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I'm in the backwaters of Vietnam.
And this is Crocodile Lake.
Aptly named, because I'm sharing it with 120 crocodiles.
That's not the animal I've come here to see.
DOMINIC MONAGHAN: I've come in search of
a fascinating aquatic assassin.
The remarkable giant water bug.
It's a merciless predator.
Extremely quick, it catches its victims with spear-like front legs.
And then injects a flesh-liquefying toxin.
Let's just hope I find it before the crocodiles find me.
(ALARM BEEPING)
I'm Dominic Monaghan.
All my life, I've been driven by two strong passions.
Acting, and wild creatures.
Since I was a kid, I've dreamt of travelling the planet
to get my hands on the rarest...
Scary...
...and most dangerous animals out there.
And now, I finally have my chance.
Wow! This is what it feels like to be walking in Vietnam.
And I'm in Vinh Long, on the banks of the Mekong River,
looking for the giant water bug.
But don't let that name fool you.
These are one of the most aggressive predators of the insect world.
Check this out.
This is a very peculiar bug.
Its front two legs are almost like pincers,
that it uses to latch onto its victims.
And then its mouth is a needle-like straw,
and it uses this to inject a toxin that liquefies the insides of its dinner,
which it then sucks up like a milkshake.
Their bite is excruciatingly painful.
And it's strong enough to take down animals 10 times their size.
Amazing, when you consider that a full-grown adult can be as big as three inches!
I've come here to try and see one of these perfect predators in action.
But because they're water bugs, I need to get hold of a boat.
Finding one shouldn't be too hard.
Vinh Long lies on the shores of the mighty Mekong River,
and it seems like most of the locals make their living on the water.
But since I don't speak Vietnamese,
convincing someone to take me in search of the water bug
is a little challenging.
Hello. Do you speak English?
Is this your boat?
Bummer.
Are you going downriver?
Go downriver?
Are you... Are you taking this boat down...
Okay. Do you speak English?
No.
I think this is the universal sign for "no".
Or, "You're scaring me a little bit."
Is this boat leaving?
-Do you speak English? -Yes, little.
-Are you going downriver today? -Oh, yes.
-Can I come with you? -Okay, sure.
-I'll pay you some money? -Yes.
Okay.
Sweet result. And he speaks English.
Let's go.
After leaving Vinh Long, I'll head 13 miles downstream
into the heart of the massive Mekong riverbed.
It's one of the most bio diverse places on the planet.
And I'm hoping it's the perfect hunting ground for the giant water bug.
But first, I need to pick up some supplies.
And when you're travelling on the Mekong,
you don't even have to leave the boat.
So it seems like we're just heading into the start of a floating market.
Food, water, drinks, coffee, fruit, all that kind of stuff.
Do you want anything, Phu? Do you want some fruit?
Uh, yes, I want some, uh, watermelon.
MONAGHAN: Okay, we'll get some watermelon.
Hey, can I get two of those?
All right.
Don't know what I was doing at his age,
but I certainly wasn't selling pineapples and bananas.
He's charging me Western prices. Thanks.
Good luck.
Can I get three pineapples?
(SPEAKS VIETNAMESE)
My mom couldn't do that.
I could do a coffee at this point.
(SPEAKS VIETNAMESE) Thank you.
Oh, it's sweet, strong coffee.
It's like a floating Starbucks, that.
I wonder if the pirate days were this decadent, you know?
"Good morning, Blackbeard." "Uh, the latte, please, thank you."
Suitably caffeinated,
we check out some of the stranger items for sale out here.
Look, they've got a ton of dragon eggs over there.
Looks like they're about a month, maybe six weeks away from hatching.
(WHOOPING) Nice! This lady makes noodle soup.
(SPEAKS VIETNAMESE)
Mmm!
Sorry about that. So that was cool.
Managed to have some cracking breakfast, and pick up some produce,
whilst constantly making progress downriver.
It's great to see this fully functioning market
just floating around on the Mekong.
Excellent way to start my day.
And now, we go looking for the giant water bug.
I didn't expect the Mekong Delta to be so busy.
Everywhere I look are boats, buildings,
but water bugs prefer more isolated hunting grounds.
So I've told Phu to head for the more remote tributaries that feed this river.
Hours later, we leave the main artery of the Mekong,
and I get a taste of the Vietnam I've been dying to see
since I first saw my favourite film,
Apocalypse Now.
For a long part of the movie, it's based on the Mekong River.
And this is getting a little closer to that feeling,
that kind of claustrophobic feeling.
The trees kind of...
It's falling in on you a little bit.
(INSECTS CHIRPING)
The sound of the jungle, the atmosphere.
So, just kind of walking in my favourite movie is a bit of a thrill.
Just have to find the water bug next.
Hey, wait, slow down, Phu. Slow down, slow down, slow down, slow down.
Look at the size of that snake!
Watch out, watch out!
Pythons like these are voracious predators.
But since they rarely attack humans,
I'm gonna take my chances and get up close and personal with it.
(GRUNTS)
This is an absolutely huge snake.
Massive reticulated python.
I'm just trying to uncoil this guy.
Wow, is this thing strong!
(WHISPERS) Please don't bite me at this point,
that would not be a good thing.
Look at that snake.
Oh! This is taking all my strength, just to hang on to this snake.
(GRUNTING)
Huge python.
Wow. Phew! Look at the size of this thing's head.
Wow. (GASPING) It's pretty much taking all of my strength
just to try and keep it in this position.
And as I'm doing that, it's exerting a little bit of its strength,
and just pushing its weight down on me.
When they get to this size, they're probably eating dogs, pigs, maybe wild deer.
A snake like this might be able to eat a human.
And if it did that, it probably wouldn't need to eat for a year or so.
When they get to this size, they don't really see humans as a threat.
And so they become a little bit more gentle,
which is the only reason why I'm taking a few liberties with this snake.
(STRAINING) But it is heavy.
Just hanging on to this guy is a bit of a challenge.
I'm just absolutely loving the privilege
of spending some time
with such a majestic animal.
Wow!
A stupendously beautiful animal.
And now, we're both tired.
It is an interesting sensation
to feel a ginormous reticulated python breathing into your ear.
There's not a huge amount I can do about it.
And to be honest, I'm just enjoying the fact that he's doing it.
I'm going to let this guy go now.
Just gonna gently release him
and see if he wants to
take his ginormous girth off of me.
See you later, buddy. (GRUNTS) There you go.
And it just keeps on going.
This is the very last piece
of the largest snake I've ever had the pleasure of hanging on to.
Now, give me a little kiss.
Good luck, buddy. Man, that was fun.
Back on the water, my quest to find the giant water bug continues.
They tend to hunt on the surface, near vegetation.
So I'm hoping to snag one with a net as we sail past.
Just not sure
if we're in the prime spot to find these water bugs.
Hey, Phu, do you know anywhere around here
where the water is a little more shallow
and maybe there's more plants in the water?
Hmm. What do you think about rice paddy?
Rice paddy?
Yeah, because they...
They have standing water, right?
-Yeah. -Yeah, is there one nearby?
Yes, we can go there.
Okay. Yeah, let's do that.
Every year, the nearby rice fields are flooded with water
during the planting season.
And the still, shallow pools that result
should be perfect habitat for our water bug.
It's clear we've come to the right place,
as we quickly learn that this farmer is no stranger to the water bug.
(SPEAKING VIETNAMESE)
All right, well, I'll be careful.
Thank you.
So this absolutely beautiful field all around me is a rice paddy.
So since the water bug lives just underneath the surface of the water,
usually surrounded by, or hanging onto vegetation,
I'm just gonna gently sweep my net through this shallow water.
I can see what I can get is a lot of mosquito larva.
I'm finding all of its prey, but no water bug.
Flooded rice paddies like this one
are magnets for all sorts of aquatic insects.
They're also prime territory for venomous snakes.
Every year, up to 30,000 farmers get bit working in the paddies.
And you're not gonna see them in these quite high grasses.
I mean, this field is absolutely huge.
I could be in here for weeks.
Oh, cool. Just get out of this rice a little bit.
This is a water scorpion.
And they're very closely related to the giant water bug.
It's a very, very effective predator.
And it will sit just under the surface of the water,
and they'll wait for something to come past close enough,
and they'll dart out these little claws at the front of their body.
And this little tail-like looking thing
is actually how this little insect breathes.
It'll stick this little straw just slightly out of the water and breathe air.
It's almost like a rudimentary snorkel.
It's a very alien-looking species.
I think I've tired this guy out enough, so I'm gonna put him back.
So tell your cousins to come hang out.
See you, man. Go on, dude.
I feel like I've been here long enough to watch the rice grow,
but there's still no sign of our giant water bug.
So with night approaching, it's time to head back to Phu's boat.
So that was kind of fun.
Got to see some absolutely beautiful rice paddy fields.
And I got to see a water scorpion,
which is kind of cool, related to the water bug...
Oh, wait, there's a snake right here, there's a snake. Look!
Hey, go this way, go this way.
It's a cobra... (WHOOPING) ...snake, just coming right towards us.
It's okay, baby, it's all right.
Let's get it in this open field right here.
Come this way, come this way.
(WHOOPING)
This is a monocled cobra.
One of the more skittish
and unpredictable cobras in the world.
What an amazing animal!
You do not wanna get bitten by this snake.
Absolutely tiny amount of venom
would send you racing to the hospital pretty quickly.
If you get there any less than 35-40 minutes,
you could very, very easily die from heart failure.
They're not in any way intimidated by humans.
From this distance, he could probably strike at my hand.
I'm not letting this part of its body get out of my hand,
'cause as soon as I do, that could spell a real problem for me.
Whoa!
So this is a very typical cobra stance.
Very intimidating to see this in the wild.
This is one of those signs in nature that is extremely easy to understand.
It's a very, very clear communication from a wild animal.
"And if I need to, I'm going to hurt you."
It's getting a little tweaked by the camera.
So it's gonna lean its head all the way back,
which is what it's doing right now,
and then when it feels it's in the strike zone, ***! It's going to strike.
Whoa!
You know what? I don't want to stress this guy out a little bit too much,
so I'm just gonna try and calm him down before we let him go.
We don't want a cobra that's annoyed when we let go of his tail.
So if you just back up a little bit,
it should just start to calm down.
When agitated, these guys are highly unpredictable.
And once freed, this cobra could easily come after me or my crew.
And these little droplets of sweat spell adrenaline.
(EXHALES)
Given my lack of success on the delta, it's time to turn to an expert.
I'm heading to Ho Chi Minh City
to meet a biologist who's agreed to help me complete my mission.
Ho Chi Minh City lies some 60 miles northeast of the Mekong Delta.
To get there, I'll use a network of canals that serve as a sort of floating highway.
And 12 long hours later, we reach our destination.
These lights behind me are the beginnings of Ho Chi Minh City,
previously Saigon,
a place steeped in history.
And arriving into it under the cover of darkness, on a speedboat
just makes it that much more mysterious.
This is a place I've wanted to visit since watching my all-time favourite film.
Martin Sheen, in a hotel room, losing his mind, in Saigon.
Apocalypse Now. So sweet.
Just can't wait to jump off this boat and start checking out this place.
Saigon.
Historic Saigon.
It's a bustling metropolis of seven million people.
And while it's technically a communist country,
capitalism is clearly alive and well.
I love night-time street markets in foreign countries.
(BELL RINGING)
It's such a great way to pick up on the energy of the place that you're in.
Full of colour and sounds and screams,
and weird smells, and great food and bargains, and scooters.
Hello.
Fun.
(CHUCKLING)
Little of everything. Little, little, little...
Look at that.
This rice is, like, sweet.
With my snack done, I decide to brush up on my haggling skills,
with one of the city's notoriously hard-bargaining merchants.
Seeing if they got any Manchester United shirts.
Oh, it's all Manchester? Whoa!
Let me see, this is small.
Nah, I don't really like that one.
-Too big. -Nah.
I like these two. Is that all you have? Finished?
Special price for you.
No, you dropped it by 40! Come on.
-Come on! -I thought we were friends.
You're hurting my heart.
I don't hurt your heart, you've broken mine harder.
Here's my final offer.
Okay, my love, I'll fall for you, okay?
How come you get to make the last offer? No!
Let me see how much money I got in my special sock.
Cleaned me out.
It's all right, you can keep that.
Come on, give me a hug. Let's hug it out.
-Night. -Thank you.
Thank you, it was nice to meet you.
So that rice that I tried was okay, but it wasn't fantastic.
It was a little bit more like a dessert than actual dinner.
But I am pretty starving.
And I think I know the perfect place to go get a bite.
(INAUDIBLE)
That's busy.
All right.
Can you recommend anything?
(SPEAKING VIETNAMESE POORLY)
I have absolutely no idea what I just ordered.
So this place is called Bo Tung Xeo.
And it's very, very famous around here,
not only with locals, but a bunch of Westerners as well.
The food is really quite bizarre.
They serve some very strange things, such as...
Deep-fried scorpion, fried cricket, barbequed ostrich,
and my particular favourite, steamed *** and balls of goat.
I haven't had that since last Thursday, so I'm really excited. (CHUCKLES)
Beef? Question mark.
Oh, and scorpions.
I spend so much time in the presence of these animals in the wild,
that I think it would be bad karma for me to take a bite out of this guy.
That's excellent.
But there's another reason I've come here.
I've heard that giant water bugs
are sometimes served as a special delicacy in Vietnam.
And if anywhere is going to serve the giant water bug,
it's gonna be in this crazy restaurant,
where they serve all types of different insects.
I don't speak very good Vietnamese,
but I'm gonna see if our waiter knows what I'm talking about.
Do you guys have water bug?
Water bug. It's like an insect, little... (MIMICKING PINCERS)
-You know water bug? -(SPEAKING VIETNAMESE) One moment.
MONAGHAN: I hope he does.
Because although I've seen some incredible things here in Vietnam,
I still haven't been able to get my hands on the giant water bug.
Sorry, sir.
-That's it? -Yeah.
Okay.
So, you know what this might be?
The juice, the essence of a water bug.
(SNIFFS) Wow!
The way to try this, is to dilute it a little bit in fish sauce.
I like spicy food, so...
Very, very strong-tasting.
It's okay.
It's quite overpowering, the taste.
I do feel like that taste is the toxin.
It's this venom, that it has inside it.
Where's my goat ***?
Hello.
Last night, I was able to taste a giant water bug,
but my mission is to get my hands on a live one.
So with just two days of my trip left,
it's time to call in some reinforcements.
Good morning.
I'm here, in this part of Ho Chi Minh City,
to meet up with Bob, my next guide, who's gonna take me
a little bit further into Vietnam,
in my hope of finding the giant water bug.
Bob Sites is an expert in aquatic insects.
And I've been told to meet him here at this bustling market,
where we'll grab supplies for our trip.
While I keep an eye out for Bob,
I can't pass up the chance to grab a couple of things for myself.
What would you be tightening with something that big? Maybe a rocket.
Robot.
Hello, ladies.
-Ten dollars! -17.
Hi. Reporting for duty, sir.
Perfect match.
This market is almost like a miniature version of the city itself, lots of fun.
But around every corner, or in this case, aisle,
are remnants of the Vietnam War.
Wild!
Every single one of these things,
these photos, it's just like someone's memories, someone's life.
Now it's just in this store in the middle of Ho Chi Minh City.
And judging from the amount of stock,
I'm not the only one who wants to bring home
a little piece of the real Apocalypse Now.
Still trying to work out if these lighters are knockoffs or originals.
You can never tell with these type of...
-SITES: Dominic? -Yeah.
-Hey, Bob Sites. -Oh, hey.
-I think you're looking for me. -Yeah, man,
I was losing hope there for a second.
No, I found you. Good deal.
-How you doing? -I'm doing well, how are you?
Yeah, good. You got yourself a bag?
SITES: Picking up a few things for our trip.
So I'm not sure if you know what I'm doing here.
I've actually come to Vietnam to look for the giant water bug.
-Mmm-hmm. -I haven't had a huge amount of luck up to now.
Where have you looked for it yet?
-I was in the Mekong Delta. -Mmm-hmm.
But I felt like I was in an area that was, uh, a little too close to humans.
-Not enough... -Well, they use a lot of pesticides down there.
I think we need to get some place a little bit more remote.
I think we ought to go north.
Um, get away from the populated areas,
head up towards the central highlands.
There's some really remote lakes out there, with a lot of vegetation,
and the lake's a perfect habitat for the giant water bug.
Mmm.
And I think we have as good a chance there as anywhere.
MONAGHAN: Back on the water, we've left Ho Chi Minh City,
and are speeding to our next destination.
We're heading 60 miles up the *** Nai River,
to Cat Tien Park, a nature reserve,
that according to Bob, should be home to some giant water bugs.
Bob spent years studying South Asian insects in remote spots like Cat Tien.
And with his help, I think I can finally have a chance of finding my quarry.
This is the *** Nai River.
Thick, dense vegetation on both sides of the river,
and this quite foreboding-looking,
caramel-coloured water.
Yeah, we're getting into the more remote areas,
away from the population centres, away from the rice paddies.
I think we have a much better chance of finding things up here
in some of the ponds and the swampy areas,
where there's good vegetation.
I think we'll wanna get off this river first of all,
and, uh, and hike inland, into the jungle a bit,
maybe five kilometres or so, to a place I know called Crocodile Lake.
But there's only one problem with collecting at Crocodile Lake,
is that there's crocodiles in it.
And I understand there's around 120 of them in the lake.
-Oh, wow! -It's not that big a lake either,
so there is, uh... It's something to be concerned about,
be aware of.
Yes, of course.
Crocodiles.
Crocodiles.
MONAGHAN: Of course it's filled with crocodiles.
When am I gonna catch a break on this mission?
Then again, given my obsession with Apocalypse Now,
maybe it's only fitting that my own Vietnamese mission is becoming quite the odyssey.
This looks like a good spot up here.
-Where? -Can you cut the engine
and bring us in over here, on the left?
So, we'll get out here, walk 5k through the jungle out to Crocodile Lake.
Sounds like a perfect day.
-All right, you ready for this? Let's go. -Yeah, man.
Now, despite what I'm doing, the general rule of thumb,
is never get out of the boat.
Now I'm keeping my eyes on the ground as well, not only to look out for just,
animals in general...
There are a lot of snakes.
There was a saying, created by the American forces in the Vietnam War,
that there are 100 snakes in Vietnam,
99 will kill you and the other one will crush you.
So you got to watch where you put your footsteps.
MONAGHAN: But as the weather threatens to turn,
it seems I've got more than just snakes to worry about.
(THUNDER RUMBLING)
That was pretty big thunder clap.
And when it rains in this part of the world, it rains.
-You know what that means? -What?
The leeches are going to come out.
-All right. -Southeast Asia, we have terrestrial leeches here.
-And they like these wet trails. -Yeah?
Especially when it's raining or after a rain.
So, I'm putting leech socks on.
I do not want to re-enact a scene from Stand by Me.
For the record, just how big does a land roving leech have to be
to warrant special footwear?
Thanks for mentioning this at the market, Bob.
(THUNDER RUMBLING)
Whoa!
SITES: Sure you don't want to put your leech socks on?
I don't have any leech socks with me.
(LOW) Leech socks?
No one told me about leech socks.
A few minutes later, I start to realize why Bob
always packs his special socks.
There's one.
I'll tell you what, these guys have a heck of a grip.
Leeches have a pretty insane homing ability.
And I think it's based on CO2 levels in the air.
You can see from the little guy down here, that's moving along,
my finger, kind of, excites the leech.
He wants to know where that bit of food is.
Got me.
And the interesting thing is that they tend to frequent these paths
and they pretty much get one shot
to grab onto something's hoof or foot or in our case, our shoe.
(CHUCKLES)
Look at the size of that guy.
This huge leech, right here,
he's just had his dinner and he's just big and fat and swollen with my blood.
They're pretty voracious feeders.
And they'll do it, any opportunity that you can get.
You can see by how big and fat and swollen this leech is.
Check this out.
So this guy's come, from my shoe, I would expect, all the way up.
Ouch!
(GRUNTS) Wow!
Not my favourite part of the day.
Hope that was tasty.
These shoes are a little higher and a little tougher.
Right, let's see where Bob got to.
I can see why Bob suggested this place.
This path is teeming with more than just land leeches.
Oh, look!
It's actually a plant hopper.
Oh!
-Oh, look at the size of this snail, Dom. -Oh, wow!
SITES: It's the size of a baseball.
I've never seen one that size.
Finding this snail bodes well for my mission to get my hands on the giant water bug.
Snails have very sensitive skin,
so if this place was filled with pesticides like that rice paddy,
he wouldn't be doing so well.
So hopefully that means
Crocodile Lake is gonna be filled with more than just crocodiles.
-Here it is. -Oh, nice.
-That's Crocodile Lake, all right. -Beautiful.
You know, Dom, we're running out of daylight really fast.
MONAGHAN: While Bob sees to our campsite,
I'm gonna take a closer look at just what I'll be diving into tomorrow morning.
-Just look at this sign. This is fun, huh? -Just be careful out there.
"Do not feed the crocodile, do not swim in the lake."
Okay.
"Do not use boat at night." (GROANS)
"Do not make loud noises."
I hope that wasn't a crocodile.
(CLICKS TONGUE)
There's supposed to be somewhere around 120
Siamese crocodiles in this lake.
They can reach lengths of about four meters.
And a crocodile from this lake
actually took apart one of the ranger's boats,
and dropped the ranger in the water.
Luckily the ranger survived, but it was a cautionary tale.
The thing about finding crocodiles in the wild,
is that if you go and look for them at this time of night,
when the light is just starting to fade,
they're very, very conspicuous due to their eye shine.
Their eyes shine just like cat's eyes.
So, hopefully,
we should be able to see some eye shines.
And when the sun finally sets,
it doesn't take long to discover that I'm not alone on this lake after all.
Oh, look right there. Look, look straight ahead.
It's when it gets to this time of night
and their eyes shine so brightly that they become so easy to spot.
They're right by the banks, right where I got into the boat.
When you're in the water, you're in the crocodile's domain.
And they will have you for breakfast if they want to.
It's a thrilling experience, but given what they did to that ranger's boat,
I think it's time to get back and check in with Bob.
While I was looking for crocs, he's been working *** our campsite.
What've we got?
Since insects are attracted to bright lights,
Bob's hoping this time the giant water bug will come looking for us.
SITES: I'm encouraged because there's a lot of aquatic things here,
so that tells us that the lake is in pretty good quality.
Good water quality.
That's a pretty beautiful moth.
-SITES: No, it's a hog moth. -No, it's a hog moth.
-SITES: Yeah. -Yeah, wow!
I'm sure the lizards around here must be super stoked.
-SITES: Oh, yeah. -'Cause all this stuff is great lizard food.
Yeah, they almost get hypnotized by the light.
That wind keeps pulling the sheet out. Let's push it back a bit.
Okay.
-Oh, Dom, look at this. -What?
Oh, look, look, look. Oh, sweet, sweet, sweet.
-That's a giant water bug, right? -That's it, we've got it.
-MONAGHAN: Grab it, grab it, grab it. -There it is.
MONAGHAN: I'm watching the way that you grab it.
Their bite is excruciatingly painful,
so they must be handled with extreme caution.
SITES: You just hold it by the sides of the thorax,
above where the legs are, so it can't push away from you.
MONAGHAN: The front two legs and the mouth parts
are obviously the place to stay away from.
That's right. You don't want to get your fingers too close to that side of 'em.
So when these things kill their prey, which is usually a vertebrate prey,
they grab it with these big raptorial front legs
and pull it in tenaciously so it can't get away.
Then with the beak,
it injects those stylets into the tissue of the prey,
whips it around, thrashing the tissue so they become liquefied,
and heart stopping neurotoxins
to immobilise that prey as quickly as possible.
Wow. Well, with that in mind, can I try picking this guy up?
If you're careful.
-Same method as you, right? -Yep!
-Grab it by the sides of the thorax. -Okay.
SITES: That's it, right there.
And these guys have massive eyes. Do they have good eyesight?
Mmm-hmm, yeah. Yeah, they're visual predators.
The front two legs are like lances
and they're actually, kind of, engineered inwards.
SITES: They grab their prey and pull it in and their prey doesn't get away.
So something of this size, what would it be eating, fish, frogs, things like that?
Yeah, any kind of vertebrate prey item that's out there in their habitat.
Fish, uh, turtles, frogs, toads, snakes, uh, birds.
They'll take any, uh... Any vertebrate prey item up to 10 times their size.
-Wow! -These things are perfect killing machines.
There is not a lot about this thing that says, you know, "I'm misunderstood.
(CHUCKLES) "Hold me tight.
"I'm actually a really nice type of guy."
I mean, this looks like something that is built to feed.
That is one of the most peculiar insects
I've ever seen in my life.
Well, I think we put this guy on show enough.
-Maybe we can direct him back to the lake. -SITES: Sure.
Cool.
Thanks, dude.
So that was pretty cool.
You know, the great thing about finding the giant water bug
in our light trap is that I know for sure
that they live in Crocodile Lake.
But the other thing that we confirmed today,
as you can see from some of these eyes shining out there,
is that crocodiles live in Crocodile Lake.
Tomorrow's gonna be fun.
Yesterday, I finally got my hands on the giant water bug.
But my mission is to see one in action in the wild.
I'm just gonna pull out some of the equipment I'm gonna need.
Look at that thing.
Sweet! Underwater camera.
Mask.
I'm gonna go and see if I can document
the giant water bug catching its prey.
And I'm gonna do that in Crocodile Lake.
So I'm hoping I don't become prey either.
(GRUNTS)
Let's do this.
I know that water bugs tend to hunt around the vegetation,
so I focus my search near these lily pads.
But finding a lightning-fast predator in this soupy water isn't going to be easy.
(EXHALES)
Well, I don't know.
It's like zero visibility down there.
And the stems of these lilies are just covered in these very sharp thorns.
Phew! Pain is temporary, film is permanent.
Whoo!
So, I've not managed
to see the giant water bug yet,
but they must be around here. This is absolutely perfect real estate.
And if you get tagged by one of these things,
their front pincers will grab hold of you,
and then their beak-like mouth will stab you
and inject a pretty vicious cocktail
that's supposed to be very, very painful.
Making things worse, as I hunt for the giant water bug,
I need to make sure nothing's hunting me.
Every minute I spend in here increases the odds
that I'm gonna encounter one of this lake's crocs.
(OMINOUS MUSIC PLAYING)
And surprising a crocodile, or knocking it on the head with my camera,
or standing on top of it,
is kind of foolhardy
and potentially life-threatening.
I'm not sure if any of this is a good idea.
One's got a fish. One's got a fish right here.
(INHALES DEEPLY)
It's a water bug, and it looks like it has speared a fish.
Wow. It did. It did have a fish.
I think he didn't quite have a good enough handle on it.
But there are fish down here, and there are water bugs as well.
But unfortunately, despite another exhaustive search of the area,
it's vanished.
And given how much I've pushed my luck with these crocs already,
I think it's time to declare a partial victory and head for the shore.
Whoo!
That was a pretty bizarre
but fun experience with the giant water bug of Vietnam.
And I got a chance to see it doing its thing in the water.
One epic adventure in Vietnam.
I had some of the best snake experiences of my life,
I had some of the most delicious food,
and I guess the new piece of advice to heed
is always get out of the boat.