Middle-aged flash packers

We made the flight to Kalaw without any mishaps. We were feeling a lot better by then although Steve said I looked very grey.

Kalaw is a little hill town in the Shan state of Myanmar. It was popular with the Brits in colonial times as an escape from the heat of the cities. For tourists, it’s the starting point of the trek to Inle Lake.

The drive from the airport to Kalaw was pretty and green although there had been a lot of forest cut down to make way for agriculture.

Our hotel, the Mya Yar Pin, is up a hill just outside the centre. It’s very comfortable with great views and cheap as chips.

Despite having felt like death warmed up only last night, Steve and I joined Jan and Nik for a mosey round town. The human body is really quite amazing in its recovery abilities.

After booking our trek ( we decided to do the 2 day trek rather than the three day as the weather isn’t looking great) the next priority was to find somewhere that was going to be showing the rugby World Cup final. (England v South Africa for all you rugby heathens out there.) Easier said than done. Most people hadn’t even heard of rugby. Luckily the lady from the trekking company pointed us in the right direction and we found a hole in the wall cafe that had the required sports channel and were happy for us to watch it.

What a strange place. No beer, only tea or coffee. No hard sell, the owner would have been happy for us to have nothing and still watch it. I wasn’t sure about the miniature tables and chairs. I think the local kindergarten must have been selling off their furniture. Steve and Nik looked like they were from the Land of the Giants. Even I found the chairs a bit on the small side.

The game itself was truly depressing. A few other passing Brits joined us and shared the misery of a terrible game.

Rather than hike back up the hill to our hotel and go back out again later for dinner, we decided to go for some early beers and food. We went to a restaurant that had been recommended on a blog I read so we made our way there. At the restaurant, a person talked to us about the political situation there and how the military still run everything. Tourism is very important to the ordinary people of Myanmar but not to the military. I found that quite depressing as on a whim, tourism could be shut down and local peoples’ livelihoods would just disappear. Their view on the Rohinga was interesting but not very reassuring.

While we were at the restaurant we bumped into our hotel manager who was having a meal with his wife. He gave us his phone number so we could ring him for a lift home if we needed one. People are so helpful and kind here it really is quite humbling.

Tomorrow we are aiming to do a local half day walk up to a viewpoint aptly called “the viewpoint”. Glad to be back in the saddle.