in Gangaw, I was ready from some
real mountain roads. Long, straight, smooth roads with gorgeous scenery around
have their place. They can be enjoyable. But what every motorcycle tourist
likes are windy roads – roads where you lean into your turn and accelerate out
of it. Not to mention that the topographical attractions of mountains are nicer
to look at.
After a ways of brown, scrubby hills, the road definitely
turned up an incline. Finally heading into Chin State. Chin is one of the
smallest and least populous areas of the country of Myanmar. Their people are
known for being strongly Christian, excellent hunters and a bit outside of more
mainstream Burmese existence.
Hakha... that way.
I’d been there before. On my last long motorbike tour, I
visited Kampletlet an Mindat in southern Chin, but got turned back on my little
scooter by the road conditions. Not this time.
Eventually, I found myself at thousands of feet of
elevation, riding down some gorgeous roads. As I’m a bit afraid of heights,
what was somewhat disconcerting was the mile after mile of driving along roads
where on one side, there’s a wall of rock, and on the other, there’s no
guardrail and a steep drop of hundreds and hundreds of feet.
Rolling into beautiful, Hakha, I was impressed by the view
overlooking the city.Hakha may not be
around much longer in its current form.
There are plans to move the entire city
due to constant danger of landslides during the rainy season. Just a few years
ago, one third of the town was wiped away due to massive landslides. All the
roads were blocked and Hakha was cut off. It’s hard to see signs of that damage
today, but I’m no expert at spotting it.
Hakha has an “Old-West” feel to it. The buildings are all
made of wood and strung together haphazardly.
The people are nice though. I
didn’t have a meal in Hakha without at least one person sitting down next to
me, asking me to join them
Enjoy the video.
Technical note: the problem with the 4:3 video format cropped up again. This time, I figured out what caused it, so this will be the last we'll see of it. Note also there's "bonus material" at the end of the musical part. Continuing the bluegrass music theme.
As explain inthe
video, April in Myanmar is sort of equivalent to autumn in more temperate
climates. See, it hasn’t rained much in this part of country I’m in for months,
and so everything is kinda brown and lifeless. How soon all that will change in
a few weeks when the monsoon hits.
Day three had me very angry as I checked out of my hotel
room in Pale. See, I hadn’t paid up front, and paid on leaving, and so I got to
see the ledger for all the other guests who had arrived after me in this
medium-sized, small time hotel. My room wasn’t at all good. No breakfast. No
fridge. No mini-bar. No kettle. No coffee, and yet I had paid 27,000 Ks (USD$21).
As I looked at the ledger, it showed what every other guest had paid who’s
arrived after me. 22K, 18K, even down to 14K. No one else had paid even close
to 27K, even those with 2 or 3 in one room.
My hotelier couldn’t understand myanger. Of course I had to pay more. I’m a
foreigner.
Out on the road, through the dry, desolate hills of Sagaing,
I made my way to Gangaw, a town on edge of Chin State, in the valley of the Yaw
River, that’s the home to the Yaw people. According to this 2005 article, the
Yaw people are a subset of the Bamar who make up the majority of the people in
Myanmar, but they have their own dialect and have a notorious reputation.
Gangaw: Home of some high grade shirt!
Gangaw is supposedly known for its witchcraft.The people from
this area are mistrusted and feared inthe greater community because of this reputation. Some Burmese won’t
even eat food cooked by the Yaw people.
Well,you're doing it all wrong! That's not how witches ride a broom!
The Yaw are also known for their exquisite longgyi, the
traditional sarong of people arounf here. I bought one. But I think I made the
wrong choice. I bought a special one. Great for the next time I’m invited to a
formal occasion, but it’s kind of like I bought a tuxedo. Not too useful for
everyday wear.
At the longgyi shop. They don't loo like witches to me.
So, this week happens to be “bluegrass” week at my ukulele
club. I’ve been so taken by this music that I think I may make it the theme for
the entire series of “Discovering Northwest Myanmar”
One thing I was thinking about in the planning of this
motorcycle journey was not taxing myself. See, touring on a motorbike through
an exotic land like Myanmar is enjoyable thing... for the first four or five
hours. If you ride longer than that, then it’s no longer enjoyable. Then it
becomes a slough. So in the planning of this trip, which I’m still on, I made
sure not to schedule any really long grueling rides of 250 km+. I wanted to
enjoy my rides, not be burdened by them.
Another cool aspect of only scheduling 4 hours of driving
per day is that you don’t have to leave in a hurry. As I prepared to leave
Sagaing, I took my time. I took in the sunrise.
Checked out the morning market.
Got a few essentials.
Always good joo joo to donate at the roadside
The road to Pale was easy. I got there about noon. Zach from
MandalayMotorbike.com texted me to see how I was doing. Arrived in Pale, I told
him, but without plans for the rest of the afternoon. He suggested I visit the
caves at Phowintaung. Why not?
The road was rough, but completely manageable on the CRF250
(man, I gotta get one of these for my own). Turned out that the “caves” were
man-made. Buddhist devotees had carved these enclaves out of the living rock
hundreds of years ago, and they’ll be here for hundreds, if not thousands of
years into the future.
The monkeys were interesting. Monkeys are always
interesting.
Once again, I’m doing the thing I enjoy most in the world:
I’m back on a motorcycle tour!As I
write this, I’m sitting in an odd restaurant “night club” in the small Myanmar
town of Palࣰe,
Sagaing Division. I’m starting to write now, long before I expect a video will
be uploaded, because I want to recall details and feelings while they’re still
rather fresh in my mind.
This trip is going to be different in several ways. First of all,
I’m not visiting any of the major tourist destinations in the country. Apart
from Mandalay where I rented the motorbike, I’m not travelling to any cities of
any significant size. This town I’m in right now has only one guesthouse, and
prior to the trip, I wasn’t even sure they’d accept foreigners (not all
accommodations in Myanmar are licensed to do so; they must meet certain
requirements like western style toilets). I couldn’t contact them because other
than appearing on Google maps, they have no presence on the internet. Not even
a phone number!
Secondly, the regions I’ll be visiting are more remote and hard to
get to. If you’ve followed previous journeys, you might remember from the
“Epic” of February 2017 that I changed my plans and gave up on heading further
into Myanmar’s westernmost state, Chin, after a bone-jarring ride in the
initial leg. My little Chinese scooter couldn’t handle it. Well, this time,
I’ve rented a Honda CRF250, a hardy bike that can handle pretty much anything,
and this time, I’ll conquer Chin.
After Chin State, I’ll be following the Chindwin River upstream to
get as close as I can to the mysterious-sounding Nagaland.The Naga people
are well known for being little known.I
don’t want to go to Nagaland proper because there’s nowhere to go from there
except into India (can’t do that on a Myanamar motorbike) or back the way you
came. I’m not a fan of that.
When you reach a fork in an unmapped road, you need to look
for clues. For example, in this pic, the road on the loft is
more traveled.
Lastly, this journey will be different in that I’m going to be
driving on roads that only appear on some maps. Google maps won’t help me because
these roads aren’t on it. On Google
Earth, however, zooming in, you can see them on the satellite image.I just need to be careful I don’t mistake a
river for a road again.
In the initial video, I start off in Yangon, on the morning of
last day of work, drop Badger off at the cat-sitter I’ve employed and make a
mad dash to the Yangon bus station situated way out on the outskirts of
town.As traffic can turn into gridlock
at any time here, I was quite nervous that maybe I had not allotted myself enough
time. I made it with 30 minutes to spare, but in my rush I had forgotten
several key items: my map of Myanmar, the fancy motorcycle-riding jacket I’d
been given (It had pads and armor built in) and worst of all, the carefully
prepared itinerary that one of my Myanmar colleagues had made for me, well
outside her regular duties. It had hotel names, phone numbers and prices. Shit!
Map of DayOne
To top it all off, I had spent extra on my ticket for a “VIP” bus,
a first-class bus that instead of the normal, confined, four seats per aisle,
this one only was supposed to only have three. I was actually looking forward
to the nine-hour luxurious ride from Yangon to Mandalay. What I got was a
standard bus. Somehow, the booking agency had messed up my ticket. I booked it
online and so there was little I could do at that point.
Once in Mandalay, I got to meet someone I’ve known online for
years, Zach, the owner of Mandalay Motorbike and tours. Visit:
mandalaymotorbike.com!Zach has given me
tons of advice over the years on my Myanmar motorcycle journeys, and in turn,
I’ve sent him referrals whenever I can. Plus, he watches and likes my videos.
Zach has my dream job. He actually makes his living spendingweeks on the road, exploring new places,
interacting with the wonderful people here in this exotic country. We spent a
few hours swapping stories, he sharing his insights and knowledge on my
proposed route.
CRF250
Then, it was off to Sagaing.Sagaing is the capital of the province of the same name, and it’s
relatively close to Mandalay, just a 45 minute drive or so. From there, I
happened onto Sagaing Hill and its famous concentration of temples (some call
them “pagodas”, but I’ve never been fond of that word as it reminds me more of
China and Japan – the word ‘pagoda’ is nothing more than the Portuguese word
for temple). Wow! What a sight!
Lastly, up to the famous antiquities of Mingun (Min Kun). There, I
saw a lot of foreign tourists; the last I expect to see in any number for the
rest of the way. Mingun is home to the largest temple I’ve seen here outside of
Bagan. Construction began in the late 18th century, but due to historical
inconveniences like massive earthquakes and the invasion of the British, it was
never completed.
From Sagaing Hill overlooking the mighty Ayeyarwaddy River
All in all, I’m ecstatic to begin this trip. As it has its unique
aspects, there will undoubtedly be unique challenges. With this awesome machine
under me, I have little doubt I’ll overcome them as I have before.
Enjoy the first video!
Technical note: I use two cameras on these journeys now. My GoPro
mounts onto the helm and is also useful for recording people candidly without
them realizing they’re on camera. My other camera I use for buildings and
scenery and such. Anyways, the GoPro and my video software are having a hard
time communicating in regards to format. The GoPro footage shows up in a 4:3
ratio, creating a vertical “letterbox” effect.
