Tapp's Travels

There may not be many bridges over the river, but those that do exist are generally mighty long.  This one had 30 spans, plus kilometre long approaches on both sides raised on stilts. Good cruising weather! First stop – Yandabo,…

Balloon flights at dawn for some and didn’t they make a noise leaving at 5 am?  We chose the day trip to Mount Popa and the adjacent temple built on top of a volcanic plug.  This is reached by steps. …

Day 9 of the cruise.  Soon after dawn, before sunrise, we passed the first signs of the mineral wealth of the country.  That is, of course, leaving aside the masses of gold adorning the temples!  Oil wells on the Eastern…

I’ve lost count of the days!  But today appears to be Thursday 31 January.  Tomorrow we are going to win on the Premium Bonds.  I say that every month, but I’ve never written it down before!  A new approach! So,…

60% of the population of Myanmar has no mains electricity. In the country we still see satellite dishes everywhere – they depend on solar panels for their TV’s and phone chargers. And they all have phones!  A few years ago…

Yesterday, after leaving Nangatgyi village, we cruised through a section of the Irrawaddy that was being extensively dredged. After much discussion aboard ship, we decided that they weren’t actually dredging to make the channel deeper.  They weren’t capturing the sand…

This morning we woke to find that the small tree to which we had moored last night was still in place!  And we were still firmly tied to it!  The story going round says that there had originally been a…

About 10 minutes after we were all back on board we set off up the Yangon River and after a few minutes we branched off left into the Twante Canal.  This  35 km long canal was dug by the British…

Yangon is a city like no other we have visited.  There are security checks everywhere.  At the entrance to every office block and major hotel there are always several security staff manning (and womanning) metal detecting arches and bag scanners. …

Jet-lagged (as planned!) we arrived for breakfast ten minutes before closing time (not as planned)!  But everyone here is so friendly and helpful.  They just told us to take our time.  The omelette man made us omelettes, the pancake girl…