Day 53 - Side trip to Kawthung / Burma

Awoken by knocking on my door. Today we are going for a 1 day trip to Burma. We left the guesthouse at about 9.30am and walked to the market where we took the local lorry transport to the pier. (lorry bearing route number 3&4 - red colour will go to the pier) The fixed price is 15B per person regardless of the distance travelled.

Went to have duck noodles for breakfast before proceeding to the pier to arrange for the transport across to Kawthung. We booked a long tail boat for 200B (1way for 3 pax). And we had to pay an additional 20B per pax for the letter of conveyance.

The 4km boat journey took us about 20 mins and we had to stop briefly at a number of checkpoints:

After clearing Thai immigrations and boarding the boat:

1) Thai customs
2) Thai army
3) Burma customs

After the boat docked at Kawthung, the boatman led us to the Burmese immigration checkpoint where we hand to hand over our passport along with a photocopy of our passport and a crisp condition USD$10 for entry fee. After inspection of our passport, the immigration officer asked us how many days we were staying in Burma (fluent English) and stamped us in (passports returned to us)

My impression of the town is that it is quite similar to Ranong (due to the high Burmese immigrants) and it is slightly better than what I had expected. We were only allowed to travel within a 5km radius around the immigration checkpoint and no further.

After about 2 hours of exploring the town on foot, we got bored and decided to return to Thailand. Went to get our passports chopped out and took the long tail boat back. It was drizzling. Cost: 200B

After the 20min boat journey back, we cleared Thai immigration and took the transport back to town. I got my Thai Visa extended for another 15days.

It's quite an exciting and new experience for me but it will be my first and last time doing it.


Expenses:

Hotel - 1000B
Boat transport - 400B
Burma entry - USD$30

***All expenses not accurate due to sharing***