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The territory of Kep is entirely surrounded by Kampot Province except for the 16km of sea coast on the southern side fronting the Gulf of Thailand and the Vietnamese island of Phu Quoc. The western limit is 20km from the town of Kampot. The eastern limit is some 20km from the Vietnamese border.
Administrative division
It is subdivided into 1 district and 1 municipality:
Damnak Chang'aeur: It is the largest of the province and divided in three quarters – Angkaol to the west, Ou Krasar at the center and Pong Tuek at the east – and 11 groups (krom).[5] It was the place where Australian David Wilson, 29, Briton Mark Slater, 28, and Frenchman Jean-Michel Braquet, 27, were kidnapped by a Khmer Rouge guerrilla unit led by Commander Chouk Rin in June 1994.[6]
Kep Municipality: The municipality, located at the center of the Province, is subdivided into two quarters Sangkat Kep at the east of the Kep Peninsula and Sangkat Prey Thum at the west, and five groups.[7]
Kep Archipelago
The Kep Peninsula enters southwest to the Kep Bay in a triangle. A tiny archipelago of 13 islands (Koh) and islets are located at the east side of the peninsula:
Koh Tonsay (Khmer: កោះទន្សាយ meaning 'Rabbit Island') is located about 4.5 Kilometers southwest of Kep. Tourists are drawn to the two white sand beaches, and the sea is shallow and proper for swimming. At the sea bottom are a variety of corals, sea animals and plants which attract researchers and ecologists.
The name Koh Tonsay is derived from the word Rumsay. While trying to avoid the commander's troops, Prince Sakor Reach grew hopeless because his own troops began to tire. He led his remaining troops across the sea to an island in front of Kep city, where the troops spread out. Accordingly, the island was called Koh Rumsay, Koh Ormsay, Koh Ornsay, and Koh Tonsay, as it is known today. Another version is that, according to many locals who spent there youth in Kep before 1975, the island was previously called Koh Antai. There is no apparent meaning for this word.
Koh Tonsay is 2 square kilometers in area. During then-Prince Norodom Sihanouk's Sangku Reastr Niyum regime, it was used as a place to rehabilitate criminals, who were also used to defend the island. Horse cart paths and wooden, thatch roofed motels were also constructed during this time. Most of this infrastructure has been destroyed by weather and decades of war. Today Koh Tonsay is a major tourist attraction for Kep. There are about 8 khmer run basic guest houses and about 5 restaurants, serving mainly fresh seafood like crabs, shrimps and fish. During the day it can get quite busy with day tourists, who leave around 4pm, so for the sunset there are only a few overnight people there. Electricity runs only from 6-9pm by generators. Water can run short during the dry months (Dec-Apr) and longtail boats with big water tanks are supply the island with water.
History
Under French rule Kep belonged to the Circonscription Résidentielle de Kampot,[9] developing into Cambodia's most prestigious beach town. Established as such in 1908 and named Kep-Sur-Mer it was a thriving resort town for the French and Cambodian elite until the early 1970s.[10]
Constructed between 1953 and 1970 - after French occupation, Kep's modernist villas are unique. Architects Vann Molyvann and Lu Ban Hap who embodied Cambodia's golden age of architectural modernism, blended elements of the modern movement (Bauhaus, Richard Neutra and Le Corbusier) with traditional Khmer architecture, promoted by King Sihanouk - known as New Khmer Architecture.[11]
An old building in Kep
A major misconception about Kep is that during the Khmer Rouge years, much of Kep's French colonial era mansions and villas were destroyed. In fact, local residents, being in need of money and food, stripped down the villas so that they could exchange all these valuable parts in Vietnam for rice and cash.[citation needed] Many of Kep's villas are abandoned, but some of the town's former splendor is still apparent.
The ocean is lined with wide sidewalks and large statues. Prince Norodom Sihanouk not only kept his own villa, but his own island as well. Ile des Ambassadeurs was a favorite spot for Sihanouk to entertain a regular stream of guests.[12][13]
A paved road connects the town with Kampot.[14] Kep's coastline consists mostly of mangrove marshes and black rock rather than the white sands of Sihanoukville, although a beach nourishment with the white sand of Sihanoukville has made the beach wider and cleaner.
There are now more than 60 guesthouses, resorts and hotels in Kep. It is currently one of the fastest developing touristic areas in Cambodia with a focus on mid-range to high-end businesses.
Education
Five schools for secondary education are located in the Province attended by 588 students, of which 246 were females in 2008. In the same year there were 9 kindergartens and 21 primary schools with a total population of 9,644 students.[15]
As a former French settlement, Kep was the seat of French schools like the Sisters of the Providence's School that was closed in 1975 when the Khmer Rouge took power. The building was demolished in early 2012 and the land dedicated to official offices.
The French legacy in education is represented today by the Ecole pour Tous dedicated mainly to children in the area.[16] The province has no university, depending on that in nearby Kampot Province.
The Don Bosco Technical School Kep offers technical training to local young people,[17] and the Kep Gardens Association[18] both institutes for underprivileged children and teenagers.
The Kep International School (KIS)[19] is the first English language school in Kep following a Cambridge curriculum in the mornings and in the afternoons dedicated to Khmer classes such as reading, writing and history, among other topics.
Places of interest
The Rabbit Island (Koh Tunsay) is probably the main tourist attraction in Kep, however the tiniest Cambodian province has many other places of interest promoted from an environment perspective as ecotourism not only by the local government, but also by private initiatives like the Kep Tourist Association that gathers local hotels and restaurants of the Province.
Kep Beach
Kep Beach is located at Kep District, in the tip of the peninsula. The area is the site of several ruined French mansions. Mostly black sand now recovered with the white sand of Sihanoukville.
Jungle Trek is located inside the Kep National Park with an 8 kilometer trek around the Kep hills.[20]
The Butterfly Farm is a private ecological garden in the Jasmine Valley Trail dedicated to preserve the local environment led by expatriate philanthropic persons.[21]
The Don Bosco Birth House Monument was inaugurated in May 2012 as a homage to Don Bosco and it is a reproduction of the house where John Bosco was born in 1816 in Castelnuovo Don Bosco, Italy. It is inside the Don Bosco Vocational Center campus.
The Teuk Chhou Zoo is a private zoo, located 2.5km away from the provincial town in Thmei Village in Prey Thom Commune and is home to a variety of animal and plant species.
Phnom Sar Sear consists of three small mountains spread across a total land area of approximately 1.5 square kilometers. The mountain rises to a height of around 40 meters holding a number of caves. The cave of Phnom Ach Pro Chiev and particularly the cave of Phnom Dam Rey Sar are the best known.[22]
Economy
The economy of Kep Province is rather confined to agriculture, fishery, tourism and salt production. 92% of the province's population was dedicated to agriculture in 2008 (75% rice farming).[23] In that same year there were 10 registered guest houses. In 2013 there were 16 main hotels enlisted by the Department of Tourism and 65 by the local Tourist Association according to www.visitkep.com.[24] Kep Expo is an official initiative to promote Kep Province as a tourist and development spot, its artists, production and environment protection.[25]
Health
In 2008 there were 452 families with a birth during that year. 150 women delivered by a traditional birth attendant and 2 babies died one month after their birth. 6 children under 5 years old died in 2008 and 7 children 9–12 months old did not receive full immunization.[26]
Families depend their water mainly from raining and well sources: in 2008 the 38% of families were using water from ring wells and open dug wells and 33% from pump mixed wells. During the dry season of that year, 78% of families were drinking water from unsafe sources.[27]
According to NCDD 2009 study, 42 families were living with a member contaminated with HIV AIDS, there were 105 registered orphans, 104 families victims of a natural disaster and 11 persons who were victims of land mines and enexploded weapons.[28]
There were 5 clinics registered in Kep Province by 2008 and none hospitals.[29]
Malaria, Dengue and others[30] are current tropical diseases in Cambodia. South coastal provinces are considered of high risk malaria areas,[31] especially islands and jungle territories, where it is advisable to keep precautionary measures against mosquito bites, especially during the raining season.[32]
Transport
Highway No 33 traverses the province from west to east, running from Kampot town to Kampong Trach District then onward to the Vietnamese border. A lane of the No 33 named No 33A detours at the Kep White Horse Monument in Damnak Chang'aeur District, running along the coast before rejoining No 33, some 3km (2mi) to the east.
The province is crossed by the southern Cambodian Rail line linking Phnom Penh and the Port of Sihanoukville with a station in Kep. However, as of 2013 the line is not in operation.[33]
The small port of Kep is served only by small tourist boats sailing for the Kep Archipelago, especially Rabbit Island. There is no scheduled sea link to other domestic coastal ports or neighboring Vietnam and Thailand.
The system of Transport in Cambodia, rudimentary at the best of times, was severely damaged in the chaos that engulfed the nation in the latter half of the 20th century. The country's weak transport infrastructure hindered emergency relief efforts, exacerbating the logistical issues of procurement of supplies in general and their distribution. Cambodia received Soviet technical assistance and equipment to support the maintenance of the transportation network.
Phnom Penh is the capital and most populous city of Cambodia. It has been the national capital since French protectorate of Cambodia, and has grown to become the nation's economic, industrial, and cultural centre.
Articles related to Cambodia and Cambodian culture include:
Kampot Province is a province (khaet) in southwestern of Cambodia. It borders the provinces of Koh Kong and Kampong Speu to the north, Takeo and Kep and Vietnam to the east and Sihanoukville to the west. To its south it has a coastline of around 45 km on the Gulf of Thailand. It is rich in low arable lands and has abundant natural resources. Its capital is Kampot town.
Cambodia is divided into 25 provinces. The capital Phnom Penh is not a province but an "autonomous municipality", equivalent to a province governmentally and administered at the same level as the other 24 provinces.
Kampot is a city in southern Cambodia and the capital of Kampot Province. It is on the Praek Tuek Chhu River southeast of the Elephant Mountains and around 5 km (3 mi) from the Gulf of Thailand. Kampot was the capital of the Circonscription Résidentielle de Kampot under French rule and Cambodia's most important seaport after the loss of the Mekong Delta and before the establishment of Sihanoukville. Its center is, unlike most Cambodian provincial capitals, composed of 19th century French colonial architecture. The region and town are known for high quality pepper, which is exported worldwide. It is also known for its Kampot fish sauce, and durian. The government and the Ministry of Culture and Fine Art have been preparing documents to nominate The Old Town of Kampot for admission to the UNESCO World Heritage Site list since 2017.
National Highway 4 or National Road No.4 (10004) is one of the national highways of Cambodia. With a length of 230 km (140 mi), it connects the capital of Phnom Penh with Sihanoukville in the south-west. Sihanoukville is the only international sea port of Cambodia, making NH4 one of the country's most important highways. The road was built in the 1950s, coinciding with the construction of the port.
Ream National Park, its official name is Preah Sihanouk Ream National Park, is a national park of Cambodia located 18 km (11 mi) from Sihanoukville city in the Prey Nob district of the Sihanoukville Province in south-eastern Cambodia. It was established in 1993, as the Cambodian government began to take action for the protection of the country's threatened natural resources. The national park's biological value is defined by its combination of rivers, forests, mangroves, estuaries, beaches, coral reefs, wildlife, and marine life.
Damnak Chang'aeur is a district (srok) in Kep Province, Cambodia. It is the largest district in the province and a train track from Phnom Penh to Sihanoukville runs through here. The district is subdivided into three communes (sangkat) and 11 villages (phum).
Phnom Voar is a small range of mountains in southern Cambodia. The mountain range is located in Damnak Chang'eaur District of Kep Province, near the border with Kampot Province. This relatively isolated range became notorious as a battleground during the Cambodian Civil War, when it was a base for communist insurgent forces and the target of significant bombing by B-52s and other air strikes.
Sihanoukville Autonomous Port is a government agency and state corporation of Cambodia and Sihanoukville that operates and governs the country's sole deep water port. In Sihanoukville, on the Bay of Kompong Som of the Gulf of Thailand in south-western Cambodia. The port was inaugurated in 1960 as construction of the Old Jetty's four berths had begun in 1955.
Yeay Mao or Lok Yeay Mao is an ancient mythical heroine and a divinity in the local popular form of Buddhism and Brahmanism in Cambodia. She is venerated mainly is in the coastal provinces of the country, especially along the road from Phnom Penh to the sea port of Sihanoukville, as well as in Kampot and Kep. At the Bokor Mountain in Kampot there is a 29 meters tall monument to Yeay Mao inaugurated in 2012, while there is a young version of Yeay Mao in the Kep Beach called Beautiful Lady (ស្រីស្អាត) or Sela waits for her husband (សិលាចាំប្តី), but that belongs to the legend of Mao looking to the west for her lost husband. She is considered the protector of travelers and hunters. Drivers still stop at her shrine along National Road 4 near Phnom Pech Nil to pay their respects and wash their cars with water from the stream nearby, as well as the monument at Bokor.
Sihanoukville Province is a province (khaet) in Southwest Cambodia on the Gulf of Thailand. The provincial capital, also called Sihanoukville, is a deep water port city and a steadily growing and diversifying urban center on an elevated peninsula.
Cambodian vehicle license plates are the license plates attached to most motorized road vehicles in Cambodia, which are required by law. Cambodian license plates display the name of the province where the vehicle was registered. The owner must register the car in the province they live; this can be a different province from where he has his official residence. If the title to the car is transferred to someone else, and the new owner lives in a different province, the number usually changes.
Tourism in Cambodia is one of the most important sectors in Cambodia's economy. In 2013, tourism arrivals increased by 17.5 percent year on year, with business travelers increasing 47 percent.
Sihanoukville or Preah Sihanouk, also known as Kampong Som, is a coastal city in Cambodia and the capital of Sihanoukville Province, at the tip of an elevated peninsula in the country's south-west on the Gulf of Thailand. The city is flanked by an almost uninterrupted string of beaches along its entire coastline and coastal marshlands bordering the Ream National Park in the east. The city has one navigable river, the mangrove lined Ou Trojak Jet running from Otres Pagoda to the sea at Otres. A number of thinly inhabited islands – under Sihanoukville's administration – are near the city, where in recent years moderate development has helped to attract a sizable portion of Asia's individual travelers, students, and backpackers.
Koh Rong is a coastal town in Preah Sihanouk Province of Cambodia. It was formed from the islands of Koh Rong and Koh Rong Sanloem by a sub-decree issued in January 2019. It has a population of around 4,000.
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