Sattahip - Military City

I was out of town for 3 days. Some "duty visit" to Sattahip. There's a Royal Thai Navy base at the town's Chuk Samet Harbour. Actually, the Sattahip Commercial Port is owned by the Thai Navy. So it's not that "commercial" afterall. The U-Tapao International Airport (the only "international commercial" flight operating regularly to and from the U-Tapao - IATA Code: UTP would be the Korean Airways' flights from Incheon Airport) which is within the Chonburi Province, which Sattahip is in as well, is more a military airport than commercial. The US military uses it whenever there are exercise requirements. The Thai Crown Prince Maha Vajiralongkorn was in Sattahip when I was there. He is a qualified military pilot (fixed and rotary wings) and was using the U-Tapao Airport. His picture was placed prominently along main junctions of the town. The town people, mainly military personnel and their family, are quite used to it. He flies rather frequently and goes to Sattahip quite regularly.

Some of the lesser known tourist attractions (if you wish to call them that) are the Silverlake Winery and the Khao Chi Chan Buddha Image. The former is a vineyard (yes, amazing) jointly developed by the Dutch as part experiment, part tourist attraction, part social policy.....encased by the rolling hills of Chonburi Province, you can almost picture a piece of Napa Valley in the area. Further down the road is the Khao Chi Chan Buddha Image. According to my host, it was supposed that someone rather important thought the face of the mountain was very suited for a carving of the Buddha. After tests were carried out, it was determined that the granite face was crumbling and not suited for extensive works to be done on it safely. Hence "lasering" was used to inlay "gold" on the mountain face. Well, that's where my host lost me. See for yourself.



That's about all of Sattahip.

Pattaya....well...perhaps a separate entry by itself.