Hpa-An

On a recommendation from Jenna, Danna and I headed to Hpa-An in an out of the way route to Yangon. Hpa-An is a sleepy little town with a bunch of surrounding sites. Getting there was an tiring task and involved an 11 hour night bus, 3 hour wait in a road side cafe, and final 6 hour bus ride to Hpa-An. Apart from being an ice box, this last night bus in Myanmar was by far the  most enjoyable one of our trip. The music was low and no soap operas or raucous singing was heard from the driver or his mates. Because we were now back in the Southern part of Myanmar (or it's just our luck) it started raining the minute we rolled into Hpa-An. As the rain gods don't totally hate us, the downpour at least waited until after we had found our guest house.

Again, we found the local market (in between downpours) and grabbed some fruit for our late lunch. Mangoes, rambutans and bananas rounded out our meal. Unfortunately mango season is coming to an end here, so Danna and I have been eating as many as possible. I didn't discover the greatness that are mangoes until moving here and I keep hearing how expensive they are to buy back home. This saddens me and I know my days of getting a mango for anywhere between 20 and 50 cents are numbered. Thankfully, avocado season is starting soon so that means avocado juice will be back on the menus shortly! (Clearly, my priorities are with anything edible!)

The tour to the surrounding areas was a ton of fun and filled with caves and ancient statues and carvings. The first spot we visited was an old monastery with a huge alter area set inside a cave. As we walked to the entrance of the cave, we passed a whole wall of the mountain that was covered in tiny Buddha carvings. Neither of us could figure out why there were so many carvings of the same thing. As Danna said, "It is incredible the amount of determination some people have." After spending a good amount of time gawking at everything,  we made our way back to the tuk-tuk where our driver was waiting with a huge hunk of sugarcane for us. I've never been given raw sugarcane before so it was an adventure trying to eay it without swallowing any of the fibrous pulp. It was delicious but the amount proved to be too much for me!

Our next spot was again another cave but this one had a tunnel to a back entrance that we could walk through. In the main opening of this cave there were Buddha statues with flaming hair. I've seen a lot of different Buddha hair styles in the past few weeks but this was a new one. It may be the only place in Myanmar that contains such statues. Danna and I braved the dark and bat poo to make it to the other end of the cave. We were rewarded with a beautiful view of the surrounding mountains and crazy amounts of stalactites in the opening.

The last stop before lunch was again at another monastery and contained a pagoda set atop a giant rock in the middle of a man made lake. At this site, ladies were allowed to climb up to the alter but no on was allowed to climb to the very top. In order to get there, tourists and practicing Buddhists would have to climb a rickety looking bamboo ladder.

The last spot of the day was at the base of Mount Zwegabin in a field that literally is home to more than 1,100 Buddha statues! They are in symmetrical rows and each statue is the same size. However, some have shelters protecting them from the elements and others are painted a reddish colour. Again,  the statement Danna made about people's determination fits perfectly for this place. Their isn't any information explaining who or why the field of Buddha statues was built in the first place and our driver didn't speak enough English to understand or answer our questions.

Hpa-An rounded out our time in Myanmar. We had one last night in Yangon where we met up with Jenna, found the night market, and had a mango party in the dining room of our guesthouse. Words cannot express how much I enjoyed my time in Myanmar and I truly do wish to return someday!