Mandalay to Mingun……on the Irrawaddy.

No trip to Burma would be complete without a trip on the Irrawaddy river….or Ayeyarwaddy as it is called in Burmese.

We set off from a jetty in Mandalay….. jetty being walking the plank through the boats closest to shore! They all seemed to be parked three deep!

 We were assigned a rather large boat….we were just 3 persons!

It was interesting going upstream…. going downstream is no problem…. however the locals need a towboat to get back upstream to their home.


We passed some people clustered around a bank…..

and apparently they were looking for teak logs which might have fallen off from the rafts of teak being towed by boats going downstream. …...it happens a lot.

We passed many  boats being towed….

this one shows their living quarters on the first boat, then perhaps covered areas for other family members, and their animals  on the second boat...……

we passed the tow boat out front…..

Two boats sharing the cost of the tow……..

We arrived at Mingun……

The Pagoda there is unfinished….one can see why! Large cracks all around….
There is a small temple in the building….but we elected not to venture in……just in case!

 This area suffered from the same devastating earthquake which affected the Inwa area …
 The front part of the huge guarding lions fell into the river!

We went to see the Mingun Bell, one of the largest in the world…….

Hysin

The village of Mingun had lots of souvenir stalls …….…..

The village straddles the length between the unfinished Pagoda, the Mingun Bell and the Hsinbyun Pagoda

There were lots of taxis…… we wondered why……

until we also  used one to return to the boat!  It was quite a walk back and we wanted to see the sunset on the river.

We also spent some time with dolphins frolicking around us!  We were surprised to find them here……

Back to Mandalay… to walk the plank again!