Myanmar: Mae Sot to Yangon

I only ended up cycling a little bit in Myanmar (520km in 6 days). The original plan was to cycle to the Indian border in the NW, after obtaining visas and permits for India in Yangon. However permits for crossing the border were not available at the time ( early September 2017.) So instead I cycled from Mae Sot in Thailand to Yangon, picked up an Indian visa there, spent 10 days backpacking in various parts of Myanmar and then flew to Dhaka in Bangladesh (visa on arrival). 

day one: mae sot to kawkareik

The border crossing with Myanmar and Thailand easy, I had an e-visa for Myanmar and it was just a matter of following the queue to the right desks before getting stamped in. A new road had just been built that led from the border towards Kawkareik.  A few police checkpoints waved me down and asked to see my passport and visa, but after a couple of minutes they let me through . Some of the hills were fairly steep but with the road surface being so awesome it was plain sailing.  Straight away the country felt different; buildings looked a bit more ramshackle and it felt a lot more natural.

I pulled off the highway to take some backroads into the centre of Kawkareik and spent a while wandering round dirt streets before someone showed me towards  'honey guest house'. I had originally been a bit worried about finding places to stay as hotels needed a license for foreigners, but here it wasn't a problem. It was very basic, a well took up most the floor of the downstairs, and electricity only ran from 6-11pm. The owner was friendly though and they had showers, which at that point was my main concern as I was rather sweaty.  

day two: Kawkareik to mawlamyine

I began on the highway again, as there was no other option, but after about 35km I came to a junction with a dirt road. The road was just 25km long and meant that I could avoid the main highway to Mawlamyine, for part of the day at least. It was quiet, rutted and dusty but a hell of a lot nicer than the highway. Sadly some of the housing looked to be very low quality, with animals often living underneath or close to water supplies. It was incredibly green though and people smiled and waved as I went past. A car pulled up next to me and handed me a can of red bull which I thought was very kind! 

After the dirt road, it was just 20km of highway into Mawlamyine, the fourth largest city in the country and the first to come under colonial British rule. A long promenade ran along the sea front and there were a few colonial buildings, but otherwise the place felt very Burmese. Huge buddhist temples could be seen from wherever you stood in the city and goats roamed on even the busiest of streets.  The central market was really fun: busy, bright and bustling. I brought myself a longyi,  as I wanted to fit it when visiting temples. Something that really impressed me about the country was how deeply rooted traditions and customs seemed to be. As opposed to Thailand, where western fashion is now almost the norm, people in Myanmar (men and women) all wore longyi and a lot of them had thanaka on their faces. Thanaka is a whitish/yellowish paste that is spread on the cheeks and nose for cosmetic purposes, as well as protection against sunburn. 

day three: mawlamyine to thaton

Wanting to keep away from the main highway I took a smaller road to the east of Moke Ta Ma, which brought me out almost directly in Thaton. This road was gorgeous, passing through small villages surrounded by dense bush and farmland. I passed a sign for a waterfall and cycled through a forest to get there, being surprised when I found that the waterfall was actually the bathing ground of local people. Young boys showed off their jumping skills and a teenage girl washed her hair, they didn't seem to mind me being there as I sat for a bit and watched. 

Back on the smaller road I knew that I had a turn off coming up, I was unaware that I’d cycled past it until loading up google maps. Retracing the route I came to what looked like a dirt path amongst the foliage, ‘I hope this isn't the road’ I thought. But no, a quick check of maps showed me it was and I set off down the track. The road was tiny and it was highly unlikely that cars could go down it, during the steep sections I had to get off to push and after 13km I came to the main road that led me to Thaton. 

I had to visit a couple of guest houses once I arrived in Thaton. The first two turned me away as they didn't have the foreigner license and I eventually ended up sleeping violet guest house, which was clean and cheap. I visited the Shwe Sar Yan pagoda, which was amazing and is supposed to house 4 tooth relics of the Buddha. A few locals wanted pictures with me, which was fine, and I ate dinner at a cheap restaurant close to the pagoda complex. 

day four: thaton to kyaikto

The first 40km from Thaton to Bilin along the highway was uneventful. The second 40km of the day was a longer route through the villages of Taung Sun and Yetkan Thema, until reaching Kyaikto for the evening. This road was gorgeous, water buffalo roamed in the fields adjacent to the road and farmland stretched as far as the eye could see. The hills in the distance towards the north provided a dramatic backdrop and I soon arrived in Kyaikto feeling refreshed. 

I stayed that night at Happy Guesthouse, which was cheap and clean, and then spent the evening wandering round the town. The town centre close to the Kyaikhtiyoe museum housed some interesting old pagodas and monasteries and the main pagoda Kyite Paw Law  was impressive and bustling with locals.

Kyaikto is the closest town to 'Golden rock', a well known buddhist pilgrimage site. Upon Mount Kyaiktiyo (1,100m) there is a boulder (golden rock) with a pagoda built on top of it, jutting precariously out into the air. The rock is meant to be on top of a strand of Buddhas hair. I considered visiting this landmark, but not fancying a 1000m climb and due to the fact that women are not allowed into the main area, I decided to push onto Bago instead. 

day five: kyaikto to bago

The 93 km from Kyaikto to Bago was rather humdrum. It was highway the entire way and whilst there were some nice stretches along rivers around the town of Waw, the rest of the day was uneventful. I cycled by small towns and houses whose residents looked on in surprise as I passed but otherwise not much happened. 

Bago itself was busy and dirty, I stayed at San Francisco guesthouse which was nice enough. That night I ended up having some drinks with the owner and her friends and family. Other than that there wasn't a huge amount to the city and I decided to set off early the next day to cycle 127km along the 'village roads' to Yangon. 

day six: bago to yangon

Rather than taking the busy highway from Bago to Yangon I decided instead to take a detour along the 'village road' past Thet Ka La and Thong Wa to Yangon. I expected it to be a hot hard day (127km on bad roads in the sun) but actually it wasn't as bad as expected. Some of the towns I went through were obviously incredibly poor but the people smiled and waved as I passed. I ate lunch in Thong Wa and then carried on to Yangon where I met with my couchsurfing host, a spanish guy who was teaching english at a private school in the city. 

A lot of people had warned me about the traffic in Yangon, but it genuinely wasn't that bad. You had to keep your wits about you, but generally the drivers weren't going too fast and gave you space. The city itself was exciting and interesting, a mix of old and new, huge fancy shopping malls and 2,600 year old pagodas within a km from each other. I hung around with a bunch of slightly mad expats who seemed to be happy living there and together we did things like have film nights and go to the cinema. It felt good to be doing 'normal' things for a while, especially as my next stop was Bangladesh, which I had a feeling would feel far removed from my sense of normality.

getting an indian visa in yangon.

Getting my Indian visa was something of a faff. On the Saturday I went to a small office on a nearby street where I could photocopy my Myanmar visa, passport page, and print a couple of head shots 2" by 2". I also filled in my online application and printed it, putting my place of arrival as Bagdogra airport. This was because it was the closest airport to the Indian-Bangladeshi land border where I would actually be entering. Entering by land wasn't an option and seeing as they required no proof of your flight I just put it down and hoped for the best.

I knew that it would cost me $162 USD plus a $2 fee so I arrived with the correct money, application, photos, passport and photocopies at 9am at the Indian Embassy. At 9:30am I was allowed in and straight away it appeared that the people working there were in a bad mood. They turned the girl in front of me away as she had put down a land border between Nepal and India. Even though a couple of weeks before they had approved her boyfriends application that was exactly the same.

I showed them my documents, but they seemed unhappy with Bagdogra airport as it wasn't a major international airport. At first the guy told me to go away and put a different airport like Delhi as my point of arrival on the application. But instead I explained that my port of arrival was Bagdogra airport as I wouldn't be stamped into the country until I arrived there (even if I did switch flights from Delhi, all of which was imaginary as I didn't even have flights booked). He still seemed unsure until I showed him the wikipedia page for Bagdogra airport, which stated it as a 'international airport' he seemed happy with this and I chuckled to myself in my head as wikipedia was apparently good enough evidence.

They verbally verified that my documents, pictures and photocopies were fine and then came the money inspection. My notes did not pass the test, a few were sightly creased which they weren't happy with. So I walked down the street to a bank with a foreign currency section and paid to change slightly creased USD into perfect USD. Obviously this is ridiculous, but seeing as I couldn't argue with the embassy I did it, managing to return just before they closed at 11am.

They took my now pristine money an passport and told me I could return to collect it on Friday. I asked if it was ok to return on Monday and they agreed. This gave me a week to go backpacking, see photos below. I returned on Monday at 2:30pm, had my picture and fingerprints taken, and was then finally handed my passport with a 6 month multiple entry visa inside. I was now all set for my flight to Dhaka the next day!

backpacking photos (pyin oO lwin, hsipaw and inle lake)