huge variety
of herons.

As the Mekong presses further towards
the sea, it splits into channels known

the Nine Dragons.

This is the Mekong Delta.

The land averages less than a meter
above sea level.

Much of this region would be sea.

Were it not for sediment that's been
carried here over thousands of years by

Mekong itself, then compacted to form
the land mass.

The Mekong Delta is home to around 20
million people.

Life is lived on the water, with houses
and farms backing onto a gigantic

network of canal.

Over the centuries, around 50 ,000 miles
of canals have been constructed across

the delta, so that during the rainy
season, the Mekong's nutrient -rich

can spread across millions of hectares.

The biggest crop here is rife.

Paddy fields stretch out across the
delta for miles on end.

Wet rice is still sown and harvested by
hand, with three crops every year.

The Delta is one of the most important
agricultural regions on the planet,

producing enough food to feed 200
million people worldwide.

At the center of the Mekong Delta is
Kanto, a water city and the biggest in

region.

It's a city that wakes up early.

And it revolves around one very special
morning event that's only possible to

experience by boat.

Local journalist Chi Mai has been many
times.

getting up before dawn like the rest of
the city.

It's amazing.

come from different provinces in Mekong
Delta and they carry with them proof or

specialties from their hometown, bring
into Cai Rang floating market, trade

local vendors or vendors from other
cities.

And the wholesalers will stay here for
three days or a week until they sell

everything and then take the empty boats
back to their hometown and refill it

before coming back to the market again.
That's how it works and that's how it's

been working for hundreds of years.

Vietnam produces a million tons of
watermelon every year.

A big slice of that makes its way to
this market.

Because it's near Lunar New Year, there
are lots of watermelons. In our culture,

watermelons' colors represent luck.

You know, it's very beautiful to
decorate your house with this kind of

and also it's a season.

So that's why you see most of the boats
here are selling watermelon right now.

There are huge wholesale operations
here, but it's the small traders who

the place buzzing.

She started to sell beverages and coffee
and milk and everything from five when

the market started.

She's been doing this for 20 years.

She used to be a rice farmer, but then
she discovered that this trade makes

money.

For the sellers, the market is their
entire livelihood.

It's common to specialize in one
particular product.

Mr. Phan Van Hu and Mrs. Le Thi Hong
have been selling mangoes for two

But no trip to the market is complete
without a visit to Mr Tran Van Trong.

You put it here and it becomes a table.

By 8 a .m., the market is over and the
sellers disperse so they can recharge

ready for their next busy morning of
trading on the river.

After Kanto, the Mekong is almost at the
end of its great journey, having

traveled nearly 2 ,700 miles from the
Tibetan mountains across six countries.

Just 50 miles on, the Mekong's fresh
waters flow into the salty water

of the South China Sea.