We have 4-5 days in Bagan, staying in NewBagan – that next to OlBagan, witch borders Nayung-U – Its all the same really, but Naying-U is the town where the offices and shops are, the people and yeah, the town. Old Bagan is all the ruins and pagoda’s, old city walls around it with a couple of museums etc.. new Bagan is a collection of tourist hotels. (New Bagan = Tourist town)
Now – we knew that we where out of the high season, we kinda picked up on that in Yangon. So arriving here finding the whole tourist town near closed did not surprise us to much. We had aimed for a nice hotel with a nice pool, so we knew we would stay in tourist town. But since this is the low season, prices drop dramatically, and you have both sights and pool to yourself. Of course, some backdrops.. restaurant is running on 30%, no hot-air balloon rides, all boats has stopped service.
Outside our hotel the sheds stood abandoned, waiting for next high season. Its hot as hell, dry and dusty – walking trough the main street you can feel its emptiness.
Out in the streets there are a few tourists still lingering around, but really not a lot. Its actually pretty nice, very less crowded.
I had a couple of days in medium pain after some crappy pork meat – but was up and about pretty fast after that, and we tried both a local tuk-tuk one day and a English speaking guide the other day. Both nice, tuk-tuk was cheap – but the money spent on an English speaking guide was worth it.
Our tuktuk guy, nice fellow – and I’m pretty sure he thought he was speaking English – but I didn’t understand 10% of what he was saying. This is an issue in Myanmar, and its not that you expect people to talk English – but if you ask if they do, and pay for an English speaking guide.. the level of English speakers in Myanmar is super low..
Its a really beautiful place, Bagan.. thousands of temples and pagodas. You can pick up a e-bike rent a tuktuk or a guide with car. All of the nice option,, walking is not one of them, distances are long and the heat is hard. Nice with some transportation.
The one day with the guide (4 hours, 40$) was nice, since we got tons of information on what was what and who was who. What was rebuilt and what buildings was the oldest ones. I think without a guide they would all start to blend together a bit.
There is a entrance fee of 25.000 kyatts pr person, that will give you a ticket that you need to show one some of these sites.. not all of em. One of the site was a lookout point – and that’s where you got an idea of not being the only tourist in town.
The camera don’t really give the scene justice, but you get the general idea. really beautiful!
