Journey to Inle Lake

On the way from Pyin Oo Lyin to Inle Lake, used several modes of transport, including shared taxi, train, tuk-tuk, walking, and a horse and cart.

Horse and cart - Journey to Inle Lake
To the train station – and don’t spare the horses!

First, a shared taxi to Mandalay – a downhill journey descending from the highlands. Maria captured this floral delivery person on his way to the flower market.

Put the petal to the metal - journey to Inle Lake
Put the petal to the metal.

Driven to Mandalay Station, we spent the afternoon browsing in an air-conditioned mall before returning to catch our 5:00 PM train.

Mandalay Station - journey to Inle Lake
Mandalay Station

This is the Rangoon Express, but we plan to get off in a place called Thazi, stay overnight, and take the slow train to Inle Lake next morning. We stay at the Moonlight Guest House, enjoying an end-of-the-day beer under a brilliant orange full moon.

Setting off bright and early – we took the horse and cart to Thazi station – we head over the mountains. This involves a series of switchbacks, backing up one incline, going forward on another, backing up another, and so on. The first is at this delightfully named station.

Onomatopoeia - journey to Inle Lake
Onomatopoeia?

The usual sights appear.

How Green Was My Valley - journey to Inle Lake
How Green Was My Valley

And some unusual ones.

Fuzzy-roofed building - journey to Inle Lake
Fuzzy-roofed building

It’s avocado season here – there are piles of avocados everywhere. We bought three from this lady for about 20 cents each.

I scream, you scream, we all scream for avocados - journey to Inle Lake
I scream, you scream, we all scream for avocados.

On the other side of the mountains are fertile foothills.

Well-tended fields - journey to Inle Lake
Well-tended fields

They don’t clear the grass from the tracks here. When you see the engine on a curve, it looks like we’re chugging along a trackless green pathway.

We make our way - journey to Inle Lake
We make our way.

Sign on Burmese Railways trains:

No smoking, no littering, no kissing - journey to Inle Lake
No smoking, no littering, no kissing

At last the train arrives in Shwenyaung. From there, it’s another 11 kilometres in a tuk-tuk  to Yaungshwe, the main town for visiting Inle Lake.

Sight or Insight of the Day

After checking in to the eminently comfortable Zawgi Inn , we found a restaurant with the cutest dog in Myanmar. (Or at least in Inle Lake.)

You look like a dog person to me - journey to Inle Lake
You look like a dog person to me.

He belongs to the proprietor. It’s rare to see cared-for animals here. I just wanted to squeeze him like a roll of Charmin.