Myanmar

Tuesday 28th June 2016 – Drew got off the bus around 4am at Hpa-an. We were now the only passengers on the entire coach. Around 5am we stopped for breakfast where while waiting for the loos we spotted some rats shuttling between the bins. Suddenly a monstrous black rat emerged from the shadows, looked at us fearlessly with his glassy black eyes and then trotted off to the bin area. Shortly after we started off again we reached a big queue of traffic on the mountain road. After a couple of hours things started moving and we saw the cause – a truck that had somehow come off the road and gone into the side of the mountain. Further on we passed a rock slide with diggers still clearing the debris from the road – one of the hazards of mountain roads in the rainy season. Nevertheless we arrived at the border about 2 hours ahead of schedule. After crossing the border and refuelling on coffee and noodles we decided we probably had time to try to reach Chiang Mai that day. We took a shared taxi from the border to Mae Sot bus station where we boarded a minibus to Tak. We reached Tak just in time to hop onto a coach to Chiang Mai and arrived about an hour before dark. On the way we met a lovely Australian chap called Chris who runs schools for orphans in Myanmar. He told us all about his work in Myanmar over the past fourteen years – it was really fascinating to hear about his experiences and insights into the country. Chris had recommended a place to stay and taking his advice we were soon entrenched in a clean, comfortable room. Tired from our long journey we slept until morning.

Wednesday 29th June 2016 – Having been deprived of chocolate for almost a month Alysa was craving Magnum ice creams so I was ejected from the room around dawn to find a 7-11 and acquire some. We caught up on the news about the Brexit – wow.

Thursday 30th June 2016 – Alysa is now consuming Magnums at a worrying rate. We spent the day blogging and relaxing by the pool. In the evening we managed to catch up a bit on Euro 2016 where they were showing repeats of the last sixteen matches.

Friday 1st July 2016 – We spent the day planning the next steps of our trip. The first cheap flights to New Zealand were at the end of July which left us four weeks to play with in south-east Asia. We looked at spending a few days in Hong Kong and Macau but it looked just a bit too expensive so instead we opted to stay in Northern Thailand and then visit Cambodia for a few days. Crossing the Pacific is an interesting problem. It looks like a good option might be to fly from New Zealand to Hawaii; we can then use our Delta vouchers to get from Hawaii to Los Angeles and then either fly or drive to Atlanta (we both like the idea of doing a road trip across America). In the afternoon we took a stroll round the centre of town; it’s amazing how many Westerners there are here. In the evening we enjoyed a lovely candlelit meal at a nice restaurant and talked about the amazing time we were having. We set our alarm for 2am to watch Wales vs Belgium but it didn’t wake us and we slept right through till morning.