Exploring Hpa-An
Hpa-An wasn't on my original plan but then again travelling never ends up the way you plan it. Originally I wanted to cross over to Thailand in the north but this would involve flying which is another word for expensive. So instead I jumped on another night bus to Yangon and then onwards to Hpa-An, after 18 hours I had finally arrived and made a new friend on the way. We found a hostel that had been recommended to him by another traveller before heading out for a walk around town before crossing the river and heading up Hpan Pu Mountain to watch the sunset.
The next day we ended up being a group of 7 hiring scooters and driving around the surrounding areas. We had been told that we could do all the main sights in one day but weddidn't even make it close to that. But we still saw some amazing sights with the first one being Kawt-ka-thaung cave which in my opinion was even better then Kuala Lumpur's Batu Caves.
Just a few minutes away we drove through Lat-ka-na Village which you got to by crossing this little bridge between the rice fields.
From there we continued down to the famous Saddan Cave. This was spectacular and once we got through to the other side we were amazed at the views of the little river lake.
We found a second temple cave where we met some monks that started chatting to us and after a few minutes whisked out their iphones asking for a picture with us, of course we got photos with them as well! As we headed out the invited us to sit with them for lunch but before we knew it they were off and leaving us by translating that the food we were eating was penis! All whilst the restaurant lady kept saying vegetables to everything we asked about. So in the end we decided to simply accept the fact that we had vegetable penis for lunch, whatever that means.
After lunch we continued to the waterfall village where we met more people from our hostel.
Together (though a few got lost from the pack) we went to the Bat Cave to watch the sunset and all the bats exiting the cave. It was much better then I could have ever imagined. The day also included almost crashing in to a cow, jumping off the seat a thousand times due to the bumpy roads and stepping in pidgeon poo, which someone pointed out is meant to mean good luck so once again I'm bringing lots of good luck with me from this trip!
We headed back to the hostel only to find out that there was a Burmese New Years celebration fair which we of course headed to. What a way to end my last day in Burma.
The only thing I regret is that I didn't do more research about the weather temperature as I simply hadn't packed well enough for the cold nights. Because if I had then I would have gone up to Hsipaw or Kalaw to do some trekking. But all in all, I'm very happy with my Burmese experience and I highly recommend anyone looking for an active holiday to go there as this is the time to go there!
The next day we ended up being a group of 7 hiring scooters and driving around the surrounding areas. We had been told that we could do all the main sights in one day but weddidn't even make it close to that. But we still saw some amazing sights with the first one being Kawt-ka-thaung cave which in my opinion was even better then Kuala Lumpur's Batu Caves.
Just a few minutes away we drove through Lat-ka-na Village which you got to by crossing this little bridge between the rice fields.
From there we continued down to the famous Saddan Cave. This was spectacular and once we got through to the other side we were amazed at the views of the little river lake.
We found a second temple cave where we met some monks that started chatting to us and after a few minutes whisked out their iphones asking for a picture with us, of course we got photos with them as well! As we headed out the invited us to sit with them for lunch but before we knew it they were off and leaving us by translating that the food we were eating was penis! All whilst the restaurant lady kept saying vegetables to everything we asked about. So in the end we decided to simply accept the fact that we had vegetable penis for lunch, whatever that means.
After lunch we continued to the waterfall village where we met more people from our hostel.
Together (though a few got lost from the pack) we went to the Bat Cave to watch the sunset and all the bats exiting the cave. It was much better then I could have ever imagined. The day also included almost crashing in to a cow, jumping off the seat a thousand times due to the bumpy roads and stepping in pidgeon poo, which someone pointed out is meant to mean good luck so once again I'm bringing lots of good luck with me from this trip!
We headed back to the hostel only to find out that there was a Burmese New Years celebration fair which we of course headed to. What a way to end my last day in Burma.
The only thing I regret is that I didn't do more research about the weather temperature as I simply hadn't packed well enough for the cold nights. Because if I had then I would have gone up to Hsipaw or Kalaw to do some trekking. But all in all, I'm very happy with my Burmese experience and I highly recommend anyone looking for an active holiday to go there as this is the time to go there!
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