Atmos

Gold Coast Suns riot act to Campbell Brown, Maverick Weller, Joel Wilkinson, Jacob Gillbee after brawl

The Australian
September 16, 2011

Four disgraced Gold Coast Suns players involved in a drunken brawl at a holiday resort in Thailand will be read the riot act by club officials.


Seedy ... Campbell Brown in a police station in Koh Phanghan.

The brawlerupted when a verbal argument escalated between Weller and another man, believed to be a member of the Australian defence forces on holiday from Perth.

A friend of the unnamed Australian then allegedly hit Weller.  Brown allegedly jumped to his teammate's defence and punched the second man, who was an off-duty Thai police officer.

All four Suns players were taken into custody and transported back to the mainland.  Brown, while seated with his hands tied behind him, was then allegedly hit by one of the police officers questioning him.

read more

Also report in ThaiRath here (Thai language)

Chantaboon Festival 9-11 September 2011



The   forefathers  of  the  community  gathered  here  300  years  ago  and became a  centre  of  agriculture,  transportation  and  trade.
The  population of the community consisted  of  Thais,  Chinese  and Vietnamese.
These  people  lived  along  the  banks  of  the  Chanthaburi  River, row houses along a 1km piece of road now named Sukhaphiban  Road
The  houses  in  the  community  are a mix of Chinese  wooden  town  houses, Thai-Chinese  buildings, European  buildings  and  Chino-Portuguese  buildings.
Gallery of historic pics here

****

We headed into the city Friday evening, 12km from home.

Better than your average festival I thought  - 1km plus some side streets closed to traffic and many of the lower floors of houses opened up as display areas; good variety of food available reflecting the mixed cultures of the inhabitants; displays included the

• Chanthaburi Old Bicycle Club - oldest bikes on display were from 1930s - Royal Enfield, Philips, Rudge, and two from Dayton and about 20 more
• Chanthaburi Vintage Motorcycle Club - mainly restored 60s Japanese bikes, also Puch, MZ, and two from the 1930s - Triumph and BSA
• Gemstones and jewellery, some for sale, some display only, featuring locally-mined rubies and sapphires
• One large and two smaller soundstages
• Art and photographic exhibitions

The road is narrow - one lane at best, things got too crowded and we left around 9.30pm when it was getting difficult to move, having made it the full length of the road, and across the river bridge to the Catholic Cathedral which is part of the 'community', being the latest church they have built (this one finished 1909) since the first in 1711.

Near the bridge there is a series of murals showing houses that were there until major floods in 1999 washed them away. Being so close to the river, flooding a few times per year must be just part of normal life.

Didn't take many pics as intended to go back Saturday, but the rain set in, really set in, and by Sunday the water was up and that was, as they say, the end of that!

mentioned this place in an earlier thread, here's more detail

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Location

30km from Chanthaburi city. Chao Lao well-signposted on Sukhumvit #3 if you're heading south from Bangkok, Rayong.

Continue north from Chao Lao past the roundabout with the dugong stautues for 3km to Laem Sadet; there are several entrances along about 500m of road on the right hand side; suggest if you're driving, park at the Laem Sadet Aquarium carpark and cross the road, takes you into a seedling nursery area, short bush walk, followed by access to the 1.6km mangrove walkway.

Entry is free.

Couple of maps attached, the Google Earth one gives an idea of the scope of fish/prawn farming in the area

Man chokes to death on flight
By Abby Gillies
5:30 AM Sunday Sep 4, 2011

A woman watched in horror as her boyfriend choked and died while he ate a Jetstar in-flight meal.

She has told how she sat next to his body for the remainder of the 11-hour trip from Singapore to Auckland this week.

Robert Rippingale, 31, was pronounced dead by an onboard doctor 90 minutes into the flight.

Ahead of the Aucklander's funeral yesterday, his girlfriend, Vanessa Preechakul, said she was struggling to come to terms with the death of her "outgoing and generous" partner.

Full article at: NZ Herald

"Chamsom Crocodile Farm and Zoo has a number of crocodiles of different  species as well as other animals
and the facility is surrounded by fruit  orchards.
An excellent way to spend the day and experience the  indigenous wildlife in Thailand.
Elephant shows 12noon and 3pm Saturday and Sunday.
Admission 40 baht adults, 10 baht children."

Continuing our exploration of the surrounding area, the latest ride took us in the direction of Chansom Crocodile Park and Zoo which we'd seen mentioned on numerous tourist websites.

Getting there was easy, heading south on Sukhumvit #3 towards Chanthaburi, a major intersection with traffic lights
- straight ahead to bypass Chanthaburi and head for Trat/Koh Chang
- turn right on #316 and 7km later you'll be in Chanthaburi at an intersection - right 200m to Tesco-Lotus and the road to Tha Mai and beaches, left and ahead will take you further into the city
- left on #3249 heading inland and after 4km, just after temple, school, gas station you're at Chansom Crocodile Park and Zoo

The bad news - turns out this attraction closed several years ago.
It was fairly obvious on arrival that this was no longer an attraction at all.
Asked at the nearby service station; the woman, when she'd stopped laughing, said it closed years ago, but it was ok to go in and look around.

So in we went, through mature fruit trees, to see rotting/rusted staging area and grass almost 2m tall where I guess the elephant shows were once held.
A slimy green lake about 40 x10m maybe once had crocs for viewing
Making lots of anti-snake noise (does that work?) pushed through the overgrown grass to see what was in the big rusted sheds, started to climb a semi-collapsed wire fence when I saw the water area inside.
Crocs - lots of them, biggest maybe 3 - 3.5m long and very broad/big across.

Worked out they couldn't get to me - unless they had a side-exit, and they were certainly interested in this new visitor (lunch?), with several lurching their way off the bank from their sunbathing and cruising across to near where I was.
Partner by this point was in a panic, she didn't believe me at first when I said to have a look, and had taken off back to the road; I took a few quick pics and left.

She said later it would be the ideal place for if we killed somebody and have to dispose of the body (now I am worried).
There must be another accessway at the back of the sheds, they're being fed - not a skinny one in sight.

So - that's off the things (not) to do list.


*****

Good citizen that I am, came back and Googled for a few tourist websites that featured this place, those that had a feedback option I notified them the zoo was now closed.

TAT Tourism Authority Thailand responded promptly saying they'd look into it, and LaemSing.com a local tourism website responded with a smart: Yeah. The website aint been updated for years either.

Oh well, I tried. And it was a nice day for a ride.