BAGAN

Ok, I finally tackled some of the many, many Bagan photos. Trying to keep the continuity going on the blog! Bagan was awesome. There were so many different temples, buildings, sights to see, it was unbelievable. I will try to sort out which are which and give better names and descriptions as the time goes by. I'll post more pictures later. These are basically a random selection of photos from our 3 nights in town. Many more Bagan pictures to come!

Lots of cool views. I'm jealous of the professionals with unlimited time and money. We wanted to take a hot air balloon ride, but it's 350 dollars a person! We spent many a sunrise/sunset running around trying to find the best viewing angles!

The center of most of the buildings is usually solid, or without access. There are usually doorways on all four sides of the building leading in to giant Buddhas. The Buddhas are located at the center of each of the four sides. Inside the buildings there are corridors connecting the four sides. I hope that makes sense. It's basically a smaller square inside of the larger perimeter square.

This is our third scooter. Bagan is really big. It's about a 15 or 20km wide square filled with sights. They only allow electric scooters. This one was by far the best and was pretty much a very slow normal scooter.

This is the very first temple we went to on our first day. It is one of the biggest temples in Bagan. There are no shoes allowed in any of the temples, so there is tons of walking around barefoot!

One of the many Buddhas inside one of the many temples.

Shwezigon Paya

Another of the many Buddhas inside the temples. There were four of these in this temple. One in the center of each of the four side.

There are lots of dirt roads leading to the temples. There are normal paved roads going in different general directions, but to reach the temples you usually have to ride dirt roads. It was very, very dry(it's the dry season,) and very very dusty. The fields are full of thorn bushes and dead grass. It's a pretty inhospitable environment.

Lawkananda Pagoda. This was the closest major pagoda to our hotel and a really unique temple. It is right on the river's edge in New Bagan.

Our second hotel in Bagan. The hotels were all full for new years, so we stayed in an expensive hotel for December 30th and 31st. on the first we moved to this little place. the room wasn't too nice but I loved their garden and driveway! the next day we left for Mandalay.