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Farangs, Day 30 — On the road to…
Mandalay, Myanmar |
Mandalay, Myanmar
Itinerary: Following breakfast, we transfer to the airport for our domestic flight to Mandalay. We will visit the Mahagandayon Monastery, where more than a thousand monks live and study. We may have the opportunity to observe the monks having their last meal of the day in silence. We continue on to the 200-year-old U Bein teak bridge, built in 1782 at the time when Amarapura was the Royal capital. We will visit the Bagaya Monastery and see an intriguing collection of Buddha statues.
This afternoon we will visit some of the most revered religious monuments in Burma: the Mahamuni Pagoda, the Shwe Inbin Monastery, the Golden Palace Monastery, and the Kuthodaw Pagoda – the world’s largest book, made of marble! We also visit a traditional hand-woven silk workshop, as well as a Kalaga tapestries craftsmen’s workshop, before proceeding to Mandalay_Hill to watch the sunset. Overnight at the Mandalay_City Hotel.
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On our way to the airport at 6 a.m., then waited for an hour and a half because of morning fog before our flight could leave.
Once out of the airport, in the coach, and driving along the road to Mandalay, our bus driver played the old Frank Sinatra song “On the Road to Mandalay) to a lot of laughter and then some folks joining in the singing. This fairly new highway, built ten years ago, certainly would be a shock to Rudyard Kipling if he visited today.
We stopped to walk on the U Pein pedestrian-only bridge, nearly a mile long, across Taung Thaman Lake. There are 1000 columns dug into the lake base to support it. It was built in 1849 using huge teak poles left over from the construction of the king’s palace.
Next we drove to the Maha Myat Pagodo. This Buddha statue is believed to have been blessed by the Buddha himself and people pay homag by sticking small pieces of gold leaf all over the statue. There is more than 8″ of gold covering the statue, and there are photos of the statue when it was originally put in place and now when it has fattened up considerably. Women aren’t allowed to approach the statue and must stay behind a barrier, although they are allowed to look at it and also are allowed to request a man to attach a piece of gold leaf.
After lunch at a Chinese restaurant, where Leroy thoroughly enjoyed roast Peking Duck, we visited a workshop which produces gold leaf, then on to our hotel. It is right in the heart of Mandaly but after driving from the busy street through the gate in the walls, it is like entering an quiet oasis.
