Burma

I hated to leave Chaing Mai, but my month in Thailand was up. The night train to Bangkok was easy, one night at the same hostel, then the early morning train to the Bangkok Airport and a short ride to Yangon, Burma.

The road into town was interesting. It looked a little like Europe, neat and clean. My hostel was very strange. I got a dorm room for $12/night. Not that nice, but cheap and I got to meet some travellers.

Yangon was interesting…. The sidewalks are all torn up, people on the sidewalks selling stuff and cooking. No motorbikes in the city. I was downtown and it was way too hot in Yangon. I visited a couple of pagodas and found a great Indian restaurant. I also found a sidewalk place where I could buy strawberry ice cream.

One day I took a boat across the river and got a motorbike ride to a village about 40 miles away. It was great to get out of the city and seeing rural Burma. I had a couple of guides to go along with me. Kimya is 17 and Sen is 12.

My guides

I paid for their motorbike ride. The first thing Kimya did was buy some sunscreen and apply it to my face. Most of the people wear this yellow paste and it does look strange.

They took me to a temple in a lake and I was surprised to find a bunch of Burmese Pythons living thete.

I got an overnight bus to Bagan and that was a great place to visit. Bagan has 3000 temples and has not been ruined by tourists yet.

Our bus arrived at 4 am. I was with a young couple from Toronto. We found a guest house to stay at. We could not check in until 9 am so we got a horse and carriage to bring us out to a temple to see the sun come up over Bagan. It was a great sight.

The next day we hired another horse, cart and driver to go sight-seeing. It was a long dusty day which I will never forget. These places are so amazing to see.

I rented a bike and took a 15 mile bike ride around the temples. I can still do this kind of stuff and I am very lucky to be as healthy as I am.

Off to Mandalay in a couple of days, either by boat or bus. I am reading George Orwell’s book “Burmese Days“. The web is very slow here…will try to upload with one picture.