The road to Mandalay

From Nyaungshwe we take a VIP overnight bus to Mandalay. No buses come to Nyaungshwe they go to a big road junction 30 minutes away. It is chaos. All the buses (6.30-7.00 to yangon' 7.30-8.00 to Mandalay) pull up at the side of the road, but there's no chance of getting on the wrong bus. It's a system of sorts that works. Bus is very comfortable, big comfy reclining seats with leg rests. They feed us a very strange salad with mayonnaise sandwich on the funny sweet bread they have in Asia and give us tea and coffee. Adrian has decided he'll need whiskey in order to sleep and promptly starts on his half bottle I get my head straight down. After 1 hour we have a catering stop, all the buses again meet up and again there is chaos but it all works,

We are scheduled to arrive in Mandalay at 4.50am not the greatest time to arrive in an a big city but it's our only option other than flying and we're not ready to run the gauntlet of Air Myanmar's bad safety record again. The journey is very mountainous and through some true wilderness from what I can see out of the windows. Sleep seems the better option. At 2.30am the lights come on and we're in a city, it's Mandalay. We later discover this is the actual arrival time but of course, no one would travel if they knew. There are 4 of us in our taxi headed to our chosen guest house. No room at the inn. We walk the streets with the packs of dogs knocking up the night watchmen but everywhere is full. Heading back to our original place to wait until checkout times we find he suddenly has rooms.

By 11am we're showered, have devoured an egg roti at the Indian place across the street and are raring go. A local bus takes us to U Bein bridge, at 1.2 kilometres it is the longest teak bridge in the world. It is a very beautiful structure built in the 1850s from teak reclaimed from the old palace as the capital was moved from Amarapura to Mandalay. It is most photographed at sunset the iconic image being the bridge with monks on. It is truly beautiful. As we reach the other side we witness an attack on a restaurant by a group of young men. Apparently it is gang related. No serious harm is done but several chairs are thrown and tables upturned.

The Mahamuni Pagoda is very important in Myanmar and is visited by many people, it apparently houses one of only five images of the Buddha made during his lifetime. It is very ornate in a simple way. Decorated in maroon and gold, the gold being gold leaf. All around the temple is temple industry, people carving Buddha images, making monk clothing, tuning gongs. Amid all this industry and people going about their lives hundreds of people are there worshipping throughout the day. The Pagoda's day starts at 4am with music played to the Buddha whilst his face is washed and teeth are cleaned. Music is played to him again at 4pm. The music is very beautiful and played by 3 very aged gentleman.

The Mandalay Palace is something of a disappointment. A square site surrounded by a 70metre wide moat, each side is 2km long with a bridge in the centre of each side across the moat. 'Foreigners' are only allowed to enter by the East entrance where they will be relieved of $10 each (although this will get you into other sites that we've visited and not been asked to show the ticket!!!). The buildings are dark and bare with no illustration of how they would be furnished. The highlight comes at the top of the watchtower where you can look down across the site and see the symmetrical layout.

Sun set sees us climbing Mandalay Hill, the point from where the  visiting Buddha is said to have phrophesized a great city would be built in the Buddhist year 2400. As a holy site it is required the 45 minute climb up steps is made barefoot. Urgh, it is filthy dirty and my feet will never be clean again. The 360 degrees panoramic views from the top are breathtaking and worth the climb. At the top is a plaque to The Prince of Wales Gurkha Rifles who retook the hill in March 1945 from the Japanese.

Food selections in Mandalay have been excellent, a Chinese owned restaurant sees us devour a fair banquet for 750 kyat each (50p) and a divine chicken paratha at an Indian owned place is a little more expensive at 1000 kyat. The busy local street restaurants are the places to eat in Myanmar as the proper restaurants are more expensive, although it's harsh to say a meal that costs £3 is expensive.