Myanmar Motorcycle Journey 15 - The Final Episode!

My bag, boy.

It's taken three weeks, but I am finally finishing up the chronicle of a two week vacation I took over the holidays. 2050 kilometers ( 1250 miles), About 70 hours of driving and 20 fuel stops. It was time to bring the motorbike to near Yangon. I was off to Dala, a town across the Yangon River from Yangon itself. One of my co-workers had family there, and they'd agreed to allow me park my bike there, and I agreed to pay them a nominal rent for the space.


The problem was that I was running out of money. I still had plenty of US dollars in my bag, but on the morning of the last day, I had 7000 Kyats in my wallet ($5). Enough for food and gas, but what about the rent I'd promised?

Surely, somewhere along the 121 kilometers of Pantanaw to Dala, there would be a bank or money changer where I could pick up some Kyats. Barring, that, I could use my ATM card to draw from my Thai bank account.


My first hope was the Pantanaw itself. Nope. Although there was a bank in town, they weren't licensed to exchange currency. Next was the larger town of Nyaungdon. I found a bank there, but no one spoke English in it, so I had to rely on my carefully memorized Myanmar phrase “do you exchange money?”. I was told by the receptionist to have a seat and so I felt I had found the place. I sat there for 45 minutes until they found the one guy who knew a few sentences of my language to explain that no, they do not exchange currency. I'd have to go to Yangon for that.

The Irrawaddy River after it's broken off into multiple streams in one of the largest deltas in the world.

I need to give Nyaungdon another chance. It looks like an interesting town and it's an easy motorbike ride away from Yangon. Maybe next weekend.


See, it's convenient that I've finished up the Myanmar Motorcycle Journey series tonight as it is also my first day of my next vacation! As I've said before, that's one of the things I like most about working here: copious amounts of time off. I don't have to work for another 8 days.


Tomorrow, I've got an early flight for Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. It's time for another border crossing so as to renew my work visa here. I'll only be in KL for 3 days; as I'd spent a lot on the motorcycle journey, and so I don't need another expensive vacation this close to the last one. Now, in April, I get a month off, and I'm not sure what I'm going to do for that. 

Enjoy the video. The last of the ukulele themed vids.