Burma

Way back in 1989 we traveled to Burma on restricted VISA with only 10 people per group.  Our group below included a terrorist from Spain a basque separatist.  He said he would not kill any policemen but would “blow stuff up”  He is there smoking the cigar

Our VISA’a were acquired in Bangkok.  We took Burma air (a little dicy) and landed in Rangoon and stayed at the Strand Hotel.  The black market on currency profits was about 1000% so I made a boat load of money and treated all the guests to Champaign and dinner and bought many artifacts and tipped big time – I did get into some trouble form dealing on the “black market” .  Ok the hotel is fabulous and the town is incredible.  We visited Shwedagon pagoda below (not my photo) as mine are very old

and many other temples

 

We took an overnight train (did not have a sleeper car)  from Rangoon to Mandalay (about 400 miles) and it was great as we got to meet some locals.  Unfortunately the military secret service tried to keep us separate – however I sneaked back and tlked to some of the locals before being asked to come back to “our car” .  In Mandalay we saw great museums, met some great people

Buddhist monks below

We spent a couple of days before heading out to Pagan and that place is awesome and a few photos below.

Ok we took a boat ride on the Irrawaddy and then headed home.  Be careful the police got me for trading currency


Shwedagon pagoda below very nice and the trains are great = never ever  drive

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