Neither Europe nor Australia - an Asian vacation

Burma river cruise and Singapore stop\over 2017      Nov 30^th – Dec 16^th

Departure and Days 1 and 2

We were off to Burma, our first Asian holiday for a long time and after considering India we decided that if we were going to go to Burma we should do it sooner rather than later and loving river cruises it made sense to combine the two.
Our flight was scheduled to leave Perth at 01:10 on Thursday so we had booked a spot at the long term car park from 22:00 on Wednesday. (When I first booked the car park I did confuse the dates but luckily sorted it out before confirming the booking). It cost us $155 for the whole period we were away which may seem like a lot but when you consider that a taxi from our house would be almost that one way it seems reasonable. The only down side would be driving home at 01.00 when we land back in Perth.

We arrived on time and got a parking spot near the shuttle bus stop. A bus arrived almost at once and we were soon in the queue to check in.

I had checked in online and confirmed our seats (having paid extra - $50US per person to get the extra leg room on the Perth Singapore / Singapore Perth flights.) When we saw the long check- in queue I went to the customer services desk and asked whether we did need to join that queue as I had checked in online. Oh, Yes. Was the reply.

After 45 minutes and slowly advancing in the queue another Singapore airlines staff member appeared and wandered along the queue – we repeated our question. No, was the answer this time, just go straight to the internet check in desk and they’ll check your bags.

No queue straight through and within 5 minutes away! Maybe we should have tried that desk first but I did ask!!!

Anyway, now we had the long wait before boarding. We had a coffee and Michael had a burger.

Then we boarded and stretched out our legs. Despite taking a pill we couldn’t actually sleep, just kept dozing on and off. So we were rather tired when we landed at Singapore where we had to change terminals to catch our flight to Rangoon (now called Yangon) so went down the stairs and got the shuttle bus. (the girl at the info desk said it was quicker than the skybus).

We left on time and after a short 2 hr flight we landed in Burma. (We will persist in calling it Burma, Myanmar is the name that the military generals call it. So that they don’t displease them world politicians and press do the same but the locals refer to themselves as Burmese. They live where they’ve always lived, in Burma.)

We joined the long queue for immigration and spotted the other cruise travellers – it wasn’t hard: they were over 50yrs old, had back packs from APT. We struck up a conversation with the couple in front of us. They were indeed on the cruise, they were from UK (Wrexham in N. Wales).

The queue was interminably slow, one person at a time going through the visa check and photo ID.

Finally we were both through and collected our bags. We headed straight for the “Nothing to declare” exit but realised that there was a very long queue for this exit as all hand baggage was to be put through the scanner! We knew better than to argue with Burmese authorities so settled in at the end of the queue and struck up a conversation with more APT travellers. (APT is the tour company, Asian Pacific Tours)

Finally we were through and out into the airport terminal. We found the APT representative and then joined another queue – to exchange our pristine $US bills. (We only exchanged $100, as we would only need local money for a few souvenirs, this $100 gave us 1355,000 kyats).

Then, when we were all assembled we were escort outside to our tour bus.

Our first taste of Burma.

We saw men and women in Longhis, flash tour buses and local ladies wearing on their faces, a sunscreen and insect repellant. It took a while to sort out the passengers, some were either really tired from the trip, zonked out or plain confused.

The traffic in Rangoon was horrific, our guide explained that it was much worse than normal because of the visit of Pope Francis. Roads were closed and it was a very slow ride to the quay and the cruise ship. We enjoyed the sights despite our tiredness and were amazed when we arrived at the quay. The entry to the quay was off the road to the container port, and it was a case of keep pushing and hoping that someone will let you across! The old corrugated gate was pushed open and the barrier raised by a little old man. We drove across a grassed paddock and there was the ‘cruise terminal’ - an old, empty concrete building. We climbed a few stairs, walked along a corridor and there was our ship, the RV SAMATHA, our home for the next 14 days.

 It was lovely .

The crew were out to welcome us and after a welcome cold drink we were given our keys and then asked to don our ‘onboard’ shoes. These slippers / thongs were kept in baskets in the foyer and whenever we came back from an excursion we would put them on, leaving our touring shoes to be cleaned and replaced in the basket ready for the next trip. This helped to keep the ship’s corridors and cabins clean, removing any dirt and nasties that we might have stepped in.

The time now was around 11.30 so there was just time to discover the cabin, unpack and have a light lunch before our first excursion!!!

The cabin was much bigger than we’d expected, the bed was huge and the french windows were double sized, opening up to a huge open area and they had tight fly screens .

Lunch was a light soup and sandwiches, which we devoured.

Then we gathered in reception and commenced our first Burmese excursion. The old habit of taking a water bottle, hat and ‘quiet voice box’ to be able to hear the guide, soon came back.

Our first trip was to visit the Shewdagon Pagoda.

The traffic was still horrendous but we eventually arrived and followed our guide, Terry, to the entry. Buddhism deems that to show bare shoulders or knees is disrespectful and one should always enter a temple / pagoda or religious site barefoot, so we had made sure that we were wearing short sleeves and long trousers, we now had to remove our foot wear. It was actually very nice to walk around barefoot on the cool marble tiles.

The 99 metre high, gilded Shwedagon Pagoda is absolutely splendid. 

Terry was a very enthusiastic guide. He told us that his friends tell him that he tends to go on for too long “Too much blah, blah Terry” but we found him very interesting and entertaining. 

 

When Michael had travelled overland from UK to NZ and Australia in 1974, he had spent time in Rangoon and travelled up to Bagan. For the past 43 years he has raved about the Shwedagon and had in fact rang a bell at the temple which supposedly meant that he would return.

Well, he had now returned but I was seeing the Shwedagon for the first time – it exceeded my expectations and renewed Michael’s awe. What a magnificent, truly awesome place, we wandered around breathing in it’s magnificence. 
 

All too soon it was time to leave.

This was only our first day,  -  how can they improve on it?

We slowly headed back to the quay and the boat, more traffic jams, another attempt to cross the road into the quay side. In the end our driver gave up trying to cross the lanes into the quayside, he drove further along the container terminal road, did a U turn and then made a sweeping right turn into the quay side. (From now on this is how he’ll do it every time).

We got back on board, welcomed by the crew with a lovely, ice cold fruit drink and after changing into our thongs, went to our cabin to rest, shower and change before cocktail hour and then dinner.

I insisted that Michael 'dress for dinner', but that only meant not wearing shorts and wearing a shirt not a T shirt. It also gave me a good excuse to get 'dolled up'.

We met up with John and Lorraine, the couple that we'd met in the immigration queue, and went into dinner with them. We also invited a solo traveller to join us, Megan was from Sydney.

The next day we enjoyed a lovely breakfast and then were off at 8.30 on a walking tour of Rangoon (now called Yangon).
 Although the quay was just across the road from the area that we were going to walk around we boarded a bus and drove 2 streets to start the tour.

The passengers were divided into two groups, Blue and Orange. There were 2 tour guides, Thomas and Terry, and they alternated which colour group they were escorting. We were in the blue group and having had Terry yesterday, had Thomas this morning. 

John and Lorraine, and Megan were in orange so we would catch up with them each evening and compare our day's experiences.

We set off to see the old colonial buildings of Rangoon, sadly nearly all were empty shells. 

The military government has built a new capital city, 500kms away from Rangoon and transferred all official offices there. There are no locals living there, it's an empty city, just a military government settleme nt.....

(who said, 'sounds like Canberra?)

Some of the old buildings had been damaged by Japanese bombers in 1942 and had been neglected since. There were trees growing in gutters and the tin roofs seemed on the point of collapse, but they had probably looked like that for the last 75years.

We walked past the very grand, recently restored Strand Hotel. Built in 1901 it was once owned by the Sarkies  brothers, who owns the 'grand hotels of asia', including the Raffles hotel in Singapore and the E & O in Penang. The hotel used to allow tourist to view the magnificent foyer and hallway but it is now only open to guests.

We stopped to watch a street vendor making betel nut wraps - a carcinogenic mix of betel nuts, tobacco, slaked lime, herbs and spices, which may include chilli, this is then all wrapped in a betel leaf which the locals then chew and spit out the red chewed remnants onto the street. It also gives them a toothless, red smile. No one was interested in trying one. Actually the whole group were non smokers - which was great. (All too sensible, spending their money on travelling.)

We walked through a market area, with an array of vegetables, fresh and dried fish and slabs of meat. we noticed that there  were lots of calendars for sale, not fancy, high gloss, tourist photo ones but basically just large print dates. We mentioned to Thomas that we'd like one so he dispatched his assistant, Min, to buy one for us. It's great, and only cost us 500kyat (50cents).

We kept walking. Even if it hadn't been drummed into us not to eat anything from local stalls, we were not tempted.   

We walked to the central park, formerly named after Colonel Fytche but now called Maha BandoolaPark.

In the centre of the park was a tall "Independence monument". 

On one side of the park was the Shwee Pagoda, which is now in the centre of a huge traffic roundabout. Thomas told us that from that corner we were close to 5 religious creeds temples - a Buddhist pagoda, a mosque, a Catholic church, a Baptist church and a synagogue.

This was just one example of the peaceful nature of the Burmese, and indeed everywhere on our little walk we had seem smiling faces.

Then it was time to get the coach back to the boat  - in that traffic.

We cast off at 11.30 and started to cruise up the Irrawaddy River.

As we left Rangoon we could see the golden top of the Shewdagon glistening in the sunshine.

Soon the scenery changed and we had views of low lying farmland, with workers in the fields working with oxen. There were many small villages and each one had golden stupas and wonderful pagodas.

Cocktail hour is 6 -7 each evening with tour director Thomas giving a 'port talk' about the next day's activities at 6.45. 
 We joined Megan and others but didn't partake of the cocktail - (Delta City -Whisky, Triple Sec, Lime Sprite) preferring to stay with white wine.
 Then it was into dinner for another beautiful meal. 
After dinner the entertainment was part one of the movie 'The Lady' about the life of Aung San Suu Kyi.


We were not travelling the river after dark and tonight we were moored at Nyaung Done. On the river bank with a small village in the distance.