Myanmar: Yangon, Mandalay, Bagan, Inle Lake

Myanmar: Yangon, Mandalay, Bagan, Inle Lake

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Yangon, Myanmar

Myanmar is beautiful, the people are very friendly, there are only a few tourists and therefore, the whole atmosphere is different to the countries I have so far visited.

The capital Yangon is famous for its Schwedagon-Pagoda, where I took a guide - normally I just visit all the sights with my lonely planet book guide but here one local addresses me and tells me that he really needs the money as I am the first tourist today and there are not many tourists around. Of course I agree and it is very interesting.

In ther afternoon, I meet a Swiss girl, we wander through the city and as we don't find a nice place for us to sit, have a chat and enjoy a drink, we end up in the lobby of a big hotel, where we enjoy a coffee and a nice homemade bread from the hotel's bakery.

My trip through Myanmar should include highlights such as Mandalay and Bagan, former cities of the royals, and Inle-lake, where locals live on stilt-houses and have so called floating gardens where they grow vegatables which they export to the rest of the country.

There are several possibilites to travel in Myanmar, either by bus, by car and driver or to fly. Due it being rainy time and traveling alone as a woman and not so many tourists being around and also due to the fact that flights are very cheap, I decide to fly from Yangon to Mandalay, from Mandalay to Bagan I take the famous boatroute on the Irrawaday river, from Bagan I fly to Inle-Lake and from there back to Yangon. But here my trip in detail:

I arrive on the aiport of Mandalay as the only tourist, the airport seems completely new, my backpack is the only one coming in on the luggage train, the whole arrival hall is dark, I guess they figured that they don't have to turn the light on just because of me. Outside the arrival hall, all the taxi drivers are just waiting for me, no bus comes here, 45 min from the city, therefore I am forced to take a taxi for US$ 10, a lot of money in this country.

I arrive in a nice hostel and decide to immediately discover the city on foot. I walk to the nearby Manadaly Fort, the former royal palace, but I underestimate the size of this huge area, each side has 2km and by the time I arrive at the entrance at the other side of the compound, I have walked for about an hour and I am very exhausted - it is lunchtime and boiling hot. I decide not to go inside this huge areal, but to walk up the nearby Mandalay Hill to enjoy a nice view on the city and the fort. On the way to the stairs i meet a funny elderly lady.

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