Fodor's Expert Review Sandakan Memorial Park

At the site of the World War II Japanese POW camp, where the infamous "death marches" to Ranau began, Sandakan Memorial Park commemorates the 1,800 Australian and 600 British soldiers imprisoned here—of which only six escapees survived—along with local residents who risked their lives to assist them. Today, the grounds are a quiet wooded area dotted with rusting hulks of machinery from the camp's forced labor program. A pavilion at the center of park includes testimony from the survivors, plus photographs from guards, inmates, and liberators.