Bringing a Thai registered car into Myanmar

[Lysdexic]

My wife is a Myanmar citizen, holds a Myanmar passport, from Shan State. She and her mother want to drive to Muang Nai in Shan State. Our car is registered in Thailand (we live in Chiang Mai).
Is this possible, and what documents does she need to do this? I am not going so no worries about where Farang are permitted to roam. Can she buy adequate insurance in Myanamar?
Any advice?

[samran]

I've taken my car to Laos, Cambodia and Malaysia and would love to take it to Myanmar.

 

According to my research, the answer is 'not at this time'.

 

The only Thai cars I've seen go across are those immediately at the border (but no further than the city limits of the border town). There is also no insurance available (and most Myanmar cars are uninsured anyway).

 

The other way is to join a 'caravan' - basically Thai tourists going on offically sponsored road trip. These happen, but are expensive and not exactly what you are looking for, I suspect.

[phuketrichard]

Same as for motorcycle, need permits, guides hotel bookings etc.

or can go on a tour with others.

[Tomtomtom69]

Depends how far away from the border this place is. Many Thai cars roam quite freely in border areas of Myanmar under the control of ethnic armies like the Karen/Kayin (DKBA and KNU) and the Shan State armies. Knowing a local can also help. I have a good Thai friend, he has connections and has driven to Dawei and to Loikaw through the local border crossing in Mae Hong Son province, without needing to go on any tour. He just goes with his contact who gets him through any checkpoints. Many Burmese living in border areas like Htee Khee (next to the Kanchanaburi checkpoint), Phayathonzu (Three Pagodas Pass) and all over Shan state (except at official checkpoints like Tachilek) own Thai registered cars that they keep within Myanmar most of the time.

 

I recently drove the short-cut between Umphang and Waley in a Thai registered car. This road is mostly used by locals (Thais that is) Burmese aren't allowed to cut through this way as their cars aren't allowed very far inside Thailand.

 

If she is allowed to take the car across by the Thai army (customs is not relevant here), no documents will be required nor will insurance be possible. Driving is on the right hand side of the road with a very small number of exceptions nearest the border (I was told driving is on the left in the tiny village in Shan state called Meng Kong Keng opposite Ban Rak Thai in Mae Hong Son, which I also visited).

[samran]

On 3/31/2019 at 9:25 PM, Tomtomtom69 said:

 

 

I recently drove the short-cut between Umphang and Waley in a Thai registered car. This road is mostly used by locals (Thais that is) Burmese aren't allowed to cut through this way as their cars aren't allowed very far inside Thailand.

 

Sorry to revive an old thread, but this is very interesting for me. I just looked on google earth and there doesn't seem to be much in the way of immigration facilities on either side. When you did the trip, did you basically tell them you were cutting through and they just wave you on?

 

I'd love to give this trip a go!

[NanLaew]

I checked this out about a year ago while working there. Apart from the cost of getting a 'temporary import license' for my Thai pickup, I would need to hire a driver to operate it AND have a government-registered guide traveling with me. Would have been around US$ 6k for the couple of months planned and that did not even include insurance so I lost interest.

 

Their government has been talking about banning the import of new RHD vehicles since 2015 and I think this has finally been enacted. Right now there's about a 80/20 mix of RHD and LHD vehicles operating in a country that from 1970, has driven on the right. Before that, they followed the 'old colonial' way and had RHD cars driving on the left. But apparently the wife of the dictator in charge at the time had a dream that suggested if the whole country switched to driving on the right, great good fortune would befall the nation. So they switched but nothing good or great happened apart from maybe managing the resultant traffic mayhem much better than Sweden did a few years earlier when they did the switcheroo. Less cars maybe?

 

I had a RHD car (and driver) while working there and being the front passenger, you serve a very, very important role telling the totally unsighted driver (on your right) that it is safe to overtake (on the left).

 

...or NOT as the case may be.