Yangon

 Made it!!!! Arrived at Yangon airport after a couple of very  uneventful flights. I was met by our guide Hay Mar who eventually collected 5 of us. The other four were all from various parts of England. There are evidently a total of 12 on the trip and we will catch-up with the rest tonight.

We were bundled into a van and driven to the Panda Hotel where we only stay for one night.

It's pretty standard Hotel but the rooms are big, it's clean and there's not a bad view from my room on the 11 th floor.

Emma, being  big Panda fan, would love the pictures on the doors.

The English crew took to their rooms to rest, but after a very welcome shower I went walkabout  for an hour or so. The Hotel is in a pleasant enough area but there was nothing very exciting to see and as we'd just had quite a downpour it was very humid.

Loved the colourful, crowded buses.

Also loved the interesting script they use here. I have no idea what it says so I hope it's not offensive.

I've learnt a few tricks for walking round these Asian cities. The first is to attach yourself to a local when crossing the road, standing on the side where you're likely to get hit last by the cars coming toward you. One thing I almost forgot here though was that they drive on the opposite side of the road to what we do and it pays to look left rather than right when you step out from the curb. Something I MUST remember. Strangely enough most of the cars have the steering wheel on the right side. I believed they changed the side they drove on back in the 70's but the cars aren't that old!

I've also learnt that it's a good idea to walk with your head down... not for any particular religious reason or out of respect but to save yourself from a broken leg. I was told to bring a torch for walking at night and I can see what good advice that was. Walking here is no straightforward matter!!

The dogs!!! Another walking hazard. Thank goodness dogs don't frighten me. I've learnt that when half a dozen stray dogs rush at you barking it's best to just keep calm and keep walking. I'm sure they don't really want to kill tourists.. they just want to tell you that you are in their patch ... and who wants to argue wiith that!!

At 5 o'clock the whole group met in the hotel. All from either England, Scotland or Ireland except for me. There are 4 men and 8 women, mostly a little bit younger than me with perhaps one a bit older. They all seem like nice people. We also found that Haymar spent a month in the U.K. ... as  a prize for being an award winning guide so we may have struck it lucky.

We all went down the road to a restaurant for dinner. I'm not totally sure what I ate but it tasted pretty good which may have had something to do with the amount of MSG they put in their food here. There were a couple of strange things in the food but I thought it may have been wise not to ask what they were.

Always have to try the local beer... maybe not my favourite of the Asian beers but it's cheap and goes well with the equally cheap food.

 

It was a short walk back to the hotel, but a noisy one. This is a festival weekend.. the end of something similar to Lent, so there have been a lot of celebrations including fireworks. Seems we might strike a few festivals over the next couple of weeks.

Tomorrow we get a 6 am wake up call as there's a lot to fit into the day.  Time to sleep!!