Shwedagon Pagoda

e start to think about moving on from Yangon so go to an internet cafe to do some research and make a bit of a plan for our 28 days in Myanmar … the first of which is back to the beach!  We’re heading to Ngwe Saung and wander up to the Sule Pagoda to find a travel agent to ask about bus tickets.  We stop for lunch at a Shan noodle place called 999 which is great.

After a few enquiries we are pointed in the direction of a tourist information office which we didn’t know was there.  They tell us about the buses and say we can get tickets by the football stadium which is just by central station or just turn up in the morning.  We go to buy tickets and are told its the northern bus station which is about an hour from downtown by cab and we need to be there by 6.30am … another early start.

This afternoon we go to the Shwedagon Pagoda which looks just amazing from the outside.  Its the one Yangon is most famous for.  We know we have to dress appropriately so Fred has a below knee length skirt and her pashmina to wrap around her shoulders.  On arrival, we pay our entrance fee which is expensive (8000 Kyat or 8 USD) and then Fred is rather snottily told she’s not dressed appropriately as her skirt is too tight and too thin!  Its hardly see-through but we take another look at their sign which just says no mini skirts, short, shorts or vest tops.  They kindly offer to sell her a sarong for 5000 Kyat, we politely refuse and ask for our money back!  Its seems like a scam to us … there are men in there in knee length shorts which don’t cover as much as Fred’s skirt.  So, we wander around the outside and go to some of the other pagodas just across the road, to which we are allowed free entry.  

We have an interesting fish dinner (with a scrambled egg topping) at a street food place and attempt to get an early night.