To be an accomplished diving master in Thailand with access to both the Andaman Sea and the Gulf of Thailand would be about as good as it gets. But it is one huge step up the joy register to own your own diving support vessel. This is especially true if you can also accommodate 30 fellow divers and a supportive crew of eight to cater to the divers’ needs and navigate the vessel.

Seacrest’s Managing Director Tavipol Hemangkorn receives guest in a board room decorated with models of large crew boats, ASD tugs and a range of other vessels that his firm has built. Located just outside the mouth of the Chaophraya River at Samutprakarn, Thailand, the yard’s three marine ways can launch vessels directly into the deeper waters of the Gulf of Thailand. They can accommodate vessels up to a 22-meter beam and up to 2500 metric tons.

 When Khun Namchai Sakunchoknamchai was seven years old he like cars. So he built himself one out of wood. Decades later, he was building those big beautiful custom tour buses that are a feature of Thai roads. When he wanted a 30 million baht machine for shaping rolled aluminum sheet, he designed and built one for less than nine million THB. This machine is just one of the impressive array of technologically sophisticated machines at his factory in Suphanburi, Thailand.

From the early 17th to the mid 18th century the Dutch maintained a post on the Chao Phraya River near the ancient Thai capital of Ayutthaya. Today little remains of the old Dutch buildings but a fine new museum has been built on the site, Baan Hollanda informs the modern visitor of that important era.

A recent report by the Ghana Ports and Harbour Authority states, “Total cargo traffic for both ports (Tema and Takoradi) grew from 19,459,834 tonnes in 2016 to 22,086,626 tonnes in 2017, registering a 13 per cent increase. Transit cargo in both ports also increased from 944,081 tonnes in 2016 to 1,249,336 tonnes in 2017, a rise of 32 per cent. Container traffic for both ports rose from 942,463 TEU in 2016 to 1,009,755 TEU in 2017, registering a seven per cent increase.”

 Thousands of people travel Alaska on mega-cruise ships each year, but only a handful get to cruise Alaskan waters on the immaculate M/V LISERON. Built in Seattle in 1952 by the US Navy as a minesweeper she was sold to France, but returned to Seattle in 1990 after being lovingly converted to yacht-class in Florida.