Driving from Udon to Chiang Rai via Laos?

[Tomtomtom69]

Yes I am Swiss too.

yes i sent you PM already! maybe we know each other already...!

the dutch guy and other people explained me, that this road from VTE along the mekhong towards kenthao will be a main route - most the land along the mekhong is sold already to rich laotiens from VTE!

also is a project to built a bridge in xenamkhan to chiang khan and open it as an international border as well!

so the restaurant from him will be a good place in the future!

btw - his wife is from there...! ;-)

other question: is it possible for me with my car and thai-plates and internat. number and passport etc. etc. to travel on my own into burma via maesot and coming back in tachileik? - is it possible the same into vietnam? or we must wait for 1st january 2016 - opening ASEAN...?!

Thanks for the PM.

Ah yes, the Xanakham to Chiang Khan crossing becoming an international crossing in future wouldn't surprise me, and would be useful. Having said that, I believe it will take a little while longer to happen as firstly there will be a bridge from Beung Kan to Paksan, currently under construction, which should open within the next 1-2 years. Also, if they ever get around to improving the road from Xanakham along the Mekong to Kaenthao, just 53km away or so, the slightly longer travel time to that border compared to crossing at Chiang Khan won't make much of a difference. As you already have Tha Li and Phu Doo in Saiyabuli province now, I think those two border crossings are good enough for the time being as they are already close enough together. What will really make a difference are the quality of the roads. The 32km road from Phu Doo to the route 4 turnoff is in excellent condition, it's wide, has street markings and reflectors that work at night but once you get to route 4, it's the same shitty Lao roads.

OK as far as Myanmar are concerned it's not so much AEC 2015 that will make an impact on whether you can freely drive your own car there, it's the security situation there.

Currently, the Burmese authorities will only freely allow your Thai car in at Myawady (coming from Mae Sot) or Tachilek (coming from Mae Sai) for either a day, or at Tachilek I believe they may give you permission for the car for up to 2 weeks but then your car can't leave the city limits of either town without permission. There are checkpoints at the edge of both towns which prevent this. At Myawady, the furthest a Thai car or truck can travel is the border trade zone, located 12km from the border crossing and there's a major checkpoint with barbed wire there. Occasionally, Thai vehicles do go further if they have connections with immigration, customs or the authority that built the new Asia highway that has been the scene of recent fighting. But certainly, trying to leave Kayin state (if you managed to get to Hpa-an, the state capital, in a Thai car) would be unlikely as there are checkpoints at all the bridges out of the state capital and they are strict with their paperwork, even for locally registered Kayin state vehicles. In any case, Myanmar customs holds onto your Thai customs paperwork, doesn't give you insurance (although the Thais offer it and require it of Burmese registered vehicles) and will want your vehicle to be brought back to the Thai side by the time the bridge closes that day. Burmese vehicles on the Thai side are subject to the same restrictions and that's why you won't see them outside of the border areas.

You can't yet travel independently in a foreign registered car in Myanmar (other than in the border towns) due to security concerns, mainly in the border areas often not far outside of the border towns themselves. You can go on a tour with government guide though, but this is relatively expensive. I enquired about this through Swiss-based Diethelm Travel. The locally based managing director in Yangon, Lilly Saxer, is also Swiss! She is a very reliable person and can organize everything. However, when I first enquired about it, I was wanting to go in via Mae Sot/Myawady and then back out again the same way or via Htee Khee/Phu Nam Ron at the end of June and coming back in early July. In the end, due to cost, restrictions on travelling only on officially open roads and the need to have 2 guides, one from the government and one from the travel agency, not to mention the bad weather this being the rainy season, we settled on our usual method of going by local car with driver and my friend as a guide.

Had I gone ahead with the trip in my own car and attemped to exit via Mae Sot/Myawady at the time I wanted to head back into Thailand around July 4th, I would have been blocked for 2 reasons. You see, there is an old one way road connecting Myawady to the interior of Myanmar, and a brand new 2-way road that was the scene of fighting that erupted between DKBA rebel forces and the government on July 2nd. So since the authorities wouldn't have given permission to travel the new road since it hasn't officially been opened, not to mention it was blocked to all traffic anyway, that would have been a no-go. Then on the 4th, all vehicles heading down to Kawkareik from Myawady on the old road were warned not to return on the 5th, because even that road would be blocked by insurgents fighting the central government who tried to clear them from the new road, due to them collecting illegal tolls. And therefore it did indeed become blocked. So we couldn't get back to Mae Sot, to retrieve my car parked there and drive back to Bangkok but decided to fly out! To Bangkok that is, then rent a car, drive up to Mae Sot and retrieve my car! Can you imagine the chaos if they allowed foreign vehicles in now? That's why it isn't allowed yet, and while security has now improved, with both the old and new roads under government control in anticipation of the official opening of the new road within the next few weeks, there are still signs that this conflict hasn't quite ended though the fighting is now dying down and is more or less restricted to villages away from the main roads. During the week or so of active fighting on or near both roads, Myanmar immigration temporarily suspended foreigners from entering and exiting Myanmar at Mae Sot/Myawady, except for day trips where you aren't allowed to leave town. Myanmar visas were temporarily invalidated. I posted about this on the Myanmar forum as it affected me directly and cost me almost a US$1000 due to having to spend extra money on flights, accommodation and car rental on both the Myanmar and Thai sides, which wouldn't have been necessary under our original plan.

Although the road has since re-opened to foreigners and locals alike, I can't see how in 5-6 months time, all of a sudden it will be safe for a surge of Thais (and other foreigners) to drive their own cars across the border and go where they want, especially since there are still plenty of dangerous restricted areas in the west and north of the country that will probably remain off-limits for a while to come. While ethnic rebel groups are in regular talks with the government to end fighting and reach a ceasefire agreement, I can't see the Myanmar government all of a sudden opening up their country for car based tourism to foreigners in such a short space of time, just because of AEC. It could happen, but I don't think it will happen that quickly.

As for leaving via Tachilek after having arrived from another checkpoint, it is currently very difficult to get permission to travel across Myanmar's route 4 from Taunggyi to Kengtung, even if you are willing to be a passenger in a local car with driver. Foreigners aren't permitted to travel this road and although Top Gear made it across as part of their "Burma special" last year or the year before, we will need to wait until the Myanmar authorities open up that road to foreigners officially first. This is the only road that connects eastern Myanmar's Tachilek and the corridor up to the Chinese border at Mongla with the rest of country, not to mention the new Lao-Myanmar friendship bridge not far from Tachilek. There are some rumours floating around that it may not be much longer before that road is opened up for us, perhaps after the November elections or AEC, because security on the road has greatly improved over recent years. In the meantime, nearly everyone that arrives in Myanmar via Mae Sai/Tachilek or wants to exit there will be flying to/from Tachilek airport or Kengtung airport from another part of the country in order to avoid the restricted road.

Vietnam - not currently possible for Thai cars due to a strange ruling that RHD vehicles driving on the right are dangerous, hence the Vietnamese don't allow them in. But it goes further than that - the Vietnamese are so paranoid about foreigners driving their own vehicles into their country and possibly causing accidents or selling their vehicles once there, that even LHD vehicles (other than those registered in Laos and Cambodia) require pre-approval to enter and then an escort throughout the whole time they are there. I have even seen Thai cars driving in Vietnam under this arrangement, but periodically Thai cars get blocked altogether, as seems to be the case now. Perhaps this is one last ditch attempt by Vietnam to control it's borders before AEC dictates it must open up.

Interesting you ask this question, because I asked Lao customs at the Friendship Bridge about a Vietnamese car entering Thailand because my friend is Vietnamese and he owns a Ford Ranger, which he has driven to Laos before. The guy answered, permission is currently only granted if the car owner/operator has a "caravan" document indicating he/she is going on an official tour inside Thailand, but maybe after the entry into force of AEC 2015, Vietnamese vehicles will be permitted entry into Thailand freely and vice versa. Thai customs expresses the same opinions, but nobody is really sure because I have yet to see any official document or news stories on this issue. I don't think most media outlets know about or care about this issue enough to comment on it.

On another thread about driving into Vietnam also on this forum, I expressed my doubts that the Vietnamese (and some other ASEAN countries) will adhere to a policy of allowing freedom of travel in a foreign registered vehicle upon entry into force of AEC. I think there are still too many obstacles and concerns that won't be resolved in just a few months. Firstly, there's the insurance issue. Currently neither Cambodia nor Myanmar offer it at the border to foreign registered vehicles when even their own vehicles barely have insurance on them. This is one issue. Secondly, bad infrastructure, a lack of commitment to follow agreements expressed by some countries such as Cambodia, and a complete lack of any agreement that I have heard of between Thailand and Vietnam, concerns expressed by Vietnamese officials about causing accidents, lack of parking, traffic jams and even local transport operators trying to protect their businesses from foreign competition mean that cross-border travel by car isn't necessarily likely to become easier after the implementation of AEC. So we only have existing agreements between certain countries, like Thailand-Malaysia-Singapore and Thailand-Laos and Vietnam-Laos.

The only way we can know for sure is by following the news in the lead up to the entry into force of AEC 2015 that takes place on December 31, 2015 and/or seeing what happens after this date. Nothing is certain and I hope things do become easier. In the meantime, I would encourage you to wait before attempting to drive to either Vietnam or Myanmar. Unless you don't mind shelling out 50,000-70,000 Baht or so for a 1-week tour of Myanmar in your own car with a guide or two in tow.

[user643543]

thanks ttt69 for all this interesting infos - this means, we are still very far away from a free circulating traffic with own vehicles in this part of the world...(like in europe etc. etc.)

but never give up...

and of course - any comments, new infos etc. etc. from other readers/members etc. are very welcome! thanks alot!

[Tomtomtom69]

thanks ttt69 for all this interesting infos - this means, we are still very far away from a free circulating traffic with own vehicles in this part of the world...(like in europe etc. etc.)

but never give up...

and of course - any comments, new infos etc. etc. from other readers/members etc. are very welcome! thanks alot!

Yes, unfortunately not yet, but it could be soon.

I have contact with various people who may have the latest info, including customs and former and current immigration officers from Laos, Thailand and Myanmar. I will certainly post more info on here and other threads when updated information becomes available to me.

I am hearing rumours of Myanmar opening up to foreign registered vehicles after either the November elections or AEC entry into force, despite the obstacles (rebel army skirmishes) that have been standing in the way. So yes, it may be possible things will end up going in our favour sooner than expected. You see, things change very fast in Myanmar. Years ago if there was one minor skirmish, the government would block the affected areas to foreigners for months or years afterwards. That is no longer happening, because unlike in the past, one the Burmese government is no longer willing to negotiate so when it means business, it will flush out the problem in a matter of weeks. It would be highly embarrassing for the government to not be able to take back control of a vital trade route like Mae Sot/Myawady to Hpa-an from rebel forces when it was just under 2 years ago it declared the area safe enough for foreigners to pass. Obviously this latest incident I described on the new Asia Highway was completely unrelated to past problems but more a matter of a new issue that came up in the meantime (illegal tolls being collected on that highway). Of course, certain conflicts such as what's going on in Kachin State and parts of Shan State are not as easy to get under control so quickly, but for the most part they wouldn't affect us travellers or business people anyway.

Even if you don't care much about local or regional politics, the Irrawaddy, Mizzima, MM Times, Karen News, Shan State News and elevenmyanmar are good sources of information about these and other regional issues that you don't find covered much (or at all) in Thai or other international media.