In Myanmar, Sailing in the Wake of Kipling and Orwell

They had agreed to take a five-day cruise along the Irrawaddy River on the recommendation of a trusted travel agent. But as their sailing date neared, Mr. Florens, who owns electronics stores across Mexico, wondered about Myanmar's political situation and the standard of the cruise ship's accommodations.

"I thought I was coming to a place with a lot of soldiers in the streets, and barricades," he recalled. "And I imagined the ship was an old boat in Louisiana."

But the atmosphere in Myanmar's cultural and business center, Yangon, was welcoming, and the cruise ship was well appointed, with teak and jade furnishings, modern amenities and a rooftop pool. Two nights into the journey, Mr. Florens said he thought the service and accommodation were on par with that of the five-star hotels where he and his wife had stayed in Tokyo and Shanghai.

"I am going to tell my brother-in-law, 'You know, you have to do this,"' Mr. Florens said, sipping a lemon-grass-flavor iced tea on the pool deck as the ship sailed past marshes and the occasional cluster of riverside huts. His only complaint — and it was more of an afterthought — was that the wireless Internet service was patchy.

Myanmar, once a pariah state that was ruled for decades by a repressive military junta, is emerging from two years of landmark political and economic liberalization. And even as ethnic and religious tensions continue to smolder in its hinterlands, the country's hospitality industry is already scrambling to meet rising demand for hotels and services.

Slightly more than one million international visitors arrived here last year — about a third and a sixth of the numbers that traveled to Cambodia and Vietnam, respectively — but the year-over-year growth rate of nearly 30 percent was Southeast Asia's fastest-rising, according to a recent report by the Ministry of Hotels and Tourism in Myanmar.

And the country's average hotel rate rose to $137 in 2012 from $66 in 2011, matching Cambodia's 2012 hotel rate and exceeding those of Thailand and Vietnam, according to data compiled by STR Global, a market forecast company.

"It happened in a year and a half where suddenly the country was thrown open, and everyone lifted their travel advisories not to go to Myanmar," said Steven Schipani, a tourism expert at the Asian Development Bank in Bangkok, which, along with the Norwegian government, financed the tourism ministry's study. "Now, with the opening, it's the hot new destination."

For now at least, river cruises capture only a small fraction of Myanmar's tourist arrivals — 14,653 people last year — but they cater to high-end travelers who often spend thousands of dollars per person during their stays.

River cruises have the advantage of sidestepping two of Myanmar's major tourism shortcomings: poor roads and a lack of upscale accommodation. The country has just two hotels that meet international luxury standards: The Governor's Residence and The Strand, both in Yangon.

Part of the allure for some tourists is tracing the footsteps of the British writers George Orwell and Rudyard Kipling, said Bill Barnett, the managing director of C9 Hotelworks, a Thailand-based hospitality consultancy.

Another, he added, is the country's comparatively limited development in comparison to that of its Southeast Asian neighbors.

"Myanmar is a great brand," Mr. Barnett said. "It's an exotic destination — people want to see it."

Some operators market cruises in this country, formerly known as Burma, as nostalgic throwbacks to its British colonial past.

Mr. Florens and Mrs. Romano Florens, the Mexican newlyweds, cruised between the cities of Bagan and Mandalay on a ship that takes its name — The Road to Mandalay — from a famous Kipling poem. The ship, operated by the London-based luxury hotel company Orient-Express, traveled the Rhine River in Germany before it began sailing here in 1995.

Source: http://www.news.myanmaronlinecentre.com/2013/08/31/in-myanmar-sailing-in-the-wake-of-kipling-and-orwell/