Cambodia’s highland province: pine ridges, waterfalls and the country’s most credible elephant sanctuaries, where you walk with the herd rather than ride it.
Mondulkiri sits high enough that you will want a jumper after dark — a genuine novelty in Cambodia. The landscape is open, rolling and green, more like a plateau in Laos than the rice plains to the west.
The province is home to the Bunong people and to several elephant projects. The reputable ones have retired their animals from logging and tourist-riding work; you spend the day walking with the elephants in forest and helping bathe them. Nobody rides.
Bou Sra, an hour and a half east, is the country’s most impressive waterfall — a two-tier drop into a forested gorge.
Book the elephant projects directly and in advance — the good ones cap daily visitor numbers and sell out in high season.
November to February — dry, and cool enough at night to need a layer. Waterfalls are at their most powerful just after the rains, in October and November.
7–8 hours by minivan from Phnom Penh via Snuol. Roads are surfaced most of the way.
Walk-with-the-herd day visits; choose projects that explicitly refuse riding.
A dramatic two-tier fall about 40 km east of town.
Rolling grassland ridges best at sunrise, when mist pools in the valleys.
Community-run overnight stays arranged through operators in town.