Knapp (DD 653) - Naval Cruise Book

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Colombo Colombo, a well known seaport and commercial center, is the capitol of Ceylon a British protectorate. Located on the west coast having a population of 284,000. A number of us, still low on funds from Hong Kong, managed to scrape up enough money, too the tour to Kandy, The Botanical Gardens of Kandy exhibited the various spice trees of the Orient. The six hours of jouncing on the bus didn't go over too big. Rubber and tea plantations were pointed out. Stops were made at the Temple of the Toothg a Buda dhist temple and some were able to see the native elephants being scrubbed down. Beggars were en- countered everywhere. Some of the Crew stayed in town picking up souvenirs or sampling liquor at one of the local es- blishments, and F akirs were to be seen exhibiting card tricks and the pea and shell game. One could also watch the charming of the king cobra. fi t iw, iff -an p .,f tif., JN , X355 5 l..

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Singapore Singapore - a city on the southern tip of the Malaya peninsula, is one of the great commercial centers of the world and the major British Naval Base in the Far East. There are many European style buildings in- cluding the public ofiices, the Cathedral, Raflles Col- lege and the King Edward VII College of Medicine. Most of the 600,000 population are Chinese. Sing- apore formed part ot the Straits Settlement until 1841, when it was erected into Singapore Crown Colony, including Singapore, Christmas Island and the Cocas-Kneeling Islands. The USS KNAPP arrived in Singapore on janu- , 23, 1954 to refuel. After a two day stay the ship E Singapore en-route to Colombo, Ceylon. FU! fi Sf. E 1

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,nf Bahrein Bahrein is an island of the Bahrean Islands off the coast of Saudi Arabia in the Persian Gulf. Bah- rein is an independent kingdom and a British pro- tectorate. BAPCO, the 3rd or th largest oil refinery supplies Phillippines, Okinawa and many of the South American countries with oil and asphalt. BAPCO is an American-owned company. The com- pany has a 99 year lease on the land. Starting out from the dock we were confronted with a long walk. After walking a useless mile some of us took the bus and were roped into a tour of the oil reHnery. We were shown four plants by the fore- man of each. They were the Power plant, both the catalystic and fractional distiller crackers, the as- phalt and barrel rnakini plants. Some did get to e nearby village bringing back some souvenirs and being good sa' ors eventu- ally found something to drink. The city itself was typically Arab in design and layout. As the majority of stores didn't open until 4:00 in the afternoon, buying was limited to street venders selling silver and gold trinkets. Most of the streets were narrow and dark with the shops dimly lighted. Articles, in the stores were mainly Britis and Arnrican and were reasonable in price. -s -. r '