Bagan Sightseeing

It's 5:00 AM and we are all on the bus headed out to another pagoda chosen for the sunrise shot. It is still dark as we arrive and we are not alone as evidenced by the zipping about of beams from flashlights (torches for you Brits) looking like a bunch of angry oversized lightning bugs (wonder if the British call them torchbugs?). At the base of the steep steps leading up the outside of the pagoda, it's off with the shoes again and the feel of the cool brick is rather soothing. But the steps are steep and it is a bit laborious making your way up carrying 25 lbs of camera gear on your back. Per Nathan's suggestion, we do not go to the top most level, where many are going, because the best photo will have something of the foreground in them. Going too high and all you get is the sunrise, which looks pretty much the same all over the world. Doubt that I would have thought of that.

We each stake out a place for our tripod and mount a long telephoto lens. Setting the focus to infinity gives a great starting point as it is still very dark and impossible to focus on manually or automatically on anything. Now it's just waiting for the sun to appear.

The sky starts to change from an almost black to much lighter rose and yellow as the sun begins to rise. Clouds start to form in the previously blank sky, adding character and then the hot air balloons make their appearance, slowly drifting from my left to right. I don't feel any breeze at all and their progression is pretty slow, but what a sight! This is really cool!

Finally it is completely daylight and we pack it up and get back on the bus, back to the hotel and breakfast! After breakfast, the adventure continues as we mount our individual rides, electric scooters, and head out looking for all the world like some anemic motorcycle gang. But listen to the beep of my horn! Maybe, horn is too strong a word for the sound coming out of this thing. Of course we look like a bunch of overgrown kids zipping around the parking lot trying out our new steeds. No helmets of course. Big brother hasn't got eyeballs here yet. But don't worry, I think these things max out at about 15 mph and you definitely cannot do a wheelie with them.

So we head on out, "looking for adventure", and some neat photo ops. Nathan in the lead and Ko Ko bringing up the rear to sheepdog any stragglers. A few of the gals opted to take a horse drawn cart instead and so their driver pretty much knows where we are going. It is good to get off the main road and onto a back road, though there is occasional loose sand which can be a bit tricky on the two wheel devices. We found some cool pagodas with few tourist and a really interesting photo op where some people were harvesting peanuts. A man plowing up the field behind a pair of brahmas and women hand picking the legumes after they have been uprooted.

There are these private pagodas everywhere and we stop at one that looks like it may make a good photo op. Of course, anywhere that tourists might appear, there are folks selling souvenirs.
These sites, built hundreds of years ago, still show the intricate detail and care that was taken in constructing them. Some of the interior work is just phenomenal.

We stop at a major religious site and have a refreshment and use the loo before going inside. As I am leaving the toilet, the lady custodian shouts that I need to pay. It is 200 Kyat (about 15 cents US). I don't have anything small than a 5000 K note and she does not have change for that. As I trying to figure out what to do the guy next to me (Burmese), hands her the money and motions to her that that is for me. A complete stranger, to whom 200 K is perhaps significant just did that for me. I thanked him and he gave me this big toothless smile.

Nathan leads us to a cool place that looks like a market but is actually a religious site (i.e. no shoes!). But is is a nice smooth floor. Pillars supporting the roof let light in in a regular pattern that looks like it would be great to photograph in. He has done this before with some young monks as subjects, but there is not a monk anywhere in sight! So he gets some poor watermelon vendor to act as our model, while Ko Ko arranges for some novice monks to come.

Finally we return to the hotel for lunch and some free time before heading out (on the coach), for our sunset shot location. As you can see these shooting locations are very popular with the tourists and can get quite crowded. I manage to squeeze in next to a gal from Ireland who is nice enough to move her tripod over a bit to let me in.