The Most Extraordinary Place You've Never Heard Of

Ask a group of people to name some of the world's great ancient sites, ruins or monuments and the usual suspects will all probably get an airing. The Pyramids, the Colosseum, the Parthenon or Stonehenge for starters. Some will venture further afield - Machu Picchu, the Easter Island Statues, Angkor Wat and even Chitchen Itza in Mexico might get a mention. But one that will almost certainly be absent from the discussion is the astonishing site of Bagan, in central Myanmar. This is a shame, because in my humble opinion it stands comparison with absolutely any of them. Bagan consists of over 4,000 temples - ranging from tiny to huge - scattered over a vast plain, the sheer scale of which puts most other sites in the world to shame.

Being the fan of the ancient that I am, Bagan was at the top of my Myanmar to-do list, but even I will admit to being pretty unfamiliar with it before I got here. Needless to say, though, that after having such fantastic experiences in the country so far and leaving this for the big finale, it had plenty to live up to.

Arriving in the evening, there wasn't much time for immediate sightseeing and so Jen and I checked into our (again very nice) hostel and decided that our plan for the following morning would be to hire a horse and cart (and driver, obviously) to take us on a full day tour of the plain. Given the weather, which had been wet but was now starting to clear up, had left a lot of the more remote areas difficult to access, our horse and cart proved to be the way to go. Starting after breakfast we began slowly, with a couple of the smaller - yet still very impressive - and more remote temples like these ones.

Had they been the top sights for the day, we'd have been pleased - but we were truly just getting started. And we quickly learned the golden rule of Bagan - no matter how spectacular any individual temple might be, it pales in comparison to the collective view. The temples of Bagan might just be Southeast Asia's first attempt at Socialism...

As the day went on we proceeded to visit some of the bigger and more spectacular structures, such as Dhammayangyi, a colossal red brick pyramid which is the largest of all Bagan's temples...

...and Sulamani, one of the prettiest and most intricate temples, which is just as impressive on the inside as the outside.

It wasn't just a temple day either - Bagan is probably the lacquer-ware capital of the solar system and we got to see the artists at work first hand. Intricacy personified...and patience too, as the process of making just one item can take up to two years.

Finally, to finish the day we were taken to what is considered one Bagan's finest viewing platforms...and to say that the view didn't disappoint would be to underrate it I'd say. Breathtaking isn't the word.

Such a day was clearly a hard act to follow, but never ones to believe that we've peaked too soon we attacked the following days with ever greater gusto, hiring bicycles to cover as much ground as possible and viewing even more of the highlights. One of these was Ananda, considered to be probably the finest and most beautiful of all Bagan temples.

As well as Thatbyinnyu, at 64m (over 200ft) the highest of all Bagan temples. Though it's fair to say that this one was something of a Monet - the closer you got, the worse it looked. Still hella impressive from a distance though.

So far, so blindingly brilliant - but the absolute highlight was still to come, and gave me one of those spine-tingling experiences that you always hope for as a traveller. Riding our bikes, we came across a path with no traffic on it at all and no other tourists in sight, which we then followed all the way to a lovely, secluded little temple with a viewing platform. So unvisited was this place that we had to ask the young woman who lived nearby for the key to open the gate to the viewing platform of the temple, which we climbed to get ourselves the best possible vantage point.

The views were magnificent, panoramas across the entirety of the plain, and despite the otherwise sunny weather we even got a rainbow seemingly beaming out of Dhammayangyi just for us.

And then, remarkably with the place entirely to ourselves, we were treated to simply the most epic sunset over Bagan.

Few things could possibly have made our time in Bagan even better, but that's exactly what happened with the arrival of Wojtek and Joanna, the Polish couple we travelled through Tibet with. As mentioned in the Tibet entries, they are on their own world tour and it was fantastic to meet up with them again.

Though I don't know where all those beer glasses came from. It seems the waiters at the bar had carelessly left other people's empties on our table...

And so ends Bagan, truly one of the most remarkable, beautiful places I've ever seen. We didn't make it to all 4,400 temples, but we gave it a hell of a shot. Just one more (long) bus ride back to Yangon and we will be leaving this wonderful country behind.

Things Jennie will remember:

1) HA HA HA!!! Sean!!! On a bike on sand!!!! HA HA HA!!! With a flat tyre!!!! And mud!! And thorn bushes!!!

2) The all-you-can-eat buffet at the Golden Myanmar restaurant. Four different types of meat curry (all with unlimited refills!) complimented by a table full of salads, vegetables and sauces (all with unlimited refills!!) - we actually had to force them to stop bringing the food to the table as it just kept coming and coming and coming. And coming!

3) Zu Zu, our very knowledgeable horse cart driver. Thanks Zu Zu!

Here are the photos:

BT24_Bagan 10 - 15 Oct