Pandaw River Cruises and the Irrawaddy Flotilla
Mekong River Cruises

For news on the Pandaw Cyclone Appeal click here....

With four luxury ships we are the largest river cruise company in South-East Asia. In 1995 we were the first to pioneer and explore the region’s great rivers and their tributaries: the Irrawaddy and Chindwin in Burma, the Mekong  and Tonle Rivers in Cambodia and the backwaters of the Mekong Delta in Vietnam.

These small ships can penetrate remote and otherwise inaccessible areas. Whilst we offer a real adventure experience, travellers are cushioned with incredible  comfort, fine dining, great cocktails and choice wines, not to mention extraordinary levels of service.

Our four boutique ships were built new and designed and finished as replicas of colonial river steamers. These small ships have the highest passenger to space ratio of any ships afloat.

Dining is single sitting with dress smart casual. We also have the highest staff guest ratio of any ship in the world to ensure an incredible level of care.  It is more like being on a 1920s private yacht party than a cruise ship.

The much loved Pandaw staterooms are spacious at 15 square meters and, whilst finished in traditional marine brass and teak, have all necessary modcons. All cabins on main and upper decks open onto promenade decks with their own seating.

A feature of all river cruises is the once or twice daily shore excursions led by expert local guides to explore Buddhist temples, historical sites, markets and handicraft workshops.

The Pandaws have an ultra shallow draft enabling them to moor where other  larger ships could not stop. Inland water navigation in these regions is challenging and the Pandaws have been specially designed to cope with constantly changing river conditions.

Our river cruises connect Saigon (Ho Chi Min City) with Angkor Wat via Phnom Penh and cover over 1500 miles of Burmese waterways from Rangoon (Yangon) to Pagan (Bagan) and Mandalay to Bhamo close to the China border.

Rudyard Kipling based his great poem ‘Road to Mandalay’ on the clunking paddles of Irrawaddy Flotilla Company paddle steamers. Over the past 150 years other poets and writers such as Somerset Maugham and George Orwell have celebrated the company and the river.

Successive Viceroys of India, the Crown Prince of Siam and King Edward VIII as Prince of Wales, are but a few of our former passengers. Today we continue to carry celebrities and royalty, but pride ourselves on treating every passenger the same regardless of fame or rank.