Bokor National Park rises to over 1,000 metres in the Cardamom Mountains behind Kampot, and near the summit sits the ghost of a French colonial resort town. The Bokor Palace Hotel, the Church of St Michel, the old casino, and various colonial bungalows stand in various states of ruin in the cloud forest, mist rolling through them on most days. The church is remarkably intact — Catholic stone construction, 1920s design, crumbling plaster, mossy floor — and the views from the old hotel over the Gulf of Thailand are wide on clear days.
The site has become complicated. A Cambodian-Chinese development company has been building a new resort complex on the plateau since the early 2000s, adding a functioning casino, a cable car, and various tourist infrastructure. The old ruins now sit alongside brand-new buildings in various stages of completion, which changes the atmosphere considerably. The French-era ruins are still worth seeing; the 1920s casino building near the cliff edge remains standing and can be explored. A motorbike taxi or tuk-tuk from Kampot costs around $15 for the round trip; the road is paved and the journey takes about 45 minutes.