Burma

Our last major stop and probably the most beautiful place in Burma was Inle Lake. The lake is fairly large but not that deep (2.1m to 3.7 m at the deepest point). The main mode of transportation is a flat boat.  The people of Inle Lake (called Intha), some 70,000 of them, live in four cities bordering the lake and many smaller villages. This community lives by fishing, growing vegetables on floating gardens and tourism. The fishermen are known in the world for using one of their legs to steer the boat and fish with a circular cage. Most of the fishermen who still fish like this, are more interested in having their pictures taken than fishing. Since this is one of the most iconic image of Burma (the Lonely Planet guide for Burma has a Inle Lake fisherman on the...

Up to this point, we had done a fairly standard Burma trip. Two destinations on our itinerary were off the beaten path. First, on our way to Inke Lake we stopped for one day and one night in Pindaya. The second one was the Kyaiktiyo pagoda also known as Golden Rock, which was an extra two days trip after coming back to Rangoon. Based on my previous post about the food and the lodging you could think it was a luxury trip (and it was) but these two locations were a little to a lot more basic in the food and accommodation. Pindaya The attraction of Pindaya are the caves that are filled with buddhas. On our way to the airport, we stopped on the side of the road to take pictures of the low fog in the Mandalay valley. Pindaya is a small town and after visiting the...

One of the most common questions about Burma I get is about the food and/or the hotel or lodging quality. So let’s talk about our trip and our experience. First we went with a small group and with a very experienced travel agency: Insider Asia. They have been organizing custom trips to Asia for many years. While this trip to Burma was their first one, they did a lot of research and selected a very good local guide. Both of those attributes made our trip amazing. The lodging was always excellent as most hotels were 4-5 stars equivalent. My favorite hotel was the Myanmar Treasure Resort Inle. Here is a couple images of what our room looked like. We had a patio with view of the lake, a cool private outdoor shower, and a fantastic bed. In Burma, they make their...

Monks are very present in Myanmar, there are between 400,000 and 500,000 professional monks in a country of about 50 million people. Our photo leader (Tuan) had arranged that we could photograph some young monks (called novices) during an entire afternoon.  Monks rise very early for the alms offering and then have their lunch quite early (around 11am). Since we went and photograph the sunrise that morning, we went to visit a monastery right before their lunch. Monks raised at the monastery were, I guessed, between the age of 5 to 12.  Novices were generally pretty happy to have their photo taken. Their lunch is mainly composed of rice and vegetables. When the gong rings, they form a line from the youngest to the oldest. Each brings his bowl in which he gets a...

After landing in Bagan early in the morning, we went directly to the Shwesandaw pagoda, which offers an impressive view of Bagan and makes you understand why it is so popular. From the upper terrace, you can see hundreds of Buddhist temples and monuments. Bagan was once the capital city of the first Kingdom of Pagan. During the kingdom’s height between the 11th and 13th centuries, over 10,000 Buddhist temples, pagodas and monasteries were constructed in the Bagan plains alone, of which the remains of over 2200 temples and pagodas still survived to the present day. To give you an idea, it’s like starting a new temple or monument EVERY week (on average) for 200 years. While in Bagan, we went to the Shwesandaw three times (mid-morning, sunset and...

Kandawgyi Lake (or Great Royal Lake) is an artificial lake in the center of Yangon. It’s a pleasant place where locals start their day exercising (it opens at 5am and it’s free for all until 7am). I went there twice during my stay in Yangoon. The lake is famous for the replica of the Pyigyimon Royal Barge (Karaweik). The barge is made of concrete and was build in 1972. Karaweik or Karaweik Hall is a palace on the eastern shore of Kandawgyi Lake, and is now a restaurant. The restaurant is a tourist attraction because there is a traditional puppet theater show every night. The entrance of the restaurant is really impressive at night with all the lights, I wish we had come a little earlier to have a blue sky rather than the black sky, but we were...