Yangon is Myanmar's biggest city and former capital. After the last cyclone, they built a new city somewhere else for the government but no one really lives there yet. All the pitfalls of big city living are here: too much traffic, too many people on practically nonexistent sidewalks, and too much noise and pollution. The airport is well connected, however, so it’s a necessary stop and worth a couple days to have a look around. Without a doubt, the Shweda...

Happy New Year 2016 from Ngwe Saung! Don't worry, I can’t pronounce it either. So my new observation from Myanmar is that the locals get motion sickness before the bus even starts to move. I call this phenomenon Vomiting Burmese Roulette. For the rest of us, this creates an uncomfortable, mystery-like environment where everyone is on the lookout for when and where the next gacking local will be depositing his or her lunch. All we can do as foreigners is t...

Moving on from Nyaungshwe, we headed south through the old capital city of Yangon (they recently moved it) and made our way to Kyaikto, also known simply as Golden Rock. We heard mixed reports on this place, mostly negative, but for some reason we were determined to see it. This is one of holiest Buddhist sites in the country and thousands of pilgrims arrive daily to do their thing here. The crazy thing about this rock, other than that it's completely covered wit...

Merry Christmas from Red Mountain Winery! We rented bicycles to ride the few kilometers out to the winery for some proper wine tasting. I think our day is pretty self explanatory. Hope you had a good one wherever you were.

The full day boat tour of Inle Lake was one of the highlights of my trip here. I loved observing their lifestyle centered on boats and being around the water. For the 100,000 or so inhabitants along the shores of Inle Lake, it appears they have mastered the ability to live on, and off the water's bounty. For generations, they have found a way to maintain floating gardens that grow tomatoes, eggplant, cabbage, beans, cauliflower, cucumbers, and peas year round. ...