He held the mud crab still with his bare feet whilst deftly tying up the claws with a length of pink raffia. Job done, the fisherman tossed his catch into a bucket. On our request the second fisherman sorted us out half a dozen choice crabs and a bargain was done. Our two boats parted company and we left the fishermen to their work. Sungai Sedili Kecil is not on the tourist track but that’s why I was there as a guest of Wild Asia. Our job was to assess the community based eco-tourism tourism potential of this proposed Ramsar...

Above is a photo of work in progress at BRL. This ‘mock-up’ chalet is now complete and all remaining 8 rooms should be ready by the end of June. We deliberately programmed construction to complete one twin chalet ahead of the others. This approach has proved very useful and has allowed us time to tweak the design without big cost penalties.The photo shows the concrete base of a spa bath which has been installed in six of the ten chalets. As well as being the area of design which as been most ‘tweaked’, this bath also...