Reflections on Myanmar

If three words could explain my Christmas 2013, they would be: buddhas, temples, and gold. Clearly this was an atypical Christmas holiday for me - rather than going home to snowy Colorado like last year, I decided to stay in Asia in order to go explore a country that's always been on my want-to-visit list: Myanmar [formerly known as Burma]. Luckily I had a trusty fellow explorer who was willing to go with me...Jordan! It was definitely weird to not be home with family on my favorite holiday of the year, but we made memories that will last a long time. It's quite an intriguing country on the brink of so much change, yet one that still retains elements of its dynamic past.

We started planning the trip back in September, so I had been anticipating the trip for a few months. We ended up using a tour company because it made it SO much easier to deal with the logistics of traveling domestically. Myanmar still has a weak infrastructure and it's difficult to book some things (like flights) online. [If you're interested in a tour company for Myanmar, we would recommend Sun Bird Tours]. Having the tour company organize everything also took the stress off of me! :)

Our trip lasted a total of 12 days - lots of time to explore various parts of the country. We visited five different main cities/sites, which made for a pretty busy trip! Here's a breakdown of the places through photos and comments.

Yangon: This city was the former capital of Myanmar [the capital was moved to the brand new city of Naypyidaw in 2005 for dubious reasons] and is still the commercial hub of the country. We spent two nights here total - one on the way in, and one on the way out. It reminded me of a mixture of Phnom Pehn, Dhaka, and Hanoi...a bit of a combo of South Asia and Southeast Asia. The first site we visited was the famous Shwedagon Pagoda, which is the pride of the country and is completely encased in gold leaf! On our last night, we did a walking tour of the downtown area, which is full of buildings from the British colonial era. Quite the contrast!

Posing in front of the golden glory of the Shwedagon Pagoda.

The Supreme Court of Myanmar - in the old British colonial building.

Kyaiktiyo: Our one-night stay up at the famous "Golden Rock" was quite possibly the most adventurous part of the entire trip. When we were organizing the trip, Jordan spied a picture of this golden pagoda online and we decided that we had to go! To get there, we drove four hours south of Yangon into the Mon State, which brought us to the base of the mountain that we then needed to scale! Our tour guide kept telling us that we would need to take a "mountain truck" to the top, and it was a hilarious experience. We were packed into the back of an open-air truck with about 40 local people who were on a pilgrimage up to the pagoda. Every time we went over a bump in the road, they let out a big yelp of excitement! It was a long hour ride. The rock itself is absolutely stunning. We arrived with the perfect amount of time to get sunset photos, and then we headed for our hotel because it got chilly when the sun went down!

Ready to head up in the mountain truck!

Here's our trusty truck!

The Golden Rock in all its shiny glory! Legend has it that the rock is held up by Buddha's hairs...I guess we'll never know!

As the sun set, the temperature dropped. Brrr!

Bagan: Bagan was the capital city of a former Burmese kingdom from around the 13th century. Many people call it the "Angkor Wat of Myanmar" because of its resemblance to the incredible temples of the Cambodian site. In some ways it is more stunning because of the sheer number of temples that are still intact - over 2,000! We spent three days exploring the various temple complexes and markets around the ancient city. The history nerd in me loved this place! It was a pretty cool place to spend Christmas Day.

Caught in the act! I couldn't resist taking a bazillion pics!

Some of the temples have been restored and are still in use - like this super shiny one!

It wouldn't be a great trip without a bike tour - our favorite!

Sunset over Bagan on Christmas Day

Mandalay: The name of this former capital of Burma exudes exoticism, but unfortunately the truth does not match the fantasy. We found the city to be pretty polluted and crowded, which was unfortunate because there were a lot of great sites around the city that we really enjoyed. Luckily we spent most of our time seeing these sites and managed to avoid the city itself for most of the daytime. This is where I found it to be most evident that Myanmar is still a developing country.

Hanging out on the famous U-Bein's Bridge - the longest teak wood bridge in the world.

A former monastery of King Thibaw - the last king of Burma.

The building in the background was supposed to become the tallest stupa in the world, but they gave up after only making it a third of the way!

View over the Irrawaddy River with Mandalay in the background.

Inle Lake: We were so happy that we ended our trip at Inle Lake as this was the most peaceful and serene part of the journey. From the airport to the hotel took about two hours because our hotel was literally on the lake - built on stilts - and the only way to get to the hotel was by boat. The local fisherman of the lake are famous for their unique way of fishing; they stand on one leg while paddling with the other. It was quite a sight to see! We had a great tour guide at the lake who did a wonderful job showing us around without making it too hectic - just what we needed at this point. She even took us to one of the vineyards in the area! Definitely a win in my book. If I could recommend just one place to go in Myanmar, I would tell people to go to Inle.

One of the local fisherman hard at work.

Touring around the lake on our own personal motorboat!

Posing with our super cute tour guide, Daphne. She was so tiny!

Our hotel on stilts! 

Last sunset at the lake. Those look like Broncos colors to me!

Overall, we had a wonderful trip where we learned so much about a country and culture that has been fairly inaccessible until recently. Right now seems to be an intriguing time in Myanmar's history as they try to figure out what direction the country will go - will they continue opening up to the world? Or will they revert to the isolationism of the past 50 years? Only time will tell, but if you have the chance to go in the next few years, you'll be able to catch the country before it hits the hight of tourism.