The Swamp of Farbish Nork
Making out over further unknown terrain for a few more days, I became completely lost in more forests of unusual nature. At last, after many nights in a tent under some great tree, I came to a small little hamlet on the edge of a swamp. After resting there for two days in a small and dilapidated inn, I decided to explore my surroundings. So, gathering my camera and notebook, I set off in a small rented boat to find the weird and unusual for my travel log.
I'm not sure what I expected to find. What started out as a day journey, turned into a few days: I became lost in the thick tangles of ever stranger trees, sounds, and fogs. It became dark sooner than I expected. Fortunately, my little rowboat was large enough to sleep in. And, of course, I never travel anywhere without my mosquito net! Experience has taught me to be prepared in many situations. Oh, but how they buzzed during the night, and the strange croaking of frogs and other animals that I couldn't see kept me up in the velvet warm darkness that surrounded everything around me. The swamps truly came alive at night, and I was trying to sleep! But in the end, exhausted from rowing all day, I fell into a deep sleep beyond the noises of waking that blared on around me.
When I awoke, it was already light. Some of the mist had dissipated and I was in a strange place...even for a swamp. The trees here were contorted and twisted into a weirdness that defied many other places I had frequented throughout my adventures. And the colors! Like a rainbow splashing it's paint cans in frenzied attempt to confuse and dazzle the beholding eye! The ground itself was multi-hued; a strange, sponge-like, material not wholly unlike a sort of moss. It was something out of a strange fantasy dream that I might have had one night, only it was real. Yet I was a little apprehensive. Truly, this sight was worth the seeing, but how could I get back? I did not know. I feared to touch the least thing here, for as everyone knows, many plants in a swamp are poisonous to the touch. So I could only look, and carefully guide my boat around the potential and unseen dangers that lurked in every corner to capture the unwary traveler in their honeyed snares.
Yet, finally, I did find my way back. I was not a mile from where I had started, and the smoke from the house chimneys guided me like a beacon far above the treetops. I later learned that the inhabitants themselves use that smoke marker to find themselves a way back home when they go deep into the swamp. They also informed me that there are many such areas in the swamp, and that I was wise not to have touched anything, for many unwary people have been caught in the tangles of the trees of Farbish Nork, never to return.