More Bagan Pagodas and another trip on the Irrawaddy…...

We saw several more pagodas and a monastery before taking a sunset boat trip on the Irrawaddy.
Oh ….and I forgot …we went to see the Archaeological museum……
We couldn't understand why this was not mentioned in our guide book…..now we know!  A huge, huge museum……..with very little in it!
One of the reasons to go to it……. is to go to the third floor, to have a panoramic vista of the whole area……unfortunately it was closed to the public!


First we went to a cave monastery…..this was mainly underground……

Then to a Pagoda built by a queen….. Tham Bula….

a little crumbling on the exterior……

but with some nice detailed stucco still intact….. 

it had interesting murals from the 13th century inside…..

then Phayathonzu …….3 pagodas joined together, no cameras allowed inside but it did have beautiful wall frescoes.

 another pagoda …….Lemyethna…..

……... with a totally painted interior…...

…..it also had a very large brick monastery which had been earthquake damaged on its grounds. It was open to visit but I chose to remain outside! Particularly after seeing the remains of a totally destroyed pagoda in front of the existing one!!

The last pagoda, the Manuha  was the most interesting. Built in 1067 and apparently totally undamaged in the many earthquakes.   There were 3 extremely large Buddhas in the sitting position.

Then one has to go out and go behind  to see a vast reclining Buddha which took up almost the whole space inside….difficult to squeeze past!

Rice donations…..?to feed the poor/or the monks…..

Village life goes on as usual between the pagodas!

Then off to our sunset boat ride on the Irrawaddy…..
the jetty area was quite busy….

 ….presumably this boat had just unloaded its delivery of pots….

The blue boat was our ride for the evening…..

…and there were some rather ancient looking boats around!

 We passed some monks waiting for the ferry to take them upstream…..

We went quite a way upstream…..and then drifted down while watching the sun go down…….

 and this rather large barge passed us going quickly upstream…… the Irrawaddy never sleeps!