Bagan: home to 4400 temples within a 42 square kilometer patch of land with farmers still living alongside some of the temples. This was by far my favorite place in all of Myanmar. Renting a bicycle and spending days exploring this vast playground will be something I will never forget and has been a highlight from this past year.
Each morning I was greeted to a 4:50AM wake-up call. Dreary (I hate mornings), I would stumble out of bed and hop on my bike to catch a sunrise atop a temple (a different temple each day). It was worth the early wake-up call every time. After 4-5 hours of temple exploring it was time to head back to the hotel for a siesta in order to beat the heat. Most of the time this siesta was interrupted by one of the frequent power outages that plagued all of Myanmar. As soon as the air conditioner turned off my room would cook up to a boiling point within no time and I would move outside and splay myself on a chair in the shade of my deck until the electricity came back on. Then around 4:00PM it was back on the bike again to witness a spectacular sunset from yet a different temple and then another 3-4 hours of temple exploring. Every single one of these sunrises and sunsets will be etched in my mind forever.
This picture is a temple as dusk settles in – my favorite time of day in Bagan. This is when the landscape seemed to turn magical and every night we would stay out long after the sun had set, biking to “just one more” temple as the sky turned from red to orange to purple and then we would be stuck in the pitch black. There were no streetlamps out here in the middle of farmland and temples, only on the main road, so with a headlamp the only light to guide us we would slowly navigate our way back to the hotel. The bicycles, however, were a cursed doom. These were not new flashy mountain bikes with all the bells and whistles. Well, there was a bell. No, these were circa 1950. OK, maybe of the late 1980’s era. Flat tires? Every day. One particularly hellish night after a sunset at the farthest temple from my hotel I had to endure two flat tires over sand, packed dirt, and pothole-ridden pavement. Torture. Pure and simple torture.
The sunset looks amazing. Can’t wait to see the sunrise pics too. I think I would definitely sacrifice a bit of sleep to experience those! I haven’t seen many pictures of Myanmar, so thanks for sharing all these!
These sunrises give you a good reason for getting up early in the morning, Kate. The oppressive heat is another reason!