Loango National Park is a national park in western Gabon. It protects diverse coastal habitats, including part of the Iguéla Lagoon, the only significant example of a typical western African lagoon system that is protected within a national park. Situated between the Nkomi and Ndogo Lagoons, Loango National Park is considered one of the best spots on Africa's western coast. The naturalist Mike Fay called Loango "Africa's Last Eden", and this is where Michael "Nick" Nichols from National Geographic took his well-known pictures of surfing hippopotamuses. Both men call Loango the 'Land of surfing hippos'. The park spans of savanna, beach, forest, and mangroves. Loango National Park offers extensive panoramas and the opportunity to observe elephants, buffalos, hippopotamuses, gorillas and leopards venturing onto the white sand beaches. After South Africa, the world's largest concentration and variety of whales and dolphins can be found right off the Loango coast. The area has over of uninhabited coastline with humpback and killer whales. Loango is renowned worldwide as a site for tarpon of record size, as well as many other large saltwater fish. The World Conservation Union or International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) classed Loango National Park as a faunal reserve and protected area for conservation. History In 1956, the first regional faunal reserves were created in and around Loango National Park to promote sustainable use of the area’s wildlife and wildlands. In November 2002, President Omar Bongo Ondimba created 13 new national parks in Gabon, putting Gabon firmly on the map. Altogether, the thirteen parks created represent 10% of the landmass of Gabon, one of them being Loango National Park. Very few villages currently exist within the park, as most are located on the opposite bank of the Ngove Lagoon. As such, the park is nearly devoid of people and home only to a vast and spectacular array of terrestrial, avian and marine wildlife. While some of these animals inhabit specific ecological niches to which they have been adapting over time immemorial, others such as elephants and buffalos, range across several landscapes. Tourism and conservation Rombout Swanborn, a pioneering Dutch investor in "Conservation Tourism" developed SCD (Société de Conservation de Developpement). Research, park management and educational activities are performed in partnership with WCS. He also created Africa’s Eden, developing the infrastructure and logistics to provide high-end nature tourism experiences in remote parts of Gabon (and from