Small ship cruising in Myanmar travel guide

Myanmar – also known as Burma – is opening up to visitors, but it’s little known as a destination for small ship cruising and sailing. But in some areas, taking to the water is not just the best way to explore, it’s the only way! The Mergui – or Myeik – Archipelago in the remote south, for instance, consists of 800 mostly uninhabited islands, scattered across 250 miles of the Andaman Sea. Boarding a boat is the only means of getting here, before swimming to shore to find pristine beaches backed by dense rainforest where the tracks of monkeys, crabs and lizards are the only footprints on the sand. This is a unique landscape, home to the seafaring nomadic Moken people, currently unspoiled but definitely vulnerable. Now is a good time to go, and sailing on a small yacht with just a few other travelers is the most responsible way to access this mysterious and extremely beautiful part of the world.

Our small ship cruising in Myanmar travel guide has all the details.

In Myanmar, cruising is on a very small scale. Luxury ships with around 40 cabins cruise the Irrawaddy River, but the Mergui Archipelago is typically explored on a catamaran. These are around 16m long, with space for a maximum of eight travellers, plus the skipper, chef, a deckhand and local guide. This style of yacht is designed to keep sleeping areas to the absolute minimum, while maximising common areas. Which brings us to the next question…

Food is a high point on this kind of holiday, with an onboard chef preparing three meals a day for you. Typically, they are Asian dishes, including curries, but fresh fish is on the menu every day, too. The Mergui Archipelago is very undeveloped, so popping out to restaurants isn’t an option; a barbecue of freshly caught fish on a white sand beach is though.

Travelling on a yacht or catamaran is, by definition, a small group trip, with typically room for just 12 people per vessel, thus reducing the environmental impact stopping off at islands can have and the waste produced. In addition, when conditions allow, you’ll be harnessing the power of the wind to travel from A to B (although the motor may be used for around 50 percent of the time). Food prepared during the trip is generally sourced locally before setting off, with fish caught fresh every day using a line or spear gun. The boat is equipped with solar panels, which is where most of the power on board comes from, and water makers, which turn sea water into fresh water, keeping the use of plastic bottles to pretty much zero.