We started this post three days ago when we were in Bagan, on the western side of Central Myanmar. It's now Sunday evening and today we flew to be here at lake Inle. I will finish this post now and upload it but it won't contain any photos yet as the internet is pretty slow here.
Also Internet is playing up so not sure this is going to work !
If it all seems pretty scrambled, sorry. We will fix it up when we can.
Written previously.
So here we are in Bagan, in central Myanmar, watching the D-day rememberance event on a French (!) TV channel in our hotel room after (another) day of sightseeing and sunset watching.
The first thing you need to know about Central Myanmar in June is that it is hot. Like 40+ degrees hot. And dry. no rain for months. The monsoon has been late coming this year, which has been good for us, but the full days out and about looking at the fabulous ancient sites have been pretty exhausting. Plus we are still recovering from the preparations before we left.
Leaving Coolangatta at 8am on the 30th we arrived in KL via Air Asia. 9 hours but a pretty good flight. There is a new low cost terminal just opened in KL that has an express rail link to the city for about $10, great service .........
After a quiet day in a friend's apartment near the station in central KL we boarded our Malaysia Air (!) flight to Yangon (Rangoon) where we were met at the airport, so no problems there. Out of the door, and into the heat. 40C plus, like a really bad summer day in Brisbane.
Good hotel with efficient air conditioning overlooking one of the Yangon masterpieces, the Shwedegon pagoda. We met the rest of the group of 9 (7 assorted Aussies, one Swiss lass, and a New York gal. Great mix!
Up early the next day for a visit to the pagoda, and back again through madly weaving traffic to the airport for the "flight to Mandalay".
Mandalay was, if anything, even hotter than Yangon. A very busy city, traffic, cars, motorbikes and bicycles everywhere. Set out on a perfect square grid of streets around the central Royal Palace and surrounding moat, it was all you would expect of a bustling Asian commercial centre.
Our hotel was brand new and close to the centre, and terribly designed, but full of very willing staff. As an example they had a servery to manage breakfast from and the waste from the sink crossed the floor in a duct staff had to step over to get to the kitchen!?
We had two days visiting the local sights including the pagodas on Mandalay Hill and a Raj style hill station out if town with the most beautiful botanic gardens.
A boat trip one morning took us across the Irrawaddy to the largest pile of bricks in the world, see photo above, a massive unfinished temple, only 50m high, one third of the planned total.
An earthquake in 1830 stopped work, and also toppled a 90 ton bell (2nd biggest ringing bell in the world - all the facts here!), rehung by the British, and still there.
The Irrawaddy river level is very low, awaiting the start of the monsoon, so the planned slow boat to our next stop, Bagan, 200km downstream was off, replaced by a flight. Roads out of the cities are generally pretty poor, so it would have been about 10 hours by coach we were told.
Bagan is truly one of the most wondrous places in the world, literally thousands of mostly Buddhist temples, pagodas and monasteries, spread across the sandy plains. At peak they say there were 10,000 structures. The local dynasties ruled Burma from here around 10th & 11th centuries AD.
The weather in Bagan was up to 44C but the hotel did at least have a swimming pool to fall into at the end of the days sightseeing.
We did see some wonderful sunsets, blazing red sky's over the pagodas in the plains, or from the terrace of bars overlooking the Irrawaddy.
Sorry but the photos at Bagan do not do the place justice, as you simply cannot get the skyline "view" of all of the pagoda rooflines in any picture that I took. They has stopped the hot air balloon flights before we arrived, so the opportunity of an aerial view of the plain was not to be.
Next day we awoke at 5am (!) for breakfast before an early flight to Heho, the airport for Lake Inle where we are for the next few days. The weather here, on the fringes of the "Golden Triangle" zone of Burma/ Laos / Thailand is mercifully cool, about 22c at present, with showers forecast for our stay.
Note : Photos added 18 June.
Also Internet is playing up so not sure this is going to work !
If it all seems pretty scrambled, sorry. We will fix it up when we can.
Written previously.
So here we are in Bagan, in central Myanmar, watching the D-day rememberance event on a French (!) TV channel in our hotel room after (another) day of sightseeing and sunset watching.
The first thing you need to know about Central Myanmar in June is that it is hot. Like 40+ degrees hot. And dry. no rain for months. The monsoon has been late coming this year, which has been good for us, but the full days out and about looking at the fabulous ancient sites have been pretty exhausting. Plus we are still recovering from the preparations before we left.
Leaving Coolangatta at 8am on the 30th we arrived in KL via Air Asia. 9 hours but a pretty good flight. There is a new low cost terminal just opened in KL that has an express rail link to the city for about $10, great service .........
 |
| one of 8 lions guarding the entrance to the Shew de Gon Pagoda |
Good hotel with efficient air conditioning overlooking one of the Yangon masterpieces, the Shwedegon pagoda. We met the rest of the group of 9 (7 assorted Aussies, one Swiss lass, and a New York gal. Great mix!
Up early the next day for a visit to the pagoda, and back again through madly weaving traffic to the airport for the "flight to Mandalay".
 |
| The orb and vane on the top of the main pagoda comprise 1/2 ton gold and 3,000 gemstones! |
Mandalay was, if anything, even hotter than Yangon. A very busy city, traffic, cars, motorbikes and bicycles everywhere. Set out on a perfect square grid of streets around the central Royal Palace and surrounding moat, it was all you would expect of a bustling Asian commercial centre.
Our hotel was brand new and close to the centre, and terribly designed, but full of very willing staff. As an example they had a servery to manage breakfast from and the waste from the sink crossed the floor in a duct staff had to step over to get to the kitchen!?
We had two days visiting the local sights including the pagodas on Mandalay Hill and a Raj style hill station out if town with the most beautiful botanic gardens.
 |
| Flower market outside Mandalay |
 |
| Difficult to grasp scale, all brick, -it's 50 m high! |
An earthquake in 1830 stopped work, and also toppled a 90 ton bell (2nd biggest ringing bell in the world - all the facts here!), rehung by the British, and still there.
The Irrawaddy river level is very low, awaiting the start of the monsoon, so the planned slow boat to our next stop, Bagan, 200km downstream was off, replaced by a flight. Roads out of the cities are generally pretty poor, so it would have been about 10 hours by coach we were told.
 |
| The Irrawaddy before the monsoon. |
Bagan is truly one of the most wondrous places in the world, literally thousands of mostly Buddhist temples, pagodas and monasteries, spread across the sandy plains. At peak they say there were 10,000 structures. The local dynasties ruled Burma from here around 10th & 11th centuries AD.
 |
| Many temples had 4 different Buddhas inside. |
 |
| Jane in the pool in Bagan. The water was 38C! |
We did see some wonderful sunsets, blazing red sky's over the pagodas in the plains, or from the terrace of bars overlooking the Irrawaddy.
 |
| Sunset over the Bagan plains. |
Next day we awoke at 5am (!) for breakfast before an early flight to Heho, the airport for Lake Inle where we are for the next few days. The weather here, on the fringes of the "Golden Triangle" zone of Burma/ Laos / Thailand is mercifully cool, about 22c at present, with showers forecast for our stay.
Note : Photos added 18 June.
