We wanted
to get out of Mandalay for a day. It´s not the best looking city in the world.
On top of that, it was very hot and noisy. Also some strange wind blew in last
evening and covered everything in fine red dust. So we read about those
botanical gardens in an old colonial hill station. Cool gardens up in hills
sounded just right.
We hired a
car with AC to drive us to the Pyu In Oo for 90 USD. The same driver we had
that drove us to U Bein and to airport. Don´t know when they wrote the LP guide
but they claimed it´s feasible to get there in a car for 5000 Kyats. We pay
4000 kyat to ride around the city in a cab. Maybe a slow bus or a seat on a
pick up truck for a local would cost 5000 Kyat? The drive itself to Pyu In Oo took
almost 2h and the driver was flooring it most of the time. Mid ways came the serpentines.
It was a struggle - a convoy of cars drove in to a water cooling depot on top
of the mountain to hose of the engines and breaks. I´m not entirely sure it´s
the best idea buy hey...when in Rome....you break your car! J
We passed the
huge Military officers school on the way in. I think the driver told us that
around 3000 officers are being trained there right now. That is A LOT of young
officers! We later saw a few of them around the city, shopping and running
around in their uniforms.
So, finally the old hill station Pyin In Oo.
The driver parked us close to the market, the central market. The only
difference between the goods on this one and other central markets was that this
market had some really warm clothes to offer. Like fleece jackets and thick
insulated jackets. We left after some minutes since we were not in the shopping
mode right now. We made a detour and walked to the church and got to the Gold
triangle cafe. A very clean and nice café located in a beautiful colonial building.
They sold organic fair trade coffee so we bought a bag home. The cookies they
sold were OK and the views of the street life and the old houses were
excellent. We spent an hour or two there, just idling and talking to the locals.
Saw some stressed Americans with LP guide making and entrance, drunk a coffee in
3 seconds, checked the Café of the “to do list” and run out again. That was fun
J. I
also talked to an old English teacher from the high school. Since I´m into
preserving cultural habitats we spoke a lot on how the new fast food culture
changes the life of today’s youth and the old Myanmar traditions. He told me of
his passion for translating old texts. He could read all of the older texts but
he could not understand all of it yet. He showed us how to decode dates in the
old Myanmar calendar and gave me a poem about the Tabara gate in Bagan. A
historic lowe story about two lovers made immortal with the status on the gate
sides. Sweet old man!
Went back
to our car. In the mean time the driver almost got a heart attack since we were
gone for so long. I guess he was used with the kind of tourists that you need
to hold in hand. Poor guy. We hugged and laughed and all was good again. Not my
fault the old teacher liked us so much that he read several poems to us.
We looked
around the small city centre and drove onwards. Next stop was the “Lucky”
pagoda. Just another pagoda I guess. A big one. In the middle of nowhere. After
that we visited the waterfalls. A very popular place with water powered merry
go round, people swimming in the pools and having lunch at one of the many
restaurants that lined the river and the falls. The shops sold a lot of local
wine, pinapple wine, cherry wine etc. I was tempted to drink one but I decided
that was a bit early still J. We drove onwards to the main attraction – the
botanical garden. I took a good while to get to the gardens from the city centre.
A 5 USD entrance fee. So the gardens were...OK. Not much more then that can be
said. The aviary was ok. The orchid garden was boring, only whites ones in
bloom. The bamboo forest was phenomenal! What a cool place! Afterwards I was a
bit concerned about the fact that there could be a lot of snakes in the forest
and we were just running around in the bamboo heaven playing Crouching Tiger Hidden
Dragon. After all, I thought it would be more exotic but it was rather looking
like an old English park. DUH! Old colonial British botanical garden....ring a
bell? We also got a “pleasure” to listen to Myanmar ABBA covers during the
whole visit since there was a concert or something in the park. Festival time –
remember? Oh! And there are hundreds of carp fish in the ponds that you can
feed!!! Funny stuff!
We chose
the Feel restaurant, the same branch like the one in Yangon, the one we liked
so much, as a lunch restaurant. Situated on the end of the lake, by the
football fields, the location is great. The restaurant is huge and clean but
does not serve food in the same way they do in Yangon. I guess they have less clients still to do that.
They looked recently opened, and the food was excellent. The driver ordered a
huge fruit dessert with ice cream. It was like 1/10 of his body size J. A real celebration! Along the road
back to the town, we saw a lot of old colonial mansions. We said bye bye to Pyu
In Oo after lunch. The driver stopped by an Indian bakery and bought some
sweets for his children. AAAAw J Sweet guy! And he bought us some sweets too!
Awwww nice! :D.
The road back
to Mandalay down the serpentines with a driver that was in a hurry to get home
was also an experience. We arrived in Mandalay in late afternoon. The sun was
setting, the dust was whipped up by the traffic, the mopeds were noisy...we
were back for sure.
A swim in
the pool and we took the blue Mazda for dinner. To the Golden duck of course
since it´s the kick ass place to visit. So up we go and guess wot ...they RUN
OUT OF DUCK! Fakk! No duck?
