Mandalay, Myanmar

We're still getting up early and so had breakfast at 6:30am, well before anyone should be awake while on vacation.

Because of the early hour, we were able to book a car and driver for the day ($45) starting at 8:30am to see the highlights of Mandalay and finish off with the sunset at the U Bein bridge. The highlights are spread out enough that walking wasn't an option; the hotel provides bicycles free of charge, but the roads are a little crazy for us.

With a car we were able to see twice the amount that I had planned. First we drove almost all the way up Mandalay Hill. It's otherwise a 45 minute walk, shoes / footwear not allowed. I probably couldn't make the climb anyways as I wouldn't be able to wear my ankle brace.

The terrace at the top is fairly large and nice to walk around for the views of Mandalay. It's supposed to be packed at sunset, but was nice at 9am. The temple itself is very colourful. We got asked to be in some more pics by locals.

In quick succession we visited Kyauktawgyi Paya (with a giant 12m tall Buddha from a single piece of marble), Sandumani Pagoda (surrounded by 1774 slabs engraved with commentaries on the Tripitaka scripture) (one of my favourites today), Atumashi Kyaung, and Mandalay Palace. There's a $10 admission ticket that covers all the major sites in Mandalay - they stamp the site at each one you visit.

We stopped for lunch at a tour-group focused place (Unique Myanmar) that had good toilets but mediocre food. Oh well.

After lunch we stopped in at a number of crafts places. The gold leaf place was most interesting. A small piece of gold is pounded for over 9 hours until it's super-thin. Small squares are bought by locals to apply to the Buddha in Mahamuni Paya. (They also sell samples to tourists).

A few more pagodas and temples later and we were at U Bein bridge around 2:45pm, with plenty of time to walk across and back, arrange for a boat for sunset ($12 for one hour) and sip a coconut from a viewpoint bar. Around 4:20 we headed out by boat, first to get pics with the nice lighting, and then to the other side for silhouette pics. About a dozen other boats were also out there, all arranged neatly in a line by the rowers so that everyone had a view. It was great, Heather and I found it more peaceful out on the water than in the hot air balloon. I'd definitely recommend taking a boat.

Back at the hotel, we cleaned up and headed out for dinner. Some restaurants had a no-alcohol policy because it was the night before the election (not sure if this was to prevent drunken violence or drunken voting). So we ended up at the same Thai restaurant as last night as they were serving beer.