Up again for sunrise, but this time we hit the asphalt heading towards the capital in the back of a pickup truck, rather than riding our e-bikes along dirt tracks for the temples of Bagan. The morning was relatively cold, so being perched in the back of a pickup truck at dawn with the bitter wind whistling past our ears wasn't exactly fun! Luckily Amelia and I didn't have to suffer for the whole journey, after roughly an hour we were transferred from the pickup to an old bus to take us the rest of the way.
As usual, when we arrived at our stop, we braced ourselves for the masses of taxi drivers harassing us for their next fare. Typically they were trying their best to rinse us of as much money as possible, but we knew how far it was to the hotel so we stuck to our guns. After a while, we found a reasonable man willing to take us for a fair price.
Having unintentionally visited every other capital city on our travels, we intended to visit probably the most bizarre. Naypidaw is the relatively new capital of Myanmar. It was constructed in secret back in the early noughties under the then military rulers. In 2005 the city was built (in the middle of the jungle) and announced by the military junta as the new capital. All governmental workers were apparently given little choice but to relocate the 200 miles within forty-eight hours!
Arriving in Naypidaw (six times the size of New York City) on one of the barren 'super highways' and past huge hotels and shopping malls, is quite an absurd experience - one could almost forget that it's one of the poorest countries in SEA!
The hotel we booked for our one night was located in the baron Vegas-esque 'hotel zone'. Most places in Naypyidaw are priced for wealthy businessmen or government paid officials. But luckily we were able to find a hotel ('The Golden Lake Hotel') that turned out to be just what we needed - the rooms were reasonably priced, clean and the place even had motorbikes available for rent.
After dropping our bags off in the room we utilised the golf buggy shuttle to take us back to reception! Clearly space isn't an issue for Naypyidaw if even a budget hotel can run a shuttle service to its rooms! The lady at reception told us they had just one moped left to rent, so we decided to snap it up and get out on the open road.
Before setting off I gave the moped a quick check over. Quite often the mopeds we hire have a couple of minor problems, like a cracked mirror or blown indicator bulb etc. which is either easily fixable or not a cause for concern. However, this moped had an endless list of faults, from the horn not working (essential in this part of the world) to a barely existent braking system! Normally I wouldn't of stepped near such a thing until it was fixed, but with the roads as empty as they were and the staff seemingly bemused by our concern we decided to cautiously scooter off on the death trap and play it by ear. It was far from ideal, but I managed to warm up the rear brake enough to make it useable, so we pottered along the vast wide stretches of empty motorways in search of some attractions.
Besides the odd temple here and there, a zoo and some American style shopping malls, Naypyidaw doesn't have a lot to offer the average tourist. I'd read that a Buddhist site called 'Uppatasanti Pagoda' is worth a visit and being home to some rare white elephants we decided to track it down. Little did we know that there is more than one 'Uppatasanti Pagoda' in Naypidaw. This only became apparent when we arrived at the wrong temple with the same name and had locals show us various carvings, paintings and statues of elephants, when we enquired into the whereabouts of the sacred white elephants.
Trusty Google managed to put us back on track though, and by sunset we were where we wanted to be. The pagoda was situated on top of possibly the only hill in Naypidaw and has a huge golden stupa that is pretty much an exact replica of the one in the former capital! With their pinkish skin, white hairs and pale eyes we were taken aback by the unusual looking sacred elephants (which are likely albinos or leucitic). Unfortunately the poor elephants were looking quite distressed and only able to move as far as the chains would let them - so much for being sacred and highly regarded in the Buddhist belief. Before darkness fell upon us we walked up to view the golden stupa and take in its great vantage point over the noiseless capital - two words that I never thought would go together in South East Asia! Being the only foreigners there many pilgrims took an interest in our presence, one elderly lady in particular took a liking to Amelia and proceeded to hold her hand and guide us around! Despite the lack of site seeing in Naypidaw, it was definitely worth a visit. We've never been to a place like it and I'm not sure I'll ever see anything like it again...

The next day we left the 'out-of-the-ordinary' and went back to the former capital for something a little more familiar!