Diving in Cambodia

Cambodia comprises of the number of picturesque and amazingly beautiful islands, you can already realize that the coasts of this country offer an amazing diving opportunities that will surprise you with the unimaginable variety of soft and hard corals, extensive reef fish, large pelagic animals, and a huge variety of the water life.  

Most of these Cambodia islands are uninhabited, therefore in between your quite exhausting dives you can easily and not ashamingly relax on the white sand or swim along the shore with the diving equipment. The islands are in 1-1.5 hours travel from the coast. Most of the dives take place along the edge of the reef, which is easily reachable by the majority of dive boats. There is often a flow of medium strength, so you can see more by spending less effort just by letting the water carry you along its natural way.

Diving on Koh Koun

Where to dive:

Koh Kon West – this part of the island has 2 bays located to the west.

The stone coast on the edge of the water goes to a depth of 16 meters and then changes to the sandy plateau. The dazzling variety of corals and fish are available here, therefore the island of Koh Kon is named as a first diving destination of Cambodia. At the southern part of Koh Kon west there is a variety of anemones, you can also meet here a stock of box fish, floating near colorful parrotfish and flocks of yellow goat fish. In the north at a depth of about 12 meters you can find sea carp, large snappers and another unique member of the wild water – the stripped fish called sweetlips.

Koh Kon South - the gulf located as the name suggest in the south part of Koh Kon.

The coral reef here starts from the surf and at a depth of 9 meters begins the sandy bottom, the maximum depth in the western part is 14 meters. There are also many beautiful anthozoan coelenterates and an abundance of fish. It's the best place for a night dive as here you can have a swim along with the rare electric blue-spotted stingrays, you can also meet moray eels and bamboo sharks or more rare kind of cat sharks.

Diving on Koh Rong Saloem

Description:

The island is located in the 1-1.5 hours travel from the mainland to the south of the island of Koh Koun. It is much larger than Koh. Kon, and has 3 large and a number of small beaches. In the northern part there is a fishing village counting about 25 huts that provide a sea food of Cambodia for the mainland, a few more huts are scattered around the island. The island is not usually visited by tourists, therefore, it provides a wonderful possibility to enjoy the time on the quiet and clean beaches and also exclusive diving opportunities. Visibility in the waters varies from 5 to 25 meters and is usually at about 10 meters depth.  

Where to dive:

Cobia Point– the place was named because of the number of cobia and kingfish that lived here.

As the name suggests, this place is attractive to many Cobia species. These are large (reaching in size even up to 2 meters) fish-like gray reef sharks. And, although they are not dangerous, they are very curious, and often swim around divers and will not leave you until the end of your dive that can be a bit annoying and stressing, especially if you do not know anything about the character of these sharks. The diving in this place is also amazing because of the gradually declining slope of the depth of 18 meters is covered with magnificent corals. The place is often characterized by the quite strong current; therefore it is usually a drift dive.

Also you can read the next part about diving in Cambodia.