Koh Kong

Koh Kong (ខេត្តកោះកុង) is Cambodia's south-western corner, where the Cardamom Mountains meet the Gulf of Thailand and the Thai border runs a few kilometres west of town. The Cardamoms behind it hold one of the largest remaining rainforests in Southeast Asia, still home to Asian elephants, sun bears, pangolins and fishing cats. The Tatai river cuts down out of these hills over a broad rock shelf that becomes a torrent in the wet season and a chain of swimming pools in the dry. East of town the Peam Krasop sanctuary protects some twenty-four thousand hectares of mangrove threaded by tidal channels, crossed on a boardwalk that ends at an observation tower. Offshore lies Koh Kong Krao, the country's largest island, and south along the coast the Botum Sakor peninsula forms Cambodia's biggest national park.