3 weeks Myanmar: Balloon festival and sunken city Mrauk U

Myan­mar has long been at the top of my list. Espe­ci­al­ly sin­ce I saw a docu­men­ta­ry about the bal­loon fes­ti­val in Taung­gyi, a small town near Lake Inle, it was clear to me: I have to go the­re. I don’t just want to be the­re, I want to be right in the midd­le of it and, best of all, in the front row.

So I had to plan my trip around the fes­ti­val, which takes place every year on the 7th full moon of the Myan­mar calen­dar. Okay, admit­ted­ly, not the easie­st time to give a Euro­pean. But Dr. Goog­le can help easily.

So we start from Frank­furt with a flight via Bang­kok and chan­ge the­re to a smal­ler pla­ne to Man­da­lay, the start­ing point of our jour­ney. From the­re we took a detour via Mony­wa to Bagan and then to Inle Lake and of cour­se the bal­loon fes­ti­val. From the­re the dome­stic air­line takes us to Nga­pa­li on the beach and final­ly to the sun­ken city Mrauk U, whe­re we had very spe­cial encoun­ter thanks to our gre­at gui­de Myint Zaw. From the­re we take the pla­ne back to the capi­tal Yangon.

Here are the stages of our journey in detail:

Day 1: Flight from Frank­furt via Bang­kok to Mandalay.

Day 2–3: Explo­ra­ti­on of Man­da­lay, with Roy­al Palace, UBein Bridge and beau­tiful pagodas.

Day 4: Detour via Mony­wa to Bagan. Here you can see a beau­tiful pago­da and the gre­at stan­ding Bud­dha. The detour via Mony­wa we made more or less by chan­ce with our taxi driver.

Day 5–6: Bagan, temp­le tour and un-Euro­pean e‑bikes. We con­tin­ued our jour­ney to Lake Inle by public bus. Prac­ti­cal­ly we got a ticket direct­ly at the sou­ve­nir stand oppo­si­te our hotel.

Day 7–9: Inle Lake: Fairy­ta­le boat trip over Inle Lake, bike tour to the winery and high­light bal­loon fes­ti­val in Taung­gyi. To get the­re we orga­ni­zed a taxi from the hotel. It cost a lot of money, but the advan­ta­ge over the public shut­tle is that it waits for you and takes you back to the hotel.

Day 10–12: Relax on the beach, snor­ke­ling and boat trip to the White Island.

Days 13–14: Mrauk U, temp­le visit and Chin vil­la­ges. Sin­ce Mrauk U alo­ne is quite dif­fi­cult to reach, I hired a gui­de from Ger­ma­ny who real­ly gave ever­y­thing to give us a few won­derful days. Here you can find Myint.

Days 15–17: Street Food in Yangon and Cir­cu­lar Train around the city.

Day 18: Return flight via Bang­kok to Frankfurt

How do I get from A to B and where do I book my flights?

In Myan­mar you can tra­vel rela­tively easi­ly by public trans­port. Most hos­tels or hotels can arran­ge shut­tle bus tickets for you. Alter­na­tively just ask a taxi dri­ver, someone cer­tain­ly has a cou­sin who has a neigh­bour who in turn knows someone who likes to dri­ve you from one place to another.

We actual­ly boo­ked our detour via Mony­wa to Bagan with our taxi dri­ver and was total­ly spon­ta­neous. Click here for the Mony­wa tra­vel report.

From Bagan to Inle Lake we have boo­ked a shut­tle bus. Direct­ly in front of our hotel the­re was a sou­ve­nir stand, which also sold excur­si­ons and bus tickets. The mini­bus was air-con­di­tio­ned and brought us safe­ly to our destination.

For the tour to Mrauk U I have alre­a­dy orga­ni­zed a gui­de from home. Here I found some­thing again in the Tri­p­ad­vi­sor Forum and got seve­ral offers. In the end, we deci­ded on the ser­vices of Myint, who real­ly orga­ni­zed ever­y­thing top and show­ed us the unvar­nis­hed Myan­mar. From the air­port trans­fer to the visit of the Chin vil­la­ges ever­y­thing was the­re. I was able to nego­tia­te the pri­ce in advan­ce and we paid on site. Here you can find Myint’s cont­act details via face­book and here you can find the tra­vel reports about Mrauk U.

Sin­ce Mrauk U is very remo­te, it is best to fly to Sitt­we and eit­her orga­ni­ze a dri­ver in advan­ce or take the speed­boat to Mrauk U. As the air­port is real­ly very small, the pro­ba­bi­li­ty that you will find a dri­ver right after your arri­val is rather low. The rou­te takes you about 5 hours by car. When we were the­re, the­re was no paved road. It won’t take you quite as long on the speed­boat. Howe­ver, you should bring warm clo­thes for the first class, becau­se in Myan­mar air con­di­tio­ning means ‑12 degrees.

We boo­ked the flights with the dome­stic air­line Air KBZ. This can be done online direct­ly via the web­site. It was uncom­pli­ca­ted and also here we always arri­ved in one pie­ce. You can pay with cre­dit card. The best way to reach Lake Inle is via Heho Air­port. From here you can also reach other desti­na­ti­ons, such as Thand­we (here we spent some days on the beach, at Nga­pa­li Beach) or Sitt­we (from whe­re you can visit Mrauk U).

Here you can find our complete itinerary

Click here for the first tra­vel report