Mandalay
Our last stop in Myanmar was Mandalay, the northernmost of Myanmar’s three main cities. We arrived after a long bus ride that included confusing bathroom stops and aggressive sellers of cooked crickets.
It’s really a game of chance at this point.
Cooked crickets? We weren’t brave enough to try.
Instead we had the standard Burmese meal of rice and lots of small bowls with fish, meat, vegetables, and spices.
The City
Although smaller than Yangon, it felt like a bigger city on the streets with hundreds of motorbikes zooming past (motorbikes are banned in Yangon), more people on the streets, and shops geared more towards commerce than a relaxing meal.
A truck filled with people. Looked dangerous to us, but they’re so happy!
Jami on the streets
Young nuns-in-training soliciting donations from an electronics shop. We saw young nuns soliciting donations everywhere in Mandalay.
It was an enjoyable city to walk around, at least for a few days. We found the residents to be very friendly and not used to seeing tourists, as many would approach us excitedly with whatever English words they knew.
Jami with two happy girls who were excited to meet us and use English.
We found local soccer games…
Street soccer in Mandalay
A street festival filled with carnival games and street food – including our favorite, Mont Lin Ma Yar. Such a great street snack and can’t believe it’s not available in the US. A was able to find the recipe from another online travel blog, helladelicious.com.
Street festival
Jami bargaining for food
This guy was justly proud of his “Mont Lin Ma Yar” – an amazing, crispy street snack that includes a quail egg, green onions, and other optional toppings. We liked ours best with tomatoes and some spice.
Close up of Mont Lin Ma Yar – yum!
And probably the biggest soups we’d ever seen.
This was a normal soup on the menu!
Mandalay itself doesn’t have all that many tourist attractions. Probably the coolest part of the city to me (a huge walled palace/fort surrounded by a moat in the middle of the city) was mostly closed to foreigners because it is still used by the army. But we hit up the highlights:
The Bargaya Monastery was fairly cool, as it includes a temple made entirely of wood. It reminded me of a huge pirate ship.
In front of the teak wood monastery
The Pahtodawgyi Pagoda was also beautiful, even though it was under construction and some parts were off-limits to women.
The Pahtodawgyi Pagoda
Only one of us was allowed to see the cool parts…
An overrated attraction is Sagaing Hill, which simply contains a lot of golden pagodas. Unfortunately, from the hill only a few of the stupas are visible.
The view from Sagaing Hill
The U Bein Bridge
The best attraction, by far, is the U Bein Bridge over Taungthaman Lake (just outside the city). A long pedestrian bridge made mostly of teak wood, it is famed for its beauty at sunrise and sunset. When we first showed up just before dawn at the bridge, I was a little disappointed to find such a small, ordinary-looking bridge. But once the sun started to rise, its beauty became clear. Sorry for all the pictures, but it was just that beautiful!
The bridge in the morning light
Monks crossing
More monks – their robes looked amazing in the dawn light.
The bridge is long and narrow as it crosses the lake
Sun coming up
Fishing boats out at dawn
More monks…
Jami watching the fishing boats
The bridge is a simple construction, but looks amazing.
The bridge was heavily used by the locals, including lots of fishermen
Fishermen (or, in this case, fisher-women) fished in the shadow of the bridge
We took a boat ride back to see the bridge from a distance
Our boatman was great and friendly
A last sunset
On our last night we hiked up to Mandalay Hill (after a hair-raising motorbike taxi ride) for a view of the sunset over the city. We’d seen a lot of spectacular sunrises and sunsets in Myanmar – from Inle Lake, to Bagan, to U Bein Bridge – so it was a fitting and beautiful end to the country. Unlike the rest of Myanmar, however, Mandalay Hill was swarming with tourists, including every backpacker’s arch nemesis, the tour group.
Sunset from Mandalay Hill
Jami overlooking the sunset
On to Thailand!