Floyd and I enjoyed a wonderful vacation in Myanmar and Vietnam over Christmas break! Scroll to the bottom for links to blog posts about other parts of the trip.
As a part of our boat tour of Inle Lake, we stopped at this weaving center, where they make cloth from lotus fiber, as well as silk and cotton.
In this video, our guide demonstrates how the fiber is extracted from lotus plants.
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| It was very interesting to see a whole room full of looms and to watch the weavers at work. |
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| Looms are more complex devices than I would have thought. |
Weaving in action. We were amazed how fast the women were!
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| The view across the water from the front walkway of the weaving center. |
I love this ingenious homemade spinning wheel! (At the end of the video, the lady is saying “hello” in Burmese.)
Want to see more memories from our trip? Click on the links below!
Floyd and I enjoyed a wonderful vacation in Myanmar and Vietnam over Christmas break! Scroll to the bottom for links to blog posts about other parts of the trip.
Here are some of our memories from a day of boating around on Myanmar’s fascinating Inle Lake.
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| Lots of people (men, women, and children) in Myanmar paint their faces with the white powdery substance the man on the right is wearing. Apparently it’s a cosmetic that functions as natural sunblock. |
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| Fishermen at dawn. We were amazed at how they were able to use their feet to both row their boats and manipulate their nets. |
This brief video shows foot-rowing fishermen in action.
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| My favorite part of the boat ride (and one of my favorite parts of the entire vacation) was seeing villages where the buildings were built right on the water. It was just amazing! |
Join us for a video tour of one of the villages on the water!
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| This house was under construction. When we went by again in the other direction a couple of hours later, most of the roof had been put on already. |
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| Most of the buildings on the water had electricity. This is how it gets to them. |
Another interesting thing we saw was these famous “floating gardens”. Crops such as tomatoes are grown right on the surface of the lake!
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| Our guide let us off the boat for a while in this little town. As you can see, every other boatful of tourists stopped there, too! |
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| It was an interesting little area. |
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| We walked through an open-air market. |
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| I wished I could try some of the local produce! |
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| These looked delicious! I especially wanted one of those samosas. |
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| No idea what these are. |
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| The lady gave us each a free sample of these. Delicious! (But we had no idea what they were.) |
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| We were told that these women were all from a particular tribe, as evidenced by their traditional head gear. |
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| More local delicacies. |
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| Heading home with goods from the market. |
A blacksmith at work in the market area by the lake. It was really interesting to watch the whole process.
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| We hiked up a long walkway for a close view of these old temples. |
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| There were a lot of them up at the top. |
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| After spending the entire day on and around Inle lake, we finally headed back as dusk fell. It was a wonderful day! |
Want to see more memories from our trip? Click on the links below!
Floyd and I enjoyed a wonderful vacation in Myanmar and Vietnam over Christmas break! Scroll to the bottom for links to blog posts about other parts of the trip.
Here are some of our memories from the town of Ngaung Shwe, where we stayed for three nights, in the beautiful Inle Lake region of Myanmar.
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| This is the guest house where we stayed. Cute, clean, and affordable, plus conveniently located right there in town, walking distance from everything. We recommend it! |
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| Horse carts were a common sight on the streets there – both as a taxi for tourists and transportation for locals. |
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| Inle Lake isn’t especially famous for its pagodas the way some parts of the country are, but still, they’re everywhere in Myanmar. |
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| The entrance to the local open-air market. I enjoyed browsing in there. |
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| The market had every kind of fresh produce you can imagine, as well as clothes, toys, souvenirs, and various other items. |
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| Prices in the market are all negotiable. |
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| This pottery was being displayed for sale at the side of the main road. |
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| There are lots of great restaurants (with English menus, most featuring Western and other international cuisine) in Ngaung Shwe. When I ordered a chocolate cashew pancake for breakfast in one of them, I’m not sure what I was expecting, but it wasn’t this. However, it was delicious! |
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| We saw this sign by the main road and decided to see what traditional Myanmar puppetry was like. It didn’t cost much, and it was a very interesting cultural experience. |
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| One puppeteer handled all the marionettes, one dancing in each separate song. Afterward he came out and talked to the audience (a small group, there were only about ten of us) about the traditional craft of making and performing with the marionettes. He makes all his own and has some for sale in his little theater. Apparently it is a dying art in Myanmar, as the younger generation is no longer very interested in such things. |
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| Floyd and I rented bikes from our guest house and enjoyed a scenic ride around the area. Ngaung Shwe is a farming community, and once we got outside the little town, everything was quaint and rural. I was fascinated at the glimpses of these traditional homes. As you can see, they stood on poles with walls woven from palm fronds or something similar. |
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| We ended up riding the bikes up a hill to a nearby winery, from which there was a beautiful view of the surrounding countryside. |
We spent the next day on a boat on Lake Inle. Stay tuned for my next blog post – those are still probably my favorite memories from the whole trip!
Want to see more memories from our trip? Click on the links below!
