Bagan

From Yangon we headed to see the ancient temples, monasteries and pagodas of Bagan. I'm sure the kids were happy that out of the 10,000 that used to be there in this 40 square mile area, only ~2000 remain as in our 3 days there we hit what seemed to be a high percentage.  Bagan and the e-bike were Jeff and Bella's favorite part of the adventure, and likely mine too as the temples were fabulous - on par with Angkor Watt and much less explored.  Off the 1000+ pics I took, I think most were in Bagan!  Fortunately my family is well trained to 'smile' quick so photo taking doesn't last that long.

Back of the bus on the VIP 2+ 1 - what you can't tell from this photo is that these headrests were not washed between the summer season and winter and smell like sweat!

Paparazzi - they even took my picture with fabulous filters that I looked like I was 20 so didn't mind at all!  

the first day, we hired a taxi to take us around so we could figure out where everything was 

not many adventure points won at lunch....  

typical kitchen - outdoor

We bought two treasures in the Bagan market - a wedding food basket and temple basket  - Jeff did the bargaining

We walked through a village with 160 homes and 600 people living there.  These houses just got electricity within the past 5 years.  

This lady is putting thanaka paste on Bella.  It's made from ground bark and is all over the ladies faces to prevent acne and promote smooth skin.

Trying to capture the perfect sunrise with the timer on our camera.  We met a French lady who offered to take our photo and used the more manual settings proving I still have a lot to learn on my DSLR.  

Festival for little boys prior to their first hair cut, or so we gathered through broken translation.  These boys had makeup and dresses, I hadn't realized they weren't girls until our girls pointed it out.  

Bella posing with the band following the procession.  There was a drummer and about 10 huge speakers on the back of a truck.  

Morgan got a henna tattoo.  A  lot of the little boys were getting them too.  It didn't last past the afternoon swim.  

Jeff checking in at a wifi spot that we won our Fantasy Football final game. 

An evening festival, this time with dressed up boys and girls.  

In 2018 the government prohibited climbing on temples, except for a few locations and this is one. I guess in retrospect I'm glad we couldn't climb as that would have added an extra dimension of sore and tired legs to the trip!