After a day of going around Bagan, you get this feeling of having had enough of temples. I can assure you that every temple is unique and different from each other, however, it isn't just healthy to go on a two-day streak going around temples. So I decided to go to Mt. Popa instead on my second day in Bagan.
Since Mt. Popa is a popular destination near Bagan, most hotels and guest houses offer a shared Taxi ride. Sometimes, the tourists you share with would come from other hotels and they just pick people up on the way to Mt. Popa. (Shared Taxi Rate to Mt. Popa: 10,000MMK/pax)
Luckily, my Myanmar trip was a week or two earlier than the tourist season, so in my shared taxi we were only 5, plus our driver. The ride was comfortable indeed. In the shared taxi I met Mike and Christine, a British couple, both of which are retirees, Boris, a Russian tourist and Karen, a kababayan who already lives in Texas.
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| New found friends in Myanmar, from left to right, Boris, Karen, our Myanma driver, me and Mike. |
The shared taxi picked me up around 9am. The trip to Mt. Popa took about 2-hrs., with a brief stop at a local palm sugar maker. With Mike and Karen around there was never a dull moment inside our van!
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| Traditional Sesame-oil extraction using an Ox-operated press. |
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| Distilling Htanyet or Burmese jaggery. |
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| Fermentation of the palm extract. |
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| Htanyet condensing and ready for transfer. |
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| Local palm used to make palm sugar and Htanyet. |
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| Smoking pork using the exhaust of the distillation set-up. |
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| Myanma Tea accompaniment: Nuts and Beans deep-fried in sesame oil. |
The mountain is also a popular mountaineering destination, however most tourists content themselves with climbing the temple on top of a rock, or known as Taung Kalat. It is quite a climb of 777 steps, three times during the climb I wanted to give up. But, Mike and Karen, my new found friends urged me on. They were such a jolly folk that was so difficult to resist. So yeah, after about 40-min, we reached the top. Being at the top is very refreshing and the temperature is about 4-C lower than at the base.
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| Taung Kalat in the background of a Buddhist meditation centre. |
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| Stupa at the top of Taung Kalat. |
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| Roof of the 777-step staircase to the top. |
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| Stupa on top of Taung Kalat. |
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| Karen my new found kababayan friend! |
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| Interior of the temple at the top, the "bed" belongs to the hermit-monk believed to have built the temple. |
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| Close-up of stupa on top of Taung Kalat. |
On our way home, we passed by a street filled with fruit stands, our driver begged to stop a while to buy custard apple for his family.
By 2-pm I was back at my hotel. I still wanted to go to the Bagan Museum but, being too tired I decided against it. I just took a stroll and found a restaurant where I got to taste Myanmar Chicken Curry. It was delicious, but sorry I wasn't able to take a photo of it.
After my very late lunch, I just went back to my hotel to pack my things up and get ready for my night bus back to Yangon. By this time I have come to associate packing bags in Myanmar with that feeling of leaving a place, and how I hated that. I just consoled myself during these moments with that reassurance that I will come back.
Tip: Hotels and guest houses in Bagan are used to tourists who take night trips in and out of town. Usually they offer up front to guests the possibility of overstaying for 6-8 more hours after check-out so that you can take the night bus going back to Yangon or those going to some other destinations like Mandalay. My guest house charged me an additional USD 15 for this extended stay.
By 6:45pm I was fetched by my transfer-service to the bus station. It was quite packed with fellow budget tourists like me. By 8-pm my bus bound for Yangon left Nyaung-U Bus Station, and with it me. With a heavy heart I bade good bye to one of the most magical places I've been to in my life.
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