Highlights
| Price In USD per person Main Deck Twin Sharing 3,500.00 Main Deck Twin Single Use 5,950.00 Owner Suite Double Sharing 5,250.00 Owner Suite Double Single Use 9,990.00 |
Detailed Itinerary
Inclusion & Exclusion
DAY 1: MONYWA
Transfer from Mandalay with 3 hours driving and embarkation at
Monywa at 11.30 am to join the Chindwin cruise. We will explore the town
and make a trip to the Thanbodi Temple with its million Buddha images -
a sort of Buddhist Disneyland!
DAY 2: MONYWA PHO WIN TAUNG KANEE
In the morning, coach to the Phowin Taung Caves, where we will
admire beautiful mural paintings and Buddha statues in riches. Beyond
Monywa we enter the Upper Chindwin. The river narrows and the forested
hills fall away to farmland we pass a number of attractive villages like
Kanee where we can stretch our legs.
DAY 3: MINGKIN
Mingkin was rediscovered by Paul Strachan in 1987 and described in
some detail in his book Mandalay: Travels from the Golden City. It
remains for Paul the most art historically interesting site in Myanmar
(more so than the now spoilt Pagan) with its Konbaung court style teak
monasteries sumptuously decorated. Mingkin may be described as the Luang
Prabang of the Chindwin.
DAY 4: KALAYWA AND MAWLAIK

The gateway town for the Chin State. We explore Kalewa with its
markets and quaint wooden architecture. And afternoon explore Mawlaik
replaced Kindat as the administrative capital but ironically the Myanma
refused to move there from upstream Kindat. It was mainly settled with
the company houses of the by the Scottish owned and run Bombay Myanmarh
Trading Corporation in the 1920s and 1930s. There are many splendid ‘Dak
Bungalows’ set around a verdant golf course. Mawlaik and the other
towns of the Upper Chindwin can only be reached by boat so cars are few.
There is a dreamy otherworldly quality to such places and truly one
feels that one has travelled there in the Pandaw time machine!.
DAY 5: YUWA AND SITTAHAUNG
We pass the mouth of the Yu River which drains the Kubu valley that
provided the route for a Lieutenant Grant to march to the relief of the
Manipur garrison when the chief commissioner of Assam was massacred in a
local rebellion. Sitthaung was the final resting place of a number of
IFC steamers scuppered there in 1942 in an ‘act of denial’ from the
advancing Japanese who were a matter of hours behind. We hope to find
remains of these ships as we have in the past at Katha on the Irrawaddy.
It was from here that the survivors of the Japanese invasion marched
out to Tamu on the India border.
DAY 6: PAUNGBYIN TO TOUNGDOOT
Pantha was an important oil refinery belonging to the Indo-Burma
Petroleum Co (Steel Brothers). Toungdoot or Hsawng-hsup in Tai, is an
ancient Shan enclave which in British times still had a ruling sawbwa
complete with palace and court. It will be interesting to see what has
become of the royal family and their home and to see these Shan people
so far from their Tai-Shan homelands
DAY 7: TOUNGDOOT TO HOMALIN
On the way to Homalin, the furthest navigable point on the Chindwin
for vessels of our size. Alister McCrae wrote of his visit there 1935
‘I loved the atmosphere of quiet and peaceful living there. At night I
could hear greylag geese as they came in to the flooded land around us
from far away north’. Bird in 1897 says little other than that Homalin
is the headquarters of a township, but has very little trade’. Until we
get there and explore the place there is not much we can say!
DAY 8: DISEMBARK AT HOMALIN
Disembarkation at Homalin and transfer to the Homalin airport.
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Inclusion & Exclusion
Cruise Price Includes: Domestic Flights Yangon-Homalin or Mandalay-Homalin resp Homalin-Yangon or Homalin-Mandalay, Entrance fees, guide services (English language), port dues, main meals, locally made soft and alcoholic beverages, jugged coffe and selection of teas and tisanes minerals.
Cruise Price Excludes: International flights, no
flights included out of Mandalay for cruise ending in Monywa/Mandalay,
port dues (if levied), laundry, all visa costs, fuels surcharges (see
terms and conditions), imported beverages such as wines, premium spirits
and liqueurs, fancy soft drinks.