Puerto Princesa Subterranean River National Park
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How it came to be
On the west coast of Palawan in the Philippines, limestone karst mountains rise from the sea. Here the Cabayugan River enters a cave and runs 8.2 kilometres underground before flowing straight into the South China Sea, its lower half mixing with seawater on the tide.
The caves hold great chambers of stalactites and stalagmites, and boats can go 4.3 kilometres in from the sea. The park keeps a full mountain-to-sea ecosystem and some of the most important forests in Asia.
The city of Puerto Princesa has managed the park since 1992, the first national park handed to and successfully run by a local government. It was inscribed on 4 December 1999, and in 2010 explorers found that the underground river has an upper level.
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