We traveled through Myanmar in the summer of April 2013.
Our trip was short (10 days), during which we traveled through Yangon, Bagan, Inle Lake and Mandalay.
If you are planning to travel to Myanmar, the first thing you need to do is throw away that 2 year old Lonely Planet guidebook, because THAT speaks of a Myanmar of 50 years ago.
The last two years have brought rapid changes to Burma and it was the drive down from the airport in a modern Toyota saloon (taxi) which shattered any pre-conceived notions of a "land that time forgot" that any of us had.
Modern cars now roam Yangon's well maintained, clean and very disciplined roads (I personally saw two breathtakingly expensive Bentley's). 80 inch flat screen TV's are advertised from every hoarding. Everyone has the latest touch screen mobile phones. And the hotels are 300% more expensive than they were two years ago.
The surprise begins from Yangon airport, which is modern, clean, well maintained and would fit without any effort in any mid-sized city in the world.
Aside from the already addressed misnomers, your guide books are also wrong on the following accounts:
1. Money - yes, you will still have to carry pristine bills, but these needn't necessarily be US Dollars. Banks and money exchanges now change GBP, Euro and AUD. Do not however, underestimate how perfect the bills you carry need to be, make the effort, go to your bank and get absolutely unmarked and unfolded bills or your money will be useless here.
2. Taxi's - all the guidebooks seem to consider the airport taxi rates to be sacrosanct. This is not the case at all. You can (and must) bargain with the airport taxi's in most places as their rates are largely unreasonable and cartelised. The taxi cartels are strong, but a short walk away from the airport will bring prices down in most places. We hired taxi's for 4000 kyat (Yangon - advertised rate 6000 kyat), 20000 kyat Heho (advertised rate 25,000 kyat) and 12,000 kyat Mandalay (advertised rate 15,000 kyat). The only place where our haggling didn't work was Bagan, which has the strongest cartel (or maybe we just had a bad day) and the most unreasonable taxi prices. We eventually walked some of the way to our hotel (not recommended) and then jumped in a local pick up truck taxi (one of the best experiences of the trip), where the kind and gentle people were too hospitable to, despite our repeated offering, take any money whatsoever from us. Myanmar is still that kind of place.
3. Airfare - there are new "low cost" air carriers (Golden Myanmar Airways), which are definitely worth a look in as they let you travel across the country at first class rail prices.
I had a million questions before my trip to Burma and I shall try and answer as many of them as I found answers to. I'll also be happy to answer any others you may have (please feel free to post them in the comments section) in future posts.
Mingalabar!
Our trip was short (10 days), during which we traveled through Yangon, Bagan, Inle Lake and Mandalay.
If you are planning to travel to Myanmar, the first thing you need to do is throw away that 2 year old Lonely Planet guidebook, because THAT speaks of a Myanmar of 50 years ago.
The last two years have brought rapid changes to Burma and it was the drive down from the airport in a modern Toyota saloon (taxi) which shattered any pre-conceived notions of a "land that time forgot" that any of us had.
Modern cars now roam Yangon's well maintained, clean and very disciplined roads (I personally saw two breathtakingly expensive Bentley's). 80 inch flat screen TV's are advertised from every hoarding. Everyone has the latest touch screen mobile phones. And the hotels are 300% more expensive than they were two years ago.
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| The most disciplined traffic I have seen anywhere in South Asia |
The surprise begins from Yangon airport, which is modern, clean, well maintained and would fit without any effort in any mid-sized city in the world.
 |
| The modern and spacious arrivals area at Yangon airport |
1. Money - yes, you will still have to carry pristine bills, but these needn't necessarily be US Dollars. Banks and money exchanges now change GBP, Euro and AUD. Do not however, underestimate how perfect the bills you carry need to be, make the effort, go to your bank and get absolutely unmarked and unfolded bills or your money will be useless here.
2. Taxi's - all the guidebooks seem to consider the airport taxi rates to be sacrosanct. This is not the case at all. You can (and must) bargain with the airport taxi's in most places as their rates are largely unreasonable and cartelised. The taxi cartels are strong, but a short walk away from the airport will bring prices down in most places. We hired taxi's for 4000 kyat (Yangon - advertised rate 6000 kyat), 20000 kyat Heho (advertised rate 25,000 kyat) and 12,000 kyat Mandalay (advertised rate 15,000 kyat). The only place where our haggling didn't work was Bagan, which has the strongest cartel (or maybe we just had a bad day) and the most unreasonable taxi prices. We eventually walked some of the way to our hotel (not recommended) and then jumped in a local pick up truck taxi (one of the best experiences of the trip), where the kind and gentle people were too hospitable to, despite our repeated offering, take any money whatsoever from us. Myanmar is still that kind of place.
3. Airfare - there are new "low cost" air carriers (Golden Myanmar Airways), which are definitely worth a look in as they let you travel across the country at first class rail prices.
I had a million questions before my trip to Burma and I shall try and answer as many of them as I found answers to. I'll also be happy to answer any others you may have (please feel free to post them in the comments section) in future posts.
Mingalabar!
