Kanchanaburi, Thailand

Kanchanaburi sits at the confluence of the Khwae Noi and Khwae Yai rivers roughly 130 km west of Bangkok, home to about 55,000 residents. The 1943 Bridge over the River Kwai formed part of the 415-km Death Railway, built by Japan using 180,000 Asian labourers and 60,000 Allied prisoners of war, of whom roughly 100,000 died. The 1977 Thailand-Burma Railway Centre and the 1944 Kanchanaburi War Cemetery, holding 6,982 graves, document that loss, while the 1980 JEATH War Museum displays period artefacts. Sixty-five kilometres north, Erawan National Park protects a 1,500 m seven-tiered waterfall. What remains of the railway today still draws visitors for reasons few expect.