The dawn gibbon trek is the park's signature. Groups leave before first light to reach a habituated family of southern yellow-cheeked gibbons as they begin their morning song — a duet that carries for a kilometre through the canopy. It is the most reliable gibbon encounter in Vietnam and needs booking the day before.

Crocodile Lake — Bau Sau — is a wetland reached by a jeep transfer and a forest walk of several kilometres. Siamese crocodiles, reintroduced here, are visible from the ranger station, along with waterbirds and, at night for those who stay over, a real chance of larger mammals coming to drink.

The night safari along the park road produces sambar, wild boar, civets and porcupine in the spotlight, and is one of the easier ways to see mammals in a forest where daytime sightings are rare.

Dao Tien Endangered Primate Species Centre, on an island in the river, is a rehabilitation facility for gibbons, langurs and lorises rather than a wild site, and is worth visiting for the context it gives to what the forest has lost.

The dry season from December to May makes the trails and the Bau Sau walk far easier. Birding is strong year-round, with Germain's peacock-pheasant and orange-necked partridge among the sought-after species.

A note on what is no longer here

Cat Tien held Vietnam's last Javan rhinoceros. The final individual was killed by poachers and the population was declared extinct in 2011. It is worth knowing that when you walk here — the forest is still rich, and it is also a place where something was lost within living memory.