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Leaving Yangon you will be taken to Bago, former capital of the Mon Empire of Hanthawaddy and home to the Shwemawdaw or ‘Golden God’ Pagoda, the tallest in the country.
Your first steps south are towards Kyaikthiyo, or Golden Rock, followed by Hpa-An in Karen State, a flat, verdant landscape broken by great clefts of mountain sparkling with stupas. Along the Thanlwin River you will travel to Mawlamyine, the first capital of British Burma and once dubbed ‘Little London’. It was here on the steps of ‘the old Moulmein Pagoda’ that Rudyard Kipling was inspired to write his poem Road to Mandalay.
From Mawlamyine you will make a day trip to the Western Terminus of the Burma Death Railway and the Thanbyuzayat Cemetery which commemorates those who died constructing it.
From Kandawgyi Park watch sunset fall over Shwedagon Pagoda before visiting the ‘shimmering wonder’ itself.
Take the Yangon Circle Train and jump off at Insein for lunch. Pass by the similarly-named, infamous, British-built jail.
Visit the Htaukkyan Commonwealth war memorial on your way to the ancient Mon capital of Bago. Drive on to reach the Kyaikhtiyo Golden Rock for sunset.
Travel to Hpa-An, capital of Kayin State. Here you can explore mammoth limestone caves and at sunset the energetic can climb to the monastery atop Mt Zwekabin for striking views over the fissured Kayin landscape.
From the capital of the Kayin to the capital of the Mon; you will be taken by boat down the Thanlwin River to the first capital of British Burma, formerly nicknamed ‘Little London’.
Boris le Montagner; Ko Bo Gyi
Visit the Western Terminus of the Burma Death Railway and the Thanbyuzayat War Cemetery, where many of those who died constructing the railway now rest. In the evening you will be taken to the ‘old Moulmein Pagoda’ from Kipling’s Road to Mandalay.
Visit Bilu Kyun or ‘Ogre Island’ to see the variety of cottage industries that are in operation there. Return to Mawlamyine for a colonial walking tour of the town.
Return to Yangon via Thaton, once the centre of a Mon empire that may have stretched as far east as Cambodia.
Before your flight out of the Golden Land, you will be taken to Bogyoke Aung San Market (Scott Market). The extensive selection of stalls here will allow you to pick up any last mementos from Myanmar.
Wooden cottages and one sky dome, nestled at the foot of a limestone mountain.
Light and humorous, set in a renovated colonial building in downtown Yangon.
Recline in an ornate colonial-style mansion dating back to the 1920s.
