Chanthaburi province is the heart of Thailand orchard country, 240 km [145 miles] southeast of Bangkok, and the durian capital of the world in terms of production — Thailand produces approximately a million tons of durian per year, and over half comes from Chanthaburi province and another 25% from neighboring Rayong province. Both provinces hold festive fruit fairs at peak season, when durians, mangosteens, rambutans, mangos, longkong/langsat, jackfruit, longans, pineapples, papayas, bananas, coconuts, sugar apples, dragonfruit, and more are present in great lavish abundance. There are so many fruits around, in fact, that the talented local people use them to not only to eat but to create astounding magnificent colorful beautiful works of community folk artistry every year in parade floats built on trucks, or this year, rafts in the water.  

Chanthaburi has a charming large lake right in the center of town, and sometime in the past year or two they've built a new beautiful wide sidewalk/promenade all the way around it. It wasn't there in 2004 when I was last here; before it was sort of a muddy trail and broken-down brick path around the lake. So this year they shifted the fruit fair to all around the lake from the nearby streets where it used to be. And instead of fruit floats built on trucks in the parade, there were literally floats in the lake alongside the promenade. Same idea, covered artistically with hundreds of fruits, but on floating rafts and boats in the lake instead of on trucks in the street! A charming innovation and likely to result in some spectacular creations in future years.

Of course, the durians were fantastic as always in Chanthaburi -- in most of Thailand, usually out of every 10 durians I buy, 2 or 3 are fantastic, 2 are not good, and the others are OK but not the best. In Chanthaburi, 9 out of 10 durians I buy are excellent! At least 5 varieties are readily available: Kradoom (the early season one), Chanee (like raspberry-flavored cream cheese, big rough spikes on husk), Kan Yao (cultured favorite of Thai connoisseurs), Poungmanee (small and supersweet), and the everpopular Monthong (luscious fruity celestial pudding with undertones of butterscotch and almond). I also was introduced to a variety I'd not experienced before, Nokacheep -- "Nok" means "bird" in Thai, and the "cheep" is exactly that -- the sound a bird makes! Difficult to describe, somewhat like Chanee but with a different flavor composition. Delightful. 

I was in Chanthaburi for 9 days and for the whole time ate only (many) durians plus a few other fruits (mango, longan, rambutan, mangosteen, coconut, pomelo). Wonderful, wonderful. :-)  Enjoy the new photogallery.  

--Shunyam Nirav