Before diving too far into Bagan, it is worth noting that details about a certain important part of our experience in this city are covered in the blog post about our engagement (here’s the link!), so be sure to check that out if you haven’t seen it! With that said, there was plenty about Bagan for us to cover in a couple posts. It was a refreshing city for us to arrive in since the previous spots we’d visited in Myanmar – Yangon, Mandalay and Monywa – are all less appealing cities which generally are not frequented by tourists. Bagan, on the other hand, is arguably the highlight of this country for most visitors, so it was an environment way more conducive to us just settling in and enjoying ourselves for a bit.
Same sunrise drive from a different angle. Again, our life is pretty amazing sometimes.
Our arrival in Bagan was unspectacular relative to others, since we just had to catch a local minivan from Monywa to Bagan – it was cramped, arrived late and involved having our bags tied to the roof (with the engagement ring hidden inside) where several guys sat for the entire trip. So again, completely normal. NBD. When we arrived we caught a “taxi” (aka: sat in the back of a rickety pickup truck) to our hotel. I had been super vague about the hotel prior to arrival and during our ride to the hotel, just kinda deflecting Jess’s questions about it (e.g.: “How much did the hotel cost?” “Meh, I don’t remember; not much.”). When we finally arrived at the fancy hotel I booked for Jess’s birthday, she was overjoyed and swore she would never leave. Ever. It really provided a nice juxtaposition to our earlier travels and ensured we’d have a relaxing place to luxuriate when we weren’t running around Bagan. [Editor’s note: After I finished squealing about the gorgeous bathroom (waterfall shower, anyone?), I started appreciating how much I’d wanted somewhere really nice to hang out – the pool and outdoor lounge areas, surrounded by a lush jungle of plants, made this a perfect home base for our time in Bagan. Most of the places we’ve stayed have been perfectly fine, but not somewhere conducive to really hanging out for long periods of time. This was a nice change.]
The fancy poolside lounge area at our hotel where we spent most of our time relaxing and forgetting that we’re broke backpackers.
For our first full day in Bagan we decided to take advantage of the detailed map our hotel gave us to rent an e-bike (a motorbike with an electric motor, narrow/small wheels and a lower speed limit than traditional motorbikes) to explore the temples in the surrounding region. As I mentioned in the earlier post, Bagan is remarkable in that it contains over 2,500 temples mostly ranging from the 11th-14th century, making it a wonderful place to just ride around and explore the temples. [Editor’s note: It’s incredible – you can be driving down a dusty road and there are ancient temples on both sides, just sitting there! There are so many that all but the largest and most impressive are completely unattended, so you can just pull up, check them out for a few minutes, and head along on your way.] With a vague itinerary in mind, we set off to just ride around and see the sights. It ended up making for a delightful day, particularly because we were able to see a broad range of types of temples. Most were fairly weather-worn, but others (such as the Ananda Temple) were recently restored to highlight their original beauty. Further, the temples weren’t as large or extensive on the inside and were jammed pretty close together, so it wasn’t difficult to ride around for a leisurely afternoon to visit a dozen or so. We ended the day with a drink at a riverside restaurant on the edge of New Bagan (the part of the city where we were staying) where we could watch a beautiful sunset over the Ayeryawaddy River. It ended up being a fantastic day.
Cruising down the street at a blistering 18 mph, the max speed of our e-bike.
In front of the recently restored Ananda Temple in Bagan.
Facing off against a rather large Buddha inside one of the temples.
Another common view inside a temple.
You want a donation for the purpose of gilding gold and other general purposes? Seems legit.
Sunset across the river – not bad, eh?
A temple and boats on the river at sunset.
The next day (Jess’s birthday!) was the fateful one where we took a sunrise hot air balloon ride and I proposed to Jess, all of which we detailed in the earlier post. We returned from the ride on cloud nine, eager to call our family and friends to share the exciting news with them. We spent the rest of the day writing up the engagement blog post, lounging around the pool and trying on the term “fiancée” for size – it’s weird, but we’re getting used to it. [Editor’s note: Because we added mostly just photos of us to the last post, here are a few more focused on the ballooning portion of the day, which was also totally awesome and incredible, if slightly overshadowed by the whole proposal thing!]
Inflating the balloons at sunrise before takeoff.
Watching the first of the balloons take flight from the ground.
Sigh~ how gorgeous is this scene shortly after we lifted off?
Looking down from the hot air balloon at a temple below us.
The following day (our third in the city) was a hybrid of the previous two days – we got a slow/leisurely start to the day, but then went out for the afternoon to ride around and see some more temples. More significantly, we stopped at a random shop to learn more about lacquerware – a product that is prominent in the region – and how it was made. We received an awesome demonstration about the full process of making lacquerware (it’s quite involved!), which then required me to keep Jess on a leash so that she wouldn’t buy half the store. [Editor’s note: It’s so amazing how many different layers of materials, and how much time and craftsmanship in general, go into making a single piece of this stuff! It’s all beautiful. Rorie hadn’t been too keen on the idea of going to a lacquerware shop, but after our informative and detailed tour he was all about it.] After that we visited a pretty temple so that we could get a picturesque view of the sunset with temples all around, as well as to buy a painting of the temples at sunrise with hot air balloons in the background as a token of our engagement.
One of the golden temples that we saw on our second outing.
This is a common design and style for some of the smaller temples around Bagan.
Another random temple, just to give you a sense of what we rode around visiting all day.
We got lost down a random side street and, while I was turning our e-bike around, this little girl saw us and waved at us. She then walked to a tree near us and picked some flowers for us. No English was exchanged, but it was adorable and sweet.
An evening of sunset views amongst the many temples of Bagan.
We were supposed to depart for the city of Kalaw on the fourth day so that we could commence a 3 day / 2 night trek to Inle Lake, but at this point I was just barely beginning to recover from my brutal stomach illness and didn’t honestly think I had enough strength to finish the hike, so we decided to skip it altogether and just allocate the extra days to time in Bagan, Inle Lake and for us to take a day bus back to Yangon (instead of an overnight bus, since we value sleep). It worked well, for the most part, since it gave us an extra day in Bagan to just luxuriate around the pool and rest up before getting back to the grind of rickety buses, meager hostels and all the other struggles that go with our backpacking lifestyle.
All told, our time in Bagan was memorable not just because it’s where we got engaged, but because it was the first city in Myanmar where were able to settle into a rhythm in a relatively comfortable setting. Given our earlier travels in Siem Reap, Cambodia to see Angkor Wat and the other temples there, it’s interesting to compare the two. I’d say that the temples in Angkor Wat were more impressive and interesting, by far, than the temples in Bagan – particularly the insides of the temples, since there wasn’t much to the Bagan temples. With that said, Bagan was “better” than Angkor Wat in that the setting was really wonderful – the large number of temples meant that there were almost no crowds or lines, so we could just ride our e-bike around and see them all on our own. Further, it was pretty surreal to just ride around the main roads of the city and see temples everywhere (literally, we’d go down a random alley to get to a dinner spot and stumble upon a few temples that were just an afterthought in Bagan, but that would be a big deal in any city in the west). Further, it was amazing to take a hot air balloon above Bagan and to see all the temples spread out below us – it was really effective at helping you appreciate the scale of the development in the area. [Editor’s note: I generally agree with Rorie’s assessment – on an individual temple scale, Angkor Wat had more to offer, but as a general setting and overall impression, Bagan can’t really be beat in my opinion. Plus, Bagan had a much wider variety of temples, from old ruins that are barely more than piles of rubble to restored, glittering ornate structures and everything in between! Plus, the balloon ride was expensive but absolutely worth it; it’s one of the top spots in the world for hot air ballooning because of the unique setting. Definitely recommended for anyone traveling to the area!]
Anyway, our next stop – after a 6-7 hour bus ride – was our final major destination in Myanmar: the scenic and relaxed city of Nyaung Shwe where we could visit famous Inle Lake!
View of the sunrise with hot air balloons in the background as we caught our early morning bus from Bagan to Nyaung Shwe.
