What wat is what ?

Day 87, Saturday 31 March 31 2012, Ayutthaya.

I didn’t really sleep that much last night, though it was unfair to call the place a flea pit as I woke this morning with no bites on me anywhere ! I got up and had the first cold shower in weeks. One of the benefits of travelling with Mike was we generally stayed in slightly more up market guest houses (yet still cheap) than I normally did on my own and most had at least lukewarm showers.

After packing up my gear Giovanni and I went and met R and B for another  final breakfast together. After saying goodbye to the three of them for the second time I headed off to the river for the boat down to the train. I enjoyed the few days I spent with G and R n B and hope to maybe see them in their home towns one day.

I had originally planned to go to Kanchanaburi, the home of the Bridge over the River Kwai, but was told there was not a lot to do there for the four days I have to kill before heading back to Bangkok for my early flight to Da Nang in Vietnam on the 4th. So I ended up deciding on Ayutthaya instead. Both towns are within a couple of hours of central Bangkok so no drama getting to either. I chose Ayutthaya as it was once the capital of Thailand and has a number of old temples to check out, and yes I still love old temples. Plus I have hardly used my camera in days and you must all be sick of blog posts that are not full of pictures. I may have to do some tests and see how many people actually read the words!

I caught a couple of trains to Victory Monument and then walked around in the brutal heat of 9.30 am looking for a mini-van that went to Ayutthaya, the vans are supposed to be only slightly more expensive than the bus, but get you there a whole lot quicker. As it turned out the mini-van was less than the guide book said at only 60baht for the ride, and it was new, air conned and we all had our own seats, it also only took 1 half hours to get there too – bonus start to the day. From the bus station I got seriously ripped off by a tuk-tuk driver in getting a lift to the hostel I chose off the internet – Prom Tong mansion. The tuk-tuks here are totally different to anyway else – still three wheels but that is about the only thing they have in common with others, this is a typical design, but an extravagant paint job.

I am going to have to say it lives up to its mansion name ! about $4 a more than the good hostel I use in Bangkok, but wow a world of difference, big room, the most comfortable bed I have slept on in weeks (if not months) , great breakie etc etc. My only complaint is the channels on the TV are rubbish – and no football ! I got used to nights in watching the beautiful game. The other thing I liked about it was the manageress took time to explain to me all the key sites in town, gave me a map and a guide book and recommendations on the best way to see them – without any suggestions of tours. I really appreciate it when hostels do this, and it was only the second time in three months.

It was mid-day, roasting hot – but not as humid as BKK, when i set off for a walk to the wats close to the guest house.

Ayutthaya is an island town built where three rivers – Mae Nam Lomburi, Chao Phraya (the main river in BKK) and Pa Sak, meet. Building of the capital city commenced in 1350 by King U-Thong and it was the centre of Thailand until being sacked and burnt by the Burmese in 1767. The current town has  been built around the ruins. There are numerous sites all around and I have decided to break things up into 3-4 hour days and see the place over a few days, I like the hostel so no need to rush and it is damn hot outside !

At the first wat I had my first banana pancake of my travels, I have not consciously avoided them but banana pancake is also the name given to a type of traveller who follow a reasonably fixed route of party towns around SE Asia, anyway it was nice…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_Pancake_Trail

First stop was Wat Maha That – which features the wonderful Buddha head in a tree.

The wats here are not in the same condition as either Angkor or Bagan, and sadly due to the flooding last year close access to a number of the sites is not allowed. There is also minimal carvings or murals to be seen. Part of me agrees that these sites are ‘as found’ and not overly renovated, but I do really miss the carvings.

What I did love with all the things I have seen here is the unrepaired Buddha figures, though many parts have been put together to form vaguely recognisable figures, i found them exquisite and have many photos.

Wat Ratchaburana

Inside the central pagoda in this temple was a stairway leading down to a small grotto with some lovely mural work. This apparently has also been recently discovered.

Wat Tummickurat

Like a number of the temples in town this temple had a working monastery attached. These monks were doing laps of the old monastery.

Wat Phra Si Sanphet

And the final Wat for the day

Wat Phra Ram

Tourists can take an elephant tour around the outside of the grand palace area, I didn’t do one as I do not agree with them in principle but I guess the elephants are probably better looked after than some working elephants in SE Asia.

I was pretty wrecked after almost four hours of walking, I foolishly decided to walk in jandals (flip flops to you readers not from NZ), instead of  my usual sandals – my feet really did not appreciate the lack of padding and were quite sore by the time I got to lie down later in the day.  After a shower I wandered down to the local market and had a meal and a beer and then stopped to buy an ice cream and some Smirnoff Ice RTD’s to take back to the room – a huge Saturday night in…

you will be pleased to know that there will be more temples tomorrow : )

My nephew Fraser is a great young musician and is the drummer in a two piece band, Heroes for Sale. He has an awesome record collection (mine) and a very good taste in music (just stay away from the dance music Frase, OK). His band played one of their first gigs a few days ago as part of the Titirangi Festival of Music and I so wished I could have been there to see them. Awesome stuff Fraser.

Not sure if the linky will work…

I ate a grasshopper – intentionally.

Days 84, 85 and 86, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday  28/29/30 March 2012, Bangkok

Wow today (Wednesday) I celebrated 5 months of being unemployed ! wee dram, alone in the room etc etc – but that was later in the day, honest !

Did sod all on Wednesday, got up late, my room has air con and wifi so there is no reason to go out, Bangkok is foul at the moment, hot and humid so not going to go out unless necessary. So blogging and email was all I did in the morning, mid-afternoon I caught the train to MBK mall with the aim of buying a couple of shirts, a pair of shorts and replenishing my panadol and bathroom kit. I could not find any shorts I wanted, nor a light weight running shirt – at a price I wanted so settled for a couple of t-shirts.

I had dinner at the yellow curry place at the end of the hostel street, $1 and it is great and then went back to the room for a couple of whiskies and more blogging, emailing etc.

Thursday morning I booked my flights on the 4th April to da nang – Bangkok to Ho Chi Minh City on Air Asia and HMC to Da Nang on Vietnam Airlines and applied for my Vietnam visa on line. I then left the hostel into the oppressive heat and made my way to the China Visa office. I was kinda thinking that this would be more straightforward than Myanmar as not many euros would bother trying to do a visa from here, what I totally forgot about was lots of Thai people want visas’ so there was a massive queue…

I know a few people who have China visas with no detailed plans to visit, no flights booked or accommodation reserved. My research on the internet suggested that this was OK, but it was not. I waited for almost four hours in queues to have my application rejected as I had no flight booked. I was disappointed to say the least. If I decide to go I will have to apply when I am in Vietnam but at least I will have a plan then.

A while ago I read a couple of crime novels by John Burdett that were set in Bangkok,  I recently discovered I had all four books on the e-reader so started reading them again, now that I  can put a few of the place names in context, the stories are a lot more interesting now. The lead detective’s mother runs a brothel on a street called Soi Cowboy, which I thought was made up, it isn’t !

I saw it from the train station at Asok when I changed from the Skytrain to  the MRT  on the way to the China visa office, so I nipped down to the street to take a photo, and no I did not go in,

The rest of the afternoon and evening was spent doing more blogging, they take so long to write so by the time I was getting to the last few days I have noticed the mistakes are creeping in and the sentences are getting shorter.

I had an email from Giovanni saying he was in a flea pit hostel up by Khao San Rd (KSR) and was meeting R n B up there tomorrow.  In Myanmar I vaguely committed to joining them up there and as I had not stayed in the area, and it is something that all back packers should probably experience –  and most under 25 do – plus a few unrepentant hippies, I agreed to meet him up Friday.

So Friday morning I checked out of my nice clean, air conned, wifi’d hostel and caught a couple of trains and the boat up river to KSR and checked into the flea pit Sitdhi Guest House. It is under a quarter of the price of my old place and the room is like a cell in the middle of the building with no windows, it has a single bed and a fan in the room. It is hot hot hot and humid humid humid.  It is not that close to KSR so hopefully will not be too noisy at night ( well that was  a stupid thought !).

I spent an hour or so slowly dying in the room due to the heat and then decided to go for a walk around and found a bar with wifi and have a beer under a fan and do some interneting. I took a walk out the hotel – it was almost cooler outside, even under the mid-afternoon sun, and almost immediately ran into Richard and Blothnard (R n B) who were picking up a bag they had left in Bangkok while in Myanmar. We made a plan to meet later and i went back to the Sitdhi to find G and let him know the plan. I lay dying in my room for a bit longer and then had to leave for that beer and fan. The four of us all met up at 6.00, had a beer and then went in search of some cheap eats and t-shirts on KSR.

We had a great noodle meal for a buck and then G bought a bag of bugs for us to share….

Grasshoppers, crickets and grubs – I thank God he didn’t get the cockroaches – they were huge. I tried one of each, they were OK, deep fried and almost like a chip, but I ate them hesitantly as you just don’t know if juices are going to explode in your mouth when you bite into them… a bad photo, but I am eating grasshopper ( not the one from Kung Fu 🙂 ).

After the bugs we wandered for a couple of hours around KSR, it was pretty much as I expected, loads of cheap clothes and tourist stuff, and a load of noisy bars full of people drinking buckets of liquor ( a bucket is literally a small bucket, I would guess a litre, that is filled with cheap booze) and massive containers of beer. It was starting to get rowdy when we wandered off back to the quieter part of KSR and had a beer together before going back to our rooms. I grabbed a bottle of Pepsi on the way back and had a couple of drinks before lying on my bed sleepless for the rest of the night.  The room was not quiet !  Amazing how many people after a night out managed to eat something that upset their stomachs.

Back to Bangkok – again…

Days 82 and 83 Monday and Tuesday  26/27 March 2012, – Yangon to Bangkok

Monday started as Sunday  finished, sitting on the night bus from Inle Lake to Yangon. I would say I managed a few minutes sleep at most. We arrived in Yangon, pretty much on time at 6.00 AM. As is usual we were swamped by taxi drivers when we got off the bus, the one driver who managed to get dibs on us wanted to charge Mike and I 5000kjat each to go our hotel and Lisa 7000 to go to hers, we argued with him for ages about the per head price for a taxi before walking off as he would not budge from 17000 for the three of us, we found one who do it for 10000, which is still ridiculous, but at least it is  better than 17000.

We arrived at the hotel at 6.30 and found, against all hope, that are room would not be ready until the afternoon as they were full. We hung around the lobby were there was a massive domestic between a Burmese couple which we endured before moving into the restaurant when it opened at 7.00 for some breakfast, the first full meal for me in 24 hours as I just do not eat before long bus rides – it was great to chow down on some rice and fried egg and sink a couple of coffees.  Luckily some people vacated their room early so we were allowed to doss there for a couple of hours where I had a wee doze.

We managed to get into a room fairly early, and pretty much did sod all for the next day and a half, dozed, read, watched bad movies and football on TV and mike raided my laptop for books and travel guides and all the photos I took while we were together – that took a long time, my laptop has lots of goodies on it! We found a good (read expensive – by Myanmar standards) restaurant just up the road – Coffee Circles. It had Wifi and the connection was bad, but better than nothing. They also had great coffee, which you would hope given their name. We had dinner there on Monday and coffee back there on Tuesday morning.

We checked out Tuesday at the last possible minute  before 12.00 and caught a cab to town, looking for a pharmacy as Mike was getting my cold, as well as souvenirs and a money changer. We lucked out on all things, Mike couldn’t find any cold medicine he knew, souvenirs were not in the part of town we were in and walking the streets on Yangon at mid-day in March is just dumb! And finally we discovered the money changer was closed – it was armed forces day and a public holiday in Myanmar… We had lunch at Monsoon instead then taxied to the airport via the hotel.

We had to wait an hour and half at Yangon airport for the Air Asia check in to open, passengers are advised be there three hours early – especially in Myanmar as it is sloooooow, but then AirAsia only open the check in desk two hours before the flight !

Mike was flying to KL and on to Europe and I was flying back to Bangkok and on to something, but no idea what at this stage. I planned on a couple of days in Bangkok catching up on blog posts and emails and booking flights to Da Nang for the wedding in a few days, and then finding something to do for three of four days outside the city.

My flight left early and arrived at BKK on time. Had a good ride back to the reliable old HI-Sukhumvit, with all the trains arriving as I did, so was there reasonably early. I picked up a small bottle of whisky on the way at the local 7 11.

I enjoyed the four weeks travelling with Mike, we made good companions I think, we certainly had a few good laughs and did some pretty cool stuff. So Mike – thanks for your company and your patience  and I wish you well in Europe and beyond and will plan to see you in Vancouver in the future !

Today was my third month anniversary of travelling so I had a wee celebratory dram in my room, in bed, alone – party on !

A couple of lazy(ish) days in Inle

Days  80 and 81, Saturday and Sunday  24/25 March 2012, Inle Lake

I woke up Saturday morning with a very full head and mostly deaf, but felt a lot better and after staggering around for a while my ears cleared and I was almost back to normal. Today all five of us had to check out of the remember inn as they had a tour group arriving, last night we arranged rooms at the May Inn so we moved there soon after breakfast.

We had a fairly lazy start and kicked around the inn for a while before hitting the dusty streets of Nyaungshwe to hunt down bicycles for the day, there was not a lot of choice, one shop had five bikes out the front, three of which had flat tyres – not a great selling point in my opinion, we ended up going to two places to get enough bikes in ‘working’ order for us to be able to go riding.

Our first stop was the Red Mountain winery about 3km from town, it was a good sealed road all the way (pays to be a to tourism operator I think) and an interesting ride, my bike had gears but most didn’t work well so i ended up riding in the hardest gear in the end – same as my singlespeed at home – or close to it anyway.

The entrance to the winery was up a steep driveway which we all had to walk up. The vineyard was started 10 years ago by a Frenchman and they grow a large number of grape varieties. We hoped to try a couple of wines over an early lunch but once we saw the pricing we knew this was never going to happen.

We elected to get the 2000kyat for 4 samples deal, but this turned out to be about a thimble each of four different wines and really soured the teasing for us, ridiculously small, plus there was no water to rinse the mouth between each sample so in the end it was a BAD deal and one I would not recommend !  sorry Red Mountain, the wine we tried was not that great either and we left a bit disgruntled. The vineyard did have a busload of tourists arrive just before we left so I guess this is their target market anyway and us independents are just a pain in the ass.

We rode back to the hostel for a rest and then hunted down some cheap street food for lunch, deep fried flour – yummmmm…. (this photo was actually taken on Sunday !)

After lunch G, R n B and I decided to ride out to find the Koun Soun Taungbo temple and nearby caves, the map we had was a bit loose, but we found them Ok, down a rocky dusty side road, really not designed for the types of bikes we were riding, would have been awesome riding there on mountain bikes, though gears would be useful…

After a false cave start we found the real cave temple system and had a local monk as a guide, you are not allowed to enter on your own, though the caves are perfectly safe. Sadly they have been renovating so the walls have been painted white and new crude murals have been started. However these are not really tourist cave temples, more active working places of worship for the village.

I stopped to get a photo of another drink station – I do really like them !

Mike was feeling a we bit unwell so we went and had pizza for dinner and the others had cheap local food. I bought a 330ml bottle of grand royal whisky for less than a big bottle of beer and we all met in the hotels garden and had a drink or two before bed.

Sunday was a slow day – not due to drink! We were all tired and Mike and I were on the overnight bus to Yangon so we spent the morning mooching around the inn, chatting G and R n B before going for a lunch time stroll to the market –  hand made local cigars.

and then checking out and waiting for the 3 pm pick up to take us back up to the junction for the bus to Yangon.

We had a few discussions around the cost of the pick up and after a few minutes of arguing agreed on what was a fairish price. I am 90% sure the guy who was driving the pickup, at hair raising speeds, was learning to drive at the same time. I was very happy when we arrived at the junction….

The bus was a proper airc con bus (not a VIP bus, but not bad) with one person per seat and no roof riders or standers… we left a couple of minutes early for the 14 hour overnight ride to Yangon. The first couple of hours were not too bad but the ride down the hills was pretty interesting, there were a huge amount of trucks coming the other way and passing was on occasions a tight and slow manoeuvre – at least all the drivers took care  the road!  At one village we passed through we had to an emergency stop as an elephant wandered out into the road…. we stopped twice, once at 6 and once at 8, but apart from those stops it was all the way to midnight….

the bus.

A day on the lake

Day 79, Friday 23 March 2012,  Inle Lake

I am sure the pickup ride yesterday didn’t help, so I woke up with a streaming nose this morning, bugger it.

Nyaunshwe is a dusty little town, there may be some small sealed sections of road, but largely it is dirt roads and small single storied buildings – I liked it !

After all the ‘fun’ yesterday I forgot to mention we ran into Giovanni (G) at an internet cafe in town and he said he had arranged a boat ride for us today on Inle Lake, along with Richard and Blathnaid (sorry for murdering your name : ) ) to now be known as R n B – which kinda has a wee bit of funkiness to it, who he had met earlier in Myanmar.

Inle lake has a number  of points of interest around it and the only way to see them is to hire a boat, though one day is never enough and that ignorance is definitely milked by the boat drivers and you get taken to many places where you have the chance to “invest in local crafts”, as it were…

We met with G over breakfast and were introduced to R n B,  R is Scottish and B is Irish and they were of similar age to me, well travelled and very interesting (and as turned out- very cool to hang with). Breakfast at the remember inn was the best in Myanmar, with  more choices than others and mine was fried rice and egg, the rice was great – not stodgy boiled and they did the eggs perfectly, yumbo !

We also had Lisa join us on our cruise, a Chinese woman (I guess late 20s) who spoke good English and was cruising SE Asis like the rest of us – which is highly unusual for a Chinese woman !

Our boat

Our driver collected us at 8.30 and we walked down to the canal to get on our boat for the day, we had hired it from 8.30 to 6.00 PM for about $4 each, though it only had 4 chairs. Mike and Lisa were happy to slob on mats on the deck.

The ride up the canal was interesting – I shot more photos today than any other single day on my trip – and deleted as many – taking photos from a moving boat – with head cold – of moving objects is not that simple!

After 20 or so minutes we hit the lake. The lake is the primary source of LIFE in these parts, it provides water (for everything), food, fertiliser, transport – and lastly a large and growing source of income in tourism.

The fishing boats are all canoes and mostly powered by humans. They have a unique style of paddling here – using the leg !

Collecting lake weed to be later used as fertiliser for the floating market.

Our first stop, (shopping opportunity) was at a weaving shop where they hand make a number of products, Mike has been gagging to buy a longyi – which is the male skirt worn by most Burmese men, and he picked up one here. It was interesting to see local cottage industries at work, and if I was not such a horrible cynic (and in need of a skirt) I could have been tempted to buy something. The technology is basic here, as is common in a very poor country – until you visit you do not appreciate poverty – nothing goes to waste and as there is no electricity so many things are done manually. Cotton is spooled on an old bike wheel…

I loved this crude form of pool/snooker/billiards, played all over SE Asia, using all sorts of material, old beer bottle tops being quite common in Myanmar. The guy with his back to camera is our boat driver.

We then stopped at a Myanmar cigar making place – now I know for a fact that Cuban cigars are rolled on the thighs of virgins so I was bitterly disappointed by this.

We had a further opportunity to share financially at a silver smith, but they were all lying about till the boat docked, leaped into action to make things, then all went back to drinking tea when it became obvious we were not spending any money – so, so much for cottage industry !

The package tour tourists got given nice umbrellas, we got to roast in the unrelenting sun, my cold did not improve! But I know where I would rather be.

After a lunch stop we went upriver to see an old temple site, the river was very cool, with a lot of buffalo cooling off and some wonderful bamboo weirs to manage the water level – my weir photos suck so you don’t see them.

We arrived in the village with the temple site which was surrounded by spending opportunities, I managed t make my way to a wonderful collection of very old stupas and was merrily snapping away when i got approached by a guy who demanded I pay to take photos. Apparently I had missed a sign saying I needed a photo pass, by this stage my snozz was a streaming mess, I had a monster headache and was no way paying to take photos. I said I would stop and he said I had taken some photos, so I walked over to him and deleted every photo in front to him and stormed off in a monster huff – and huge loss of face. He followed me all the way back to the boat. I was steaming (it was 36 degrees – everyone was steaming !) . I found this on the seat by the water – my only photo of the site- but fuck it, I am not paying to take photos – a tourist scam, bastards. 

I waited an hour for everyone else though, so more fool me, tough R n B joined me after 20 minutes so we got a good chat in. I did get a nice shot of some of the local women in this particular head dress (which I am sure has a name) but it is unique to this area.

Once the suckers who had paid their 60 cents to take photos (it was a matter of principal, no cost) had arrived back on the boat we head back down stream to the jumping cat monastery.  I had heard that the cats only jumped in the morning so I had told the boat driver that if there were no jumping cats then I was not paying any money… luckily there was one !

Though whether it was worth visiting or not is a mute point. The monastery has been teaching cats to jump through hoops for decades, well before it was a tourist thing, so I was not concerned about any weird animal cruelty thing. The monastery itself was quite interesting, some awesome Buddha and monk statues, but so badly lit it was impossible to take photos.

From the monastery we had a quick whip through the floating gardens – a vast vege patch built out of the lake – and where all the fertiliser goes, and then back out to the lake for an hour long ride back towards the canal for sunset. I was feeling so crap by this stage, nose streaming, sneezing and coughing all the way, no fun on a large uncovered canoe for 10 hours –  at least my hanky got to dry in the sun : )

We stopped at a great sunset spot and the local poser drifted past for some classic Inle Lake photos – I took a lot, posed, but hey I am not going to get them again – he drifted past for a collection and we were all happy to throw a few dollars in the pot.

Once we got back to the hotel, I crashed for a few hours while the others went for dinner and then I joined them for a beer later on.

Bagan to Inle Lake – really it’s not that far…

Day 78, Thursday 22 March 2012, Bagan to Inle Lake

You will be glad to know this post features no temples, but I still managed to make it a long one; which sums up the day I guess. One of those days I will remember for a while I suspect !

We were up at 6.15 to get ready for the 7 am bus and were wondering about breakfast when the breakfast guy knocked on our room door and asked if we would like him to make us some food, that was so awesome, most places wouldn’t bother – we said yes to coffee and he didn’t need to make eggs for us.

We were down in reception waiting for the bus to arrive to take us to Meiktila, a town about 4 hours away and the main junction point for buses going to Mandalay. We had to pay for a seat to Mandalay even though we got off less than halfway,  I am guessing that as soon as we were off the seat was resold to some one else. We were thinking – stupidly that this would be some sort of directi(ish) bus, but an utterly ridiculous thought, though there is only one road, we stopped everywhere and must have packed dozens of people on. At one point, when we were so full I though we would burst we stopped in a town and seven more people got on – from there we were obviously full as we stopped no more  I highly suspect the driver and ticket guy/spotter get paid for x number of people, I guess the legal limit, and anything else is a bonus, they do not give a shit about how many get on, and I guess for those in rural towns with no transport apart from these buses, this is how they normally travel.

The bus…  Are you loving the grungy unshaven look ? it is now 7 days later and the face has still not seen a blade, a new unshaven record. The heads up the centre of the shot are people sitting in the aisle seats, so yep – there is no aisle.

There were 7 or 8 people crammed in the stairwell…

Back to the spotter reference. As mentioned a few posts ago in Myanmar the cars are predominately right hand drive, which is fine in NZ where you drive on the left hand side (and Thailand where I guess vehicles come from), but in Myanmar they drive on the right. This puts the driver on the sidewalk side of the vehicle, which must suck big time if you want to overtake safely, which they generally do here,  but they love to overtake so they have a guy who stands on the left hand side and signals the driver when it is safe to move out into the middle of the road. The roads here are so narrow that any parked vehicle will force a moving vehicle on to the other side of the road. The spotters on these trucks must have one of the crappest jobs out – the roads are extremely dusty.

We stopped for breakfast under an hour into the journey (where I took the above photo), once on the way we went five minutes before stopping for gas, and to allow the driver to flirt with the gas girls, once under way again, we stopped to pick up more passengers and then broke down… seemed to be dirty gas as there was a lot of tools being used and a strong smell of fuel in the bus, I am assuming they were cleaning diesel filters. Under way after twenty minutes we stopped to pick up passengers – repeat….  though this was the last time. I suspect all bus drivers in Myanmar are mechanics at heart – though we got away lucky as you will see later in the day. (though lucky is erm yes interesting…)

After so many stops I lost count, we arrived in Meiktila, one hour late after five hours of the four hour bus ride. We were suppoed to be taken to the bus station but were unceremoniously dumped on the side of the road and vague finger pointing suggested which direction the bus station was in so we could make our way to find the bus to Nyaungshwe, the main town by Inle lake. Or at least to the junction at Shwenyaung which is the main town on the Shan highway, which is where the buses to Nyaungshwe stop and from there you get a taxi or pickup to the Nyaungshwe.

The road from Meiktila is the Shan Highway, lonely planet calls it a national disgrace. Given how crap some of the roads in Myanmar  are you can only imagine…  I may as well cover it now, as far as roads go, yes it was bad, it was so bad that all vehicles went slowly, which really makes it not so bad after all – if we had been doing Malaysian bus speeds on this road it would have been awful. As a notified highway it was bad though – very narrow, barely two car widths wide in most places so passing an oncoming truck or bus in the hills was slow or at least interesting, the road is very rough and in a few places just dirt and rock. However, there are a lot of road works going on so in a year it will be not as bad –  still bad, but not as bad ! I liked it as it is – at least it was slow – I would hate to be doing it at pace… Right,  back to the story (and another whisky)

The eight of us found our way to the Meiktila bus terminal only to discover there were no buses to Shwenyaung until tomorrow, however the kind gentleman could offer us a ride in the back of his truck – no seats, just a tray – we asked him how long and he said 7 hours. We laughed…. his second offer was a ride in a pickup.

The pickups are an extremely common form of public transport in Myanmar, we argued over price and availability of buses, but ended up facing the possibility that it was this or nothing (I am still not sure if we were conned or not, but the Burmese are pretty genuine, so I don’t think so, maybe on the price). We agreed on a price and foolishly thought it was just us going in the pickup, oh how naive we were ! Once we said yes, 3 burmese jumped onto the pick up and the 8 of us were left to find spots.  You can sort of see this grin on Mike’s face as he was thinking this is just silly, little did he (or we) know, silly got sillier and sillier…

We made it about 100 metres before the first stop where we picked up half a gear box, on the floor under our feet, and a massive bag of something on the roof. The second stop was to pick up 6 massive bails of something that went on the roof, plus a bunch of people.

Third stop saw a big bag of something, dumped under our feet and a person sitting on it….. stop, stop stop. We were soon under way with about 25 people on the vehicle. In NZ you would legally be allowed 2 – in the front – both wearing seatbelts.  The ride was still 7 hours…. The ute had 3 in the front, two rows of 4 each facing fwd in the back, 6/7 of us facing inwards in the back back, with 2 sitting on sacks/gearboxes in the middle and up to 4 standing on the tray and 5 on the roof…

The road was rough, dusty and dirty, we were crammed in, we let people off and more got on, we stopped for ciggies, for wees, for drinks (hopefully not the driver) and we stopped to allow the engine to cool. The good thing was it was slow, though my butt was killing me after a while, the padding was a layer of vinyl on wood. Bizarrely, once the inevitable was accepted, which didn’t take long, I actually enjoyed the ride, we saw a lot, we shared the travelling experience with numerous people, some quite intimately – if they were sitting in the middle, they were sitting on my feet, if they were standing on the tray then there crotch was in my face… The worst was the dust and the fumes, I had the start of a head cold and was blowing and coughing all the way and the dust just made it all worse. I was wearing a bandana over my nose and mouth cowboy styles for a chunk of the way – I wasn’t the only one…

The ride up the Shan hills took about 2 half hours, of slow grind, though the scenery was amazing, the villages, rural, but friendly . We stopped half way to allow the engine to cool down, parked next to a truck of chickens. The driver is hosing the engine, not urinating on it !

And a really broken down bus, –  that is the engine on the road side with the head off… I did say earlier our wee bus issues were minor compared to some.

There were loads of road works all the way up the hills which forced a lot of vehicles to share a single narrow lane, the drivers here are used to this type of driving so giving way and patience is part of their style – thank God ! apart from road rollers the road works are done by hand, rock breaking and laying, the heating of tar is done by road side fires and the tar is poured by hand – I would hate to see the lungs of these poor men, women and children. Sadly children are part of the workforce in the remote areas:( this is a hard hard life.

After 7 hours we arrived in Shwenyaung and got shifted to another pickup, where there was just the 6 of us (we lost 2 at a trekking town further back) and the last few kms were done at a good speed on a (my Myanmar standards) good road. It was dark by now and it was amazing to see the amount of fires burning all around, lots of burning off of corn and cane fields, the sky was alight in many directions.

13 hours after leaving Bagan we arrived in Nyaungshwe, we asked the pickup to drop us off at the Remember Inn where we had arranged to meet Giovanni who theoretically had arrived hours before us on the direct bus. Fortunately he had and they even knew who we were and had a room for us when arrived – awesome!

We unloaded our gear and I jumped straight into the shower in my shirt and undies in attempt to get the dust out (my shorts were too far gone!). After washing my shirt while it was still on my body I discovered I still had my non-waterproof money belt on, I so rarely use it that I had totally forgotten I had it on. Mucho swearing ensued, though luckily my passport was only damp around the edges, but all money was soaked – the room looked like a money laundry as I dried it out – I had close to 80 notes of various currencies – mostly worthless mind….

Once the passport panic was over Mike and I went for a wander around town and had Italian for dinner while my nose streamed nonstop.

Bed was a relief.

I am going to say, the new NZ passport with the silver fern on the front and back is the most distinctive passport out there, it utterly rocks for coolness – so well done NZ Passport designers – the coolest passport in the world.

I have washed that shirt 3 times and it is indelibly stained with dust of the Shan highway, I am not sure whether to keep it as a badge of honour or toss it in the bin as a dirty dusty relic, and to think that Nike shirt cost me at least $3 maybe even $4…

The temples of Bagan – day 3

Day 77, Wednesday 21 March 2012, Bagan

Back to using MS Word, not that I disliked BlogDesk, I just realised I lost my own original copy of the blog… I may go back to it yet.

Mike was feeling unwell this morning so we hung around the hotel for a while to see if things would improve, around mid-morning the power went out which knocked off the fan and air con, didn’t do much for Mike feeling lousy but was a good reason for me to go out. I had sort of arranged with Giovanni to ride out to Old Bagan with him, do a couple of the temples that neither of us  had seen and then go our separate ways.

Our first stop was LokaHteik Pann, one of the big temples on the way to Bagan.

This temple had steps right up the outside which was quite unusual for the area but great for the views…. A tour bus full of Burmese arrived as we were there, they were escorted to the top and back down again and back onto their bus, all quite normal tour bus behaviour.

When we got to the bottom I ventured off into one of the other buildings and found this stunning example of a reclining Buddha, probably 20 metres long, the Buddha was only lit by the three doorways it was just awesome and I cannot believe the tour group did not stop to see it. It was the most beautiful one I have seen in Myanmar.

Next was Sulameni Pagoda, which had been extensively repaired with assistance from the Korean government, and this was subtly noticeable in the site. We were here at mid-day again, which sucks photographically, but does mean very few other tourists and more time to look at the detail. This temple had some stunning art work inside, a lot of which was in original condition, or if it had been repaired it had been done very well – so maybe good on the Koreans for being subtle. I was faffing about admiring the art and taking photos and found Giovanni sitting around outside. I said how much I loved the murals, and he said “I am Italian, we have great murals” . I had to laugh, I guess when you are used to Michaelangelo , the works here are very crude…. plus a wall with 999 Buddhas is probably not that interesting !  I still loved it. (apologies, just saw that this image is wonky !! and i cannot be stuffed fixing it !)

We went our separate ways from here with Giovanni going back to the temples in Old Bagan and me heading out to the southern area. My first stop was Dhamma Yazika pagoda, which was an odd 5 sided pagoda built in 1196, quite different to the others in Bagan. It has also had extensive renovation and is quite well visited by local worshipers.

This was the most southern point on my travels and for me the last place that was ‘fun’.

[rant warning] I like temples, I mean I really do like them, not for any religious reason as I am a confirmed non-believer, but I like them as sacred places and respect their reason for being.  I like to spend time looking through them at my own pace, looking at what I can (I respect all the rules and never go across barriers) and in the order that takes my fancy, and often this is in the “wrong” order – but I don’t care. What pisses me off is being followed or ‘guided’ around the sites by souvenir touts, at the next temple I went to the ‘guide’ got quite annoyed as I was not going where he wanted nor at the pace he was dictating, I chose to stop and look out at the view, or look at the images that were ‘uninteresting”.  it got worse as I went around the southern temples so I rode off in a huff and it ruined my day. Well not really as it was still freaking awesome ! [end rant]

Stupidly I did not get the name of this white pagoda, but it is stunningly beautiful and you cannot get inside without the guide. This was the first locked pagoda I have come across in the 3 days of touring Bagan, I can understand why they are locked (sort of), the murals here are great and it appears few people come here. And I am sure the guide is trying to be helpful, but not speaking anything but Burmese and speaking through a mouthful of betel nut was next to useless. He also got grumpy as I was wandering at my own pace, but at least I could take photos…

I loved this nat image.

I left there a wee bit frustrated and rode off hoping to find some more obscure pagodas down the dirt roads.

I got to Nandamannya Pahto which had some stunning mural work, but this one I was not allowed to take photos, though the betel nut chewing incomprehensible guide was willing to sell me some art works showing the murals.

I just got the hump(not visibly – bad loss of face and offensive in SE Asia!) , got on my bike and rode back to the hostel.  I met an American guy who was heading in the opposite direction to me and he said it just got worse…. and damnit my bike was awesome all day !

I guess most of you (if you have made it this far – maybe not ! are sick of temple photos anyway)

I had a wee lie down and Mike was feeling a whole lot better for not going out today. Giovanni and I caught up again later on and went out for a final ride around town to look for a sunset, we headed down to the river and found these  monk trainees kicking a ball around at the back of the monastery.

Then went down to the river for sunset.

The three of us left reconvened for a final meal at Weatherspoons and I spoiled myself with a big burger – a massive protein hit. It was damn good… while we there we watched the owners kids  counting spaghetti sticks, we asked him why and he said he imports his spag from Italy, it was expensive so he wanted to make sure all his customers got the same amount per meal, rather one getting too much and another not enough. Awesome.

Giovanni was on the 5 am direct bus to Inle and Mike and I were on the indirect at 7.00 so it was an early night.

I loved Bagan !!!

2 days in Bagan – Part 1

Day 76, Tuesday 20 March 2012, Bagan

Lots to track back on as it is now 10 days later and I am in Bangkok. I have a few scribbled notes and some photos as a source for the post – as well as some good memories.

I am also experimenting with a new tool called BlogDesk that I have just downloaded off the net, so this could be either a great post with some detail, or a second attempt using MS Word that is really short! I will soon find out, if it has a faster method of uploading and inserting images I will be mega-happy.

Mike and I tried to book direct bus tickets to Inle Lake for tomorrow but there were no seats available so will stay here for another day and go the slow way and get a bus to Meiktila and try to catch a bus from there to the lake, there must be more backpackers around than are visible ! I am not complaining too much as I quite like it in Bagan and we have a couple of spare days up our sleeves.

Today we hired bikes from the shop next to the hotel, only 1000kyat and with normal valves in the tyres, which will hopefully mean we will have less issues with leaking valves than we did two days ago.

First stop was Kyan-Sit Thar Umin temple which was right on the edge of town, there is a new and old temple here, we visited the old temple first and got up to the roof to snap a few photos of town, there was some quite good art work inside.

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Bob had told me about a couple of good temples just out of town on the old road to Old Bagan so we pedaled there next. Passing these young monks on the way.P1100705

First up was Thagyapone Phaya, I was looking forward to this one as I had been told it had an 11th century Buddha figure with 13th century Buddha built around it, I have not seen this before so was quite keen 🙂

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On the way up to the roof I discovered a wee bee hive right on the inside of a tight corner, so with safety in mind I backed the truck up…. the bees are very small here, about 1cm long.P1100724

The next temple in the group was undergoing some renovation, unlike some of the shoddy work we saw in Inwa this looked to be pretty good. There was also some very good original wall art in this temple, the best I saw in Bagan that was not in one of the heavily touristed temples.

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While I was in the temple Mike was spending some time chatting to some of the workers outside, including one in Arsenal shirt, so when I came out we got to chatting about the team and their fortunes over the season, he was one passionate Arsenal supporter ! Football has its good side – two men from wildly different backgrounds with a common interest to chat about!

From here we rode back to Old Bagan and to one of the main temples – Htilo minlo Guphayo-Gyi, as we were close to lunch time there were not a lot of tourists about, though of course it was damn hot !

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and then a minor temple before lunch, the elephants had all been repaired as well as the ogre, but the work was quite good and will hopefully age to the same colour as the original. There were only a small number of elephant carvings around.

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Mike bought a painting here while I milled about taking photos – and I took a lot…

Back to Yar Pyi for lunch, where we met up with Bob, Paulo and Giovanni and I had the famous guacomole and poppadoms, which I will say was damn good…. we also had a game of Burmese dominoes (I am sure it has a name in Burmese) with the owner as Bobs 4th visit (and final) and everytime he came he brought more customers…

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After lunch Mike and I rode to Shwe Gu Gyi another one of the big temples, which was starting to get a bit crowded again. this temple was built in 1131.

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I loved the way the gold leaf was pealing off the Buddhas in this temple, but had been utterly left alone.

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There was also a neat stairway to one of the lower roof’s with a good view out over some of the other major temples.

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When we went to leave here I found I could not release the lock on my bike, Mike had a go, one of the local kids had a go, the lady selling water had a go, her husband had a go – by then we had a small crowd and I decided it was time to carry the bike back the main road…

Mike rode back to the shop to get help as I walked, I got to the main road and a guy on a bike stopped to help, he couldn’t work it so flagged down 2 guys on a scooter, he couldn’t do it, one of them went an organised a horse and cart – against my wishes, but I believe out of a genuine desire to help, so I ended up spending some cash to get a very slow horse and cart back to town. As we hit the edge of town the bike shop owner saw me and flagged down the horse driver. We unloaded the bike, the owner turned the key and the lock magically opened…. Burger !

I rode like mad back to the shop, got another bike and then tried to find Mike who had gone looking for me, after riding all the way back to Old Bagan, I gave up and rode back to the guest house and found Mike lying down waiting 🙂 not sure how we missed each other a he had ridden all the way back as well.

We said a farewell to Bob who was heading off that afternoon and the went back to the Weatherspoons for dinner with Paulo and Giovanni. I had my first salad in almost three months and it was great !

I made the mistake of asking the owner how much a Grand Royal Whisky was he said 200k a shot, this is 25cents…. Grand Royal is advertised everywhere in Myanmar and I had been wanting to try it. I got a double and it was damn good – OK it is not a fine single malt, but as a blended whisky it stood up fine. the guys all had a sniff and ended up with one each, and the Irish guy at the next table did likewise….. A good score!

We said goodbye to Paolo here and I said I would catch up with him in Italy when I am there and he promised to show me some good food and wine – sounds good to me!

Mt Popa

Day 75, Monday 19 March 2012, Bagan – Mt Popa

At dinner last night we discussed the possibility of joining Bob, Paulo and Giovanni on a trip to Mt Popa, about an hour and half drive from Bagan in a hired van. Mike and I decided to go ahead so agreed with Bob over breakfast. The total cost for the van was 35,000 Kyat and worth it split five ways, under $10 NZ a head.

Mt Popa is known for the Popa Taungkalat monastery on its peak and the the 37 nats (spirits) that live on the mountain. Me Wunna is the main nat.

The van left town with the five of us on board soon after 9.00 and we had a mandatory tourist stop (which wasn’t on our plan) at a jaggery making place. Jaggery is a sugar like substance made from the sap from the seed of a Toddy palm tree. It was actually quite interesting to see how it was all made using the primitive technology that is available to the Burmese villages where there is no electricity,this farm had sixty palm trees. They also make peanut oil from grinding peanuts using a bullock drive pestle and mortar and “whisky” which is basically pure fermented sugar alcohol.

Alcoholism is a big killer with young men frequently drinking themselves to death on the cheap locally produced fire water.

After our local tourism show we set off on the real journey to Mt Popa.

After an hour or so of driving and soon after we hit the low hills our driver stopped for us to take a photo of the view of Mt Popa and the temples. It was a wow moment  ! none of us had any idea of what to expect, i was thinking a monastery on a hill, but nothing like this. Another foggy/smoggy/dusty skyline, everyday in Myanmar was the same, it is the time of year, little wind and no rain to blow away the dust and the constant fires from burning off old cane and corn fields as well as the destruction of forests, cooking and dirty old cars.

Sadly it is ‘the” place to stop so the local villagers had the young girls out selling souvenirs, so sad they are not at school.

It was another half an hour to the temple entrance and there were a lot more tourists here than i expected, the whole village is geared towards tourists and there was a significant amount of industry around it, stair wipers, monkey shoo-ers, souvenir and water sellers etc etc.

Note the slingshot, used to deter the more aggressive monkeys.

The monastery is quite ordinary (by the regions standards !!) , but the walk up to the top was interesting, there are numerous stops on the way with descriptions of the life of Me Wunna and the various nats. Me Wunna is in the green.

The top had some semi-spectacular views (hazy again) and plenty of Buddha and monk statues. There was a MASSIVE amount of cash offerings in all the small temples – a guy with a gun and helicopter could be very rich ! 

We spent a couple of hours there and headed back down to the village.

Giovanni, Paulo, Bob and Mike.

Love this cow.

Obviously NZ farmers have been bullshitting us (pun intended) for years about how many acres are required per cattle beast !

Our driver was a bit miffed that we did not want to have lunch at the local restaurant, we assume he got some kickback. Bob had been to a great vegetarian place Yar Pyi in Old Bagan and wanted to go back there today. Our driver was initially reluctant to take us, but once the inevitable had sunk in he was OK with it, turns out Yar Pyi is owned by his uncle.

The food at Yar Pyi was great, most of the guys had the famous guacamole but i went for a pumpkin curry and it was very good. The owners family were great, very friendly and a bit of a laugh. They loved Bob as he had been there twice before and kept coming back with more people in tow. After lunch it was back to the hotel for a lie down and a clean up before dinner.

Dinner was back at the Weatherspoon again, I had my first salad since being in SE Asia and it was great!

Though this post may not inspire any potential visitors, if you are in Bagan and can get a crew together to take vehicle, it is definitely a worthwhile day trip, I did enjoy the day !

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Popa

Bagan – beautiful Bagan (day 1 of 3)

Day 74, Sunday 18 March 2012, Bagan

Ah, Bagan !  Bagan is what I have most wanted to see in Myanmar. The Bagan archaeological zone is approx 42 square km’s and contains over 3000 (yep three thousand, or 4400 depending on your source) stupas’ monasteries and temples dating back to the 1100’s. Angkor may contain big and impressive temples but Bagan has the volume, and oh how I loved them !

The plan for the day was to hire bicycles (1500 kyat (2 NZD) for a day), leave late morning and ride to New Bagan about 10km away and the furthest point from Nyaung U. At New Bagan we would check out some of the mid-range accommodation options and see if any had wifi (our hotel has no internet) or would be a good place to chill if we got sick of the Eden Hotel after the two nights we had booked for. We would then check out the temples etc on the way back and hit one of the biggies for sunset.

At the free breakfast – toast, egg and fruit I was chatting to Bob who I met last night and he was meeting an Italian guy he had met at Inle Lake who arrived in town yesterday, I asked him the Italians name and he said it was Paulo. I replied that I thought it might have been Giovanni (who I first met in KL and again 2 days ago in Mandalay) and he said that Paulo had just met with Giovanni and was meeting him again in town tonight, so we planned on all meeting up for dinner later –  a small world. Unfortunately breakfast pretty much went straight through me , so I was really hoping it was not a re-occurrence of last week.

I went and checked the internet shop again and the web was still out of action, damnit ! I wanted to email a few people and let them know what was happening in my week. I am so reliant on the web, so different to when I went to Europe in the eighties and it was all slow post and no one worried if they didn’t here from you for a few weeks.

Around 10.30 we went to the bike rental place over the road from the hotel and rented two (untrustworthy) steeds. I would call them girly bikes, but everyone rides them and the basket on the front is so much better than having a backpack sweating away on your back. The seat was way too low, it had one gear and virtually no brakes, but it was a bike and we were off exploring.

If you got bored with me going on about Angkor Wat, now would be a good time to stop reading, as this is all about temples, and I soooooo love the temples – and the buddhas and monks and nats and ogres and all the other bits and pieces associated with Myanmar’s Buddhism.

The first km was riding through the outskirts of town, past the villager’s houses and gardens, cows and chickens and pigs. It is very dry so not a lot of small greenery, though plenty of trees and as with most of SE Asia, lots of cafes, small restaurants and little shops selling all sorts of useful things. Out of town we started to see stupas and small pagodas on the road side. It is a six 6km ride to Old Bagan on the old road and there is plenty to see on the way, we had decided that we would focus on the further away sites today and come back tomorrow for the closer ones, so we just rode on past. The road was not pancake flat like I expected, with lots of small dips and rises and the surface was not too bad. Mike got his first flat tyre just outside of Old Bagan, fortunately bikes are very common here so there are numerous bike repair stands around the place, so we were soon back on the road after a valve replacement.

The archaeological museum is in Old Bagan, so we paid the $5 entry fee and took an hour or so to wander around the museum (relishing the air con) and learning about the things we will see today. It seems a lot of the carvings and features of the temples have been removed, either stolen or damaged or taken to museums for safe keeping. It was a useful trip as there is little or no information out in the field and my guidebook is next to useless for detail. The museum looks like it has been built at great expense by the government, which sucks when you see how little money the real people have 😦

Old Bagan used to just be called Bagan until 1990, when the government forced all the residents out of town and moved them to a new village – now called New Bagan, four kms down the road. Old Bagan is now full of resorts for rich people and package tour tourists as well as some of the big temples – hence the clean out…

The massive temple building effort in Bagan was started in 1044 when King Anawratha took the throne and embraced Buddhism. The building frenzy lasted 200 years until King Narathihapati bankrupted the city building Mingalazedi pagoda leaving the area vulnerable to invasion by Kublai Khan in 1287. The whole area was damaged in an earthquake in 1975. Sadly Mingalazedi, which is supposed to be beautiful inside is under renovation.

We carried on the ride to New Bagan, where we had lunch at the Green Elephant, it was a tourist place with inflated prices but we decided to eat there as we had not had decent  food for a few days and my stomach was not feeling that great. The food was very good too ! one of the great things in Myanmar is a lot of the restaurants give a gift of a small plate of fruit as a dessert, I ate a bit of the fruit but pretty much had to go straight to the loo again, I had a lot of fruit at breakfast as well so I am wondering if I am overdosing on fruit after a long period without it ? I was a bit worried that this was going to be the start of another four days of stomach illness, but fortunately it was the last real episode.

Outside the restaurant I found my first flat tyre of the day, so walked down the road  till we found a tyre repair man who pumped my tyre up and we rode around and looked at a couple of hostels. At the second hostel we visited my tyre was flat again so had a valve change and rode on some more, this time we managed to make it out of town and it was time to go sight see.

We stopped at numerous small pagodas during the day, a lot are empty of anything at all, most of the stupas had four Buddha figures inside and most of those are locked behind gates. There are a lot of great Buddha and monk statues to see though.

My wheels…

Lay Myet Hnar temple

The view from the roof. A lot of the pagodas have access to the roof, but the passages are small and tight and in some cases very easy to miss.

Dhammayangi temple

Some of the temple have remains of murals on the walls, a lot in a state of disrepair, which I like, in some cases touch up work has been completed which ruins the authenticity for me. The same applies to most of the large Buddha figures. This monk was part of a series of monks painted on the wall.

This temple was built in the mid 1100s and is one of the biggest temples in the area, the inner part of the temple was blocked soon after it was built, but we could walk around two external passageways.  I found a sneaky passage way to an upper window and shot a few photos of the view.

The big temples close to the villages where the roads are sealed and in reasonable condition draw all the package tour tourists and late in the day is when they all come out. Like some pre-dusk vampire hoard they magically appear and suck all the vitality out of the sites, luckily they only seem to stay for a few minutes – or maybe the light is just too much for them. This is why I suffer the heat of the day. (Mum – sorry !!!)

Ananda Paya

This is supposed to be the most beautiful temple in Bagan, but frankly I found it dull. It had been extensively renovated and all the small figures were behind bars. It is possibly the most beautiful on the package tour trips, but i found some stunningly preserved sites out in the field over the next few days.

There was very little mural work., but it was in original condition and hard to find, it is lucky I like poking my nose into all the doorways and walkways….

What was cool was the inner wall was lined with indented shelves, presumably with Buddha figures, right up to the ceiling five or six metres up.

When we left Ananda I found I had another flat tyre, which I had pumped up at the place Mike had his flat repaired earlier in the day. We were originally planning on going to one of the big temples and getting to the roof with the horrible herds for some photos, but the sunset looked like it was going to be as dire as every other day in Myanmar and with the constant flat tyres and a six km ride between towns we decided to head back before nightfall and check some of the small temples on the way.

At the Upalithein Monastery

Mike found he too had another flat tyre so started walking towards town and I rode ahead and stopped to take photos along the way. After stopping to at my final temple I had a flat front tyre this time so ended up walking with Mike back into town. It was a looong 3km…

We got back later than expected so had a quick shower as we were meeting Bob for dinner, we  walked way the heck out to the small Weather Spoon cafe where we had an excellent meal and a couple of well earned beers with Aussie Bob and Italian Paulo. The cafe had slow and sporadic internet and I managed to get one email and one facebook posting away before giving up !

On the way back I was drawn into one of the local cafes to watch the end of the Chelsea / Leicester City FA cup tie, they LOVE their football here.

Surprisingly after a warm day of riding and walking I felt good. The weather here is not as hot as elsewhere and definitely not as humid as Cambodia.

Did I love the day – yes I did !

The last of the prepared posts, back to writing and some photo editing now !