...As we slip our moorings in the pre-dawn, a rumbling of the Chinese built marine diesels emanates from the bowels of the ship. The river bank is hidden in a swirling grey cloud, damp tendrils snaking between the palms. We start to motor upstream, the banks rising high above the surface of the water, crumbling earthen strata revealed. Mist that has pooled in the fields with the dawn tumbles over the beveled lip, billowing downwards like dry ice and threatening to obscure the occupants of a passing fishing boat as they paddle close to shore. Soon they are left behind us, as the water slides easily under our shallow hull.

The sun soon crawls over the near horizon, a blazing orange globe that feeds life into an umbral world. The faces of trees and buildings, temples and pagodas, are thrown into darkest shadow, silhouettes against the growing light. As we pass by one of the largest trees the ship’s horn sounds, and startled by this noisy intrusion, a thousand fruit bats scramble from their perch, their leathery wings beating the cool air. They fly as one, streaming along the course of the river, black shapes that whirl through the brightening sky.

Later, as I stagger downstairs in search of hot water for coffee I am met by blinding sunshine and dozens of tiny swift-like birds that swoop and dart around the ship, diving towards the water and then with a lightening turn fly upwards again, and out of sight.

The countryside has become very flat, a wide and arid landscape. Although the width of the river changes with the miles, it always presents a face of calm – a great volume of water moving, but barely a ripple on the surface. From the prow of the ship, the presented panorama is spectacular in its simple expanse. The river is a vast glassy brown sheet, flecked by spots of foam and reflecting mud coloured clouds back at the sky – distorted by only the gentlest of ripples. The banks are still high, sandy, muddy walls slowly eroding in to the water, occasional trees clinging precariously to the land as more soil is washed from under their roots each time the monsoon passes. We often see trees whose entire root system has been exposed in this fashion, and they stand as if balanced on a thousand legs.

As the miles pass by, wide mud flats and flood plains give way to rolling green hills with a modest scattering of palms and other leafier trees. To the distance, a barest shadow between the hazy horizon and the sky reveals a larger range. We pass by a village perched on the very cusp of these precipitous banks – people busy washing clothes and themselves, children splashing noisily. The village pagoda shines in the sunlight.

The scene at dusk, tied up to a steel barge with a peeling green painted roof is as beautiful as it is timeless – a snapshot from any day in the past hundred years. Rusting passenger ferries built along the sweeping curved lines of those that came out of the Clyde-side shipyards over a half century ago (think Hong Kong Star Ferry style), along with a ragged assortment of decrepit old tubs – well past official retirement age, but coaxed endlessly onwards. Chains of people, both men and women are strung out along the slope, loading and unloading weighty baskets of goods balanced on their heads.

Smoke from two or three fires drifts lazily through the darkening air as passengers await a distant departure aboard one of the local ferries, cooking, sleeping, talking amongst themselves – and one old lady who tirelessly brushes out her waist length mane of silver hair before tying it in to tight knots atop her head. Twenty minutes later she changes her mind, rebrushes, restyles. Children run around energetically, flipping elastic somersaults in to the river with abandoned delight and women wash themselves in the tepid water, maintaining complete modesty by wearing their longyis (sarongs) throughout the whole process – finishing with the conjuring act of exchanging the old sodden garment for a fresh and dry one without getting the new one wet, or exposing any more skin.

Then as a grand finale the sun slides below the horizon of dark peaks, filling the dusky sky with hues of pink and orange streaked with blue. Taking their cue from the encroaching darkness, the wings of the hundreds of fruitbats once again disturb the stillness, a streaming dark cloud of them flapping their way south down the course of the Irrawaddy.

***

The river is high – crumbling dusty banks that I know will appear later just beginning as the waters start to recede from their monsoon heights. Floodplains are starting to become exposed, great tracts of fertile alluvial soil, where bamboo huts are already making an appearance. Villages make the annual migration closer to the river as the height of the water diminishes. From the top deck, islands are evident in what must be a huge expanse of water during the rains. Great swathes of rushes line the river banks, swaying softly in the barely apparent breeze, green stalks, off-white tops. Sometimes only the ridges of scattered houses are visible through them.

***

As we wait on the ship for the return of our passengers, the skies thicken and grow close, and within minutes we are deluged by an unseasonably late down-pour. Water pours in spouts from the green corrugated roof of the Pandaw, and darkness drops hard. Faces crowd into the barge we are tied up against, hair plastered to foreheads, wet bodies steaming amongst sacks of onions and piles of baskets.

From close behind comes the violent blast of an air horn, and we must stand off to let a recently arrived ferry come in to dock. We move off to the middle of the river just as our passengers reach the barge, their soaked expressions aghast at our departure, uncomprehending and bewildered until the ferry starts to maneuver in to position. She seems to slide across the rain troubled waters, her lines blurred through the storm, lights shining bright as passengers crowd her open decks in anticipation of dashing for cover ashore. Within minutes we have returned to our mooring, collected our sodden passengers and in short order we head once again upriver. The searchlight plays off the river banks, a tightly focused ray through which the rain falls like sparks, guiding our passage through the dark.

***

Later. It’s a beautiful morning. Bland and unremarkable in its colours - a dense cloud ensures that - but shafts of light poke through gaps in the cloud, illuminating the land and the river. The water is calm, bare ripples and eddies on it’s slate grey surface and to the distance before me, a thin belt of land between it and the sky. A wisp of mist lies across the dark fields, occasional hills rising in deep shadow from the otherwise flat terrain. It is all in shades of grey at the moment, but beyond, to the horizon, there is the faintest of colour-washed sunrises. Occasional fires send up plumes of dense white smoke that drift aimlessly in the absolute stillness of the daybreak.

I am sitting enjoying the peace, with only the steady rumbling of the deck beneath me. As I sip gingerly at my morning coffee, the clouds begin to break up and pale patches of blue appear in their place. Brightness steals into the day and the river starts to wake - the clatter of an un-muffled engine from upstream, small rowing boats ferrying people to their business. And we move inexorably against the current, the landscape slips past at the slowest of paces.

By late afternoon we are passing through the second defile. The light is beautiful, and the scenery is far more dramatic than what has passed before. The rolling hills and flat plains have given way to sheer cliffs and rocky edifices that line the narrowing river. We maintain a careful course midstream, virtually alone on the river, and our passage seems impossibly quiet. All the passengers are on the sun-deck, and of those almost all are gathered on the small decking before the bridge. We marvel at the density and size of the trees we see, as yet un-denuded by logging, and with macaws and hornbills much in evidence sweeping from treetop to treetop.

Those that have been there make comparisons with the Yangtze gorges, but all of us are nonetheless impressed by the unfolding beauty of the scenery, made more so by the rarity of our passage here. As a reminder of times less serene, the captain of the Pandaw, U Chin Maung, explains that it was here in 1988 during insurgent uprisings that a sister ship to the Pandaw was sunk by Kachin rebels, hit by mortar-fire and her captain killed on his bridge. I am mindful that when we took her over, the Pandaw herself was fitted with heavy armour plating against such actions. These thoughts fresh in our minds we all jump when 3 explosions in close succession reverberate off these steep cliffs, but as a sign of the times, they are just a part of a nearby road building project.

An elephant is spotted near to a village we pass, ears flapping in the dusk.

***

We are steaming north from Yandabo village as I glance up from my task. The water level has still been dropping rapidly and already the ship’s lower decks are often hidden below the level of fields that we pass. As I look out I can barely see over the parapet of the sandbank, the lip close to me rushing past against the horizon and a great haze of heat roiling off the burning bright white sand. Through it I see the shining spire of a pagoda set amongst a relief of dark green trees. It’s bell-like shape shimmers and waves in the distorted air

***

Crowds of people litter the muddy shores, plunging themselves in and out of the torpid waters between the assorted moored ships. The women in particular achieve a splendid feat, the exchange of the old, dirty and wet longyi for a clean dry one while maintaining complete modesty. It’s a variation of the trick of trying to change out of your wet and sandy swimming costume as a small child, behind a towel on a beach full of people, but done with significantly more finesse.

Soap suds bloom outwards on the surface of the river, as a week’s washing is pounded on rocks, beaten with wooden batons until judged adequately clean. How they achieve such bright whites from such grimy waters is a mystery, and I don’t imagine that the clothes last very long either. And as we pull away again and cast a view backwards, all along the sloping shores are a bright patchwork of drying garments, laid flat in the midday sun.

***

Small bodies, swaddled in rust red robes and clutching pot-belly stove shaped black lacquer rice bowls tightly in their arms, kick and splash barefoot in roadside puddles pooled by the latest tropical rains. These novice monks faces, so often masked by a solemn gravity that one would associate with a person of greater years are now lively, full of smiles and laughter. Instilled Buddhist devotion defeated by childhood gaiety.

***

Two or three days in to our expedition and the flat lowlands have given way as we head north west and up towards the Chin Hills. Beyond them lies India. The Chindwin does not have the majestic sweeping presence of the Irrawaddy, but is an altogether different animal. Although still relatively wide and deep due to the monsoon rains, the course she takes is far more aggressive, zigging and zagging like a switchback, the way forward and behind often hidden from view.

The riverbanks are bursting with dense foliage, a green carpet upon the land that will soon desiccate and fade under a choking blanket of dust. But for now, tropical palms stand erect and clear against the skyline, forests of banana leaves and fields of rushes hide small dwellings from which the shrill voices of infants cry out in surprise and in excited greeting as we pass.

The height of the water allows us passage close to the banks, and as the light begins to fade from the sky, birdcalls are everywhere, momentarily overwhelmed by the cacophony of a million crickets. Villagers performing their evening ablutions take pause from soaping their bodies to stare at us, and suddenly word spreads - crowds form along paths lining the river, whistling, cheering, waving.

Beyond the immediate countryside the ranges of hills fade gradually to gray. Above them thunder-heads build, for the Monsoon is not yet spent. Irregular patches of evening light break through in places, but it is a losing battle and in the distance, lightning flickers. From where we sit though, the evening is still balmy and cool.

***

We stop at Kanee village, and as the crew wrestle with heavy teak gang-planks the crowds of villagers gather, children wide eyed. Chattering groups of people take up position, leaning or sitting against large cords of bundled firewood, waiting for the show to begin. Soon they are rewarded with the sight of these ungainly foreigners with their strange clothe and big noses making their way unsteadily up the riverbank and along into town. Our smiles of greeting are met with either wide-eyed delight or solemn gravity.

***

The Irrawaddy is as a new river after the rains, lined with a dense tangle of vegetation, riding high and running fast. We pass in close proximity to villages that in a few short weeks will be above us and further away from the receding water’s edge. Children burst from behind bushes along the banks shouting out “Pandaw, Pandaw” in their excitement at their first sight of us in several months. There are new tributaries feeding into the flow that will soon dry up, and surrounding them fields of strong green shoots that will so soon wilt and accept the all-encompassing mantle of dust. But for now there is an exceptional clarity to the sky, previously unimagined, and I see distant hills of whose existence I had never previously appreciated and colours that are sharp and vibrant.

***

In the dawn light the sky is filled with clouds still fat with rain. The monsoon is supposedly over, but a glance upwards tells the lie of it. Lazy tendrils of swirling grey drift along the tops of hillsides lush with trees and vegetation, teasing us with glimpses of the dense forests beyond. As we head north the sun breaks through to our starboard side, and the much-flooded countryside is transformed to a vista of shimmering silver, gunmetal grey and nickel. The great swathes of rushes that accompany our passage upriver blaze downy white heads atop jade green stalks, bending in supplication to the lightest of breezes. The river’s surface is implacable, marred only by spots of drifting vegetation and a spattering of brown-flecked foam. The great expanse of calm water belies a deceptive strength, and behind me is the well-muted roar of our engines battling the current, the decks beneath me vibrating at the effort.

By stark contrast, our arrival in Katha is to an explosion of noise and colour. The sun has been burning strongly for the last hour, and along the riverbanks is a kaleidoscope of wet laundry stretched out flat to dry. The gilded bell shape of a large pagoda before us positively glows from behind a screen of tall green palms. U Kyin Maung, our captain, stands full in the bow in front of the bridge, watchful as we nudge our way forward – outstretched hands waving directions back to the man on the helm We edge in past a local ferry built along similar lines to the Pandaw, with long low lines, white and black painted ironwork and a cambered green corrugated iron roof. Her open decks are obscured from casual view by a bewildering array of longyis and other clothing hung out to air, turning the sides of the ship into a riotous patchwork of clothing.

Our berth lies where downtown ends, and at the top of the riverbank there is a lively bustle of horse-drawn carts, bicycle rickshaw drivers in hope of a fare, the inevitable rickety wooden shacks selling betel nut, passer bys and casual spectators. Patrons of a nearby tea-shop look up in renewed interest as it becomes apparent that we are more than the usual passing vessel, our Western passengers on deck in eager anticipation. Beyond the tea-shop are the rooftops of teak houses lining the streets where Orwell once walked.