Kratie is a small town located on the banks of the Mekong River and is dominated by a central marketplace surrounded by old, French colonial buildings.
There’s no large scale tourism, but plenty of backpackers pour through here during the peak season.
The river is home to Irrawaddy dolphins, fish, and birds. The flow of the Mekong River at Kratié town varies greatly. There are hundreds of seasonally flooded islands in the river. As of 2007, the Cambodian government planned to build a dam on the Mekong River near Kratié town. The province also contains many forests, the Phnom Pram Poan mountain range, Phnom Prech, and rubber plantations. Eastern Kratié is an important bird area.
The province is mostly covered in dense forest. Craters from Operation Menu bombings during the Vietnam War, some of which are filled with water, are still visible in the countryside. Some land in Kratié is used for agriculture, though a smaller percentage than elsewhere in Cambodia.
The province has a monsoonal climate, with a cool season from November to March, a hot season from March to May, and a rainy season from May to October. Flooding is frequent in Kratié; the Mekong may overflow by as much as 4 m during the rainy season.
Kratié is known for its attractive riverside scenery and its green villages and paddies, and the river dolphins.
Kratié's fisheries are part of the Upper Mekong River Zone, which is important support for migratory species and subsistence fishing but does not play a major role in commercial fishing.
Forests in Kratié tend to be open and less dense than elsewhere in Cambodia; they are generally made up of deciduous trees that lose their leaves during the dry season.
