Today was my last full day in Myanmar, the group by now had separated – most had already left Yangon for their trips home or to the next destination.

There were only two of us left – and given that we had already seen the interesting bits of Yangon before the trip, it was time to venture out a bit further.

A bit further in the end meant, that we actually stayed fairly close, i.e. within a few kilometers from Yangon’s city center, but still ended up in a different, more rural and basic world. We took the ferry to cross the river from Yangon over to Dala, here sai kaas (“sidecar”, the Myanmar version of a cyclo) were waiting for us – and we were now cycled around town.

The first stop was at Shwe Sayan Pagoda (ရွှေစာရံစေတီ); from here the ride continued to a water pond (with clean water – at drinking quality, as could be seen by the numerous waterlilies … at least per our guide) and then to a small cafe for a drink and snack. A further stop was at the Mahar Thin Gyan Buddha Image (မဟာသၾကၤန္ဘုရားႀကီး), before we made it back to the ferry and back to Yangon.

It certainly has been an interesting trip to Myanmar. There is loads to see here, temples and stupas everywhere, combined with great nature and a (still) traditional way of life – – the trip certainly has been a great combination of everything. Surely one can see, that the country only opened up for tourism fairly recently. So there is loads to be desired in terms of infrastructure and overall service consistency – but then a fully professional tourism industry would also kill many of the traditions, one can still witness or even become a part in in Myanmar – – and isn’t that one of the main reasons for traveling?