I woke up today at 5.30 am, unfortunately the sunrise didn’t turned out as we expected because of the cloud. We have a decent breakfast at GIC Hotel, where they set the table at the lobby for us. We began our tour today at 8 am, heading for Phaung Daw Oo Pagoda which we were supposed to visit yesterday if it wasn’t raining. Local people are coming to pray and stick a gold leaf on the Buddha image. We walked around the temple then took another boat ride to Indein. But we make a quick stop at a local silk workshop and umbrella production.

Breakfast at GIC in Inle Lake, Myanmar

Over the water village in Inle Lake, Myanmar

Long neck villager weaving silk, a population similar to those popular in Chiang Mai, Thailand

Umbrella workshop in Inle Lake, Myanmar

It took about 30 minutes to Indein, followed by 1 hour walking to the top of the pagoda. Surrounding the center pagoda is smaller pagodas with different color, most of them donated by common people. We saw shops along the way to the top, also many dogs were walking around. The stupas looks like the one in Bagan, I like it better in Bagan also due to more natural construct of the stupas. We met local people walking with cows and kids playing around. Burmese people are very nice and friendly, when they are not shy. No wonder that people always said Myanmar has the kindest people among Asean countries.

Shops along the road to the Pagoda in Indein, Inle Lake

Local kid following us around trying to sell scarf, we eventually gave her K500 to make her leave

The descent road from Indein Pagoda to our boat dock was quite long, as long as the hike to the pagoda. It was 11 am when we got near the dock, after 30 minutes ride back to the lake we have our lunch at a local restaurant popular among tourists. As usual I ordered a fried rice with vegetables and egg for only 1500 kyat ($1.5) which tasted good and looks hygiene. We were early from schedule, so after having lunch we walked to pagoda complex around the restaurant

Kids playing on the river in Inle Lake, Myanmar

View from our restaurant at lunch in Inle Lake, Myanmar

One hour away from our lunch spot and across the central of the lake, we arrived at Mine Thauk to see rice fields being harvested. Our boat stopped at the front dock and we have to walk for about 10 minutes on a bridge to go to the land. Since we visited at Sunday, local city people were also enjoying the scenery im Mine Thauk. We also saw number of tourist brought a bicycle on a boat to ride it across the fields. We sat for 15 minutes on a gazebo near the land, then retrace our path before and went to the last stop for today.

Mine Thauk, a vast fields of rice paddy in Inle Lake, Myanmar

The photo spot is located at the center of the lake, a building from World War 2 that still stands but unoccupied today. From this building we could take photographs of 360 degrees view of Inle Lake. The mountain, boats, resorts among other things. The sky was cloudy when we finished taking photos, that was the reason we headed back to our boat and drive as fastly as the machine allowed to our hotel.

Landscape at Inle Lake, Myanmar

Eventually we got slightly wet due to small rain on our way to the hotel. We settled an arrangement for 90 minutes massage beginning at 3.30 by two local men. After taking a shower, I looked at the time showing it was 6 pm, we walked to the restaurant in Golden Island Cottage Inn and ate the same food we ate yesterday, fish in oyster sauce and bbq prawn. The sunset wasn’t really good due to the cloudy sky, but I managed to take few good shots. After dinner we were tired and went straight to sleep.

WP