Blue Bird Bagan

... tour hire a bicycle in Bagan and cycle around the huge temple area independently and that’s what I of course did as well. I have to admit that Bagan impressed me. The area is just so big that you can easily cycle there many days and still leave without seeing even nearly all of the temples. While the biggest, best known and architecturally most impressive temples as well as the best sun set spots are crowded with ...

... look at the temples that afternoon so at 1430 we set off on our Oscar 'Hero' The way to pronounce horsecart around these parts seems to sound like Oscar.<br><br>We looked at some really cool temples, totally unlike anything that we saw at Siem Reap last year, unfortunately the children putting the ************ to everyone have followed, fortunately after you've refused a couple of times most of them are keen to chat about anything in general.<br><br>We caught an awesome ...

... is nevertheless useful to confirm that this country has the worst roads and buses in the entire South East Asia, and makes traveling using public transport a total nightmare. Today I just had to ride the 80 km between Moniwa and Pakokku and according to my guidebook there should be up to 6 daily buses connecting both towns. When I got to the bus station at 7:45 to take the 8:00 bus, I was called that the first one wouldn't be ...

... Temple. The name was not printed in English, so I am not sure which one it was. It is a larger Temple with faded frescos. There is a small building out back. We climbed the low wall to get a view, but there was not much to see. It did not clear the power lines. The sky is more clear than it has been for a while. The last time we had a clear sky was in Yangon. Bill gave the boy a small tip, so he did not follow us up the road. We tried to ...

... treasure. Payathone (Payathonzu) has three interconnected shrines (stupas) that dates to the 13th century and is also incomplete. There are sikhara (structures that are influenced by Khmer). Some ancient writing is still visible here (Pali). The shrines contain influences from Mahayana or Tantric also, Chinese or Tibetan. There are paintings of a Hindu like woman (we bought a painting the next day) and small Buddhas everywhere. Here our guide and a painter were giving ...

... ones got out and joined them. OUCH, the ball is hard and hurts your foot if you hit the wrong spot, which I did a lot! A group of "watchers" materialized out of the mist and when it got dark just as mysteriously drifted off. Where did they come from?? Finally we were encouraged to get back on the boat, since it has no lights and it was already dark. Then to dinner (too full to eat) and a puppet show.

... me *f the temples with 'r**f' access, and taking in the c*untry vistas *f Bagan all ar*und: the nearly 4500 temples d*tting a plain appr*ximately the size *f Manhattan, carpeted with the plains grass, turned a h*ney g*ld in the late Burmese fall, rustling with each gust *f the wind, which als* carried *v** the s*und *f a wayward bull *r tw*, and m*nks chanting in the distance. W*rds can hardly c*nvey the idyll *f the juxtap*siti*n *f such a buc*lic and architecturally and hist*rically rich scene.

... pay ($20 US) for public transportation, so for the ticket seller it was a no-brainer. We had one real seat and one folding middle seat that would be extremely uncomfortable on a perfectly smooth road. So it was close to torture on a Burmese road. The older model South Korean and Japanese buses, like all buses in the country, was a mobile temple with all likes of Buddhas, amulets, posters, charms, and lighted sculptures. These alters were on the inside ...

... a bunch of feathers left. You could buy and free one of the songbirds for 2000 Kyatt and preserve it from a grisly fate at the hands of the owls, or you could do the same for one of the owls for 6000 Kyatt. Either way the guy got his money and won. Next I asked my taxi to take me to the Ava Bridge. This giant Steel Bridge was the first bridge across the Irrawaddy when it was built by the British in 1936 and was one of the longest if not the longest in the British Empire when it ...