{"id":1361,"date":"2019-02-20T10:49:32","date_gmt":"2019-02-20T10:49:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/?p=1361"},"modified":"2026-08-20T08:28:48","modified_gmt":"2026-08-20T08:28:48","slug":"myanmar-oz-17","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/?p=1361","title":{"rendered":"MYANMAR & OZ. 17"},"content":{"rendered":"

En route for Heho airport, we passed the gangs of workers still hacking cliffs to bits by hand and others still making the road, also by hand!\u00a0 We stopped briefly at a paper and umbrella “manufacturing” workshop.<\/p>\n

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Then we arrived at Hehohehoheho airport!\u00a0 OMG. Travelling in Myanmar has it’s moments.\u00a0 We will have five hours in Yangon before our flight onward to Singapore.\u00a0 Plenty of time.\u00a0 Find our bags.\u00a0 Get them into the international terminal.\u00a0 Two hours check-in.\u00a0 Good organisation.\u00a0 Well done Trailfinders and APT!\u00a0 There are 8 of the 16 on this part of the trip going on to Singapore.<\/p>\n

… except our plane is in Bagan with flat tyres.\u00a0 This means a three hour delay at the very un-exciting Heho airport. Oh well, 8 of us are in the same boat – so to speak.\u00a0 We get a free lunch courtesy of Yadanarpon Airlines – or is it Myanmar National Airlines?\u00a0 No it’s Air KBZ … BUT, do we want it anyway?\u00a0 We have no idea which street vendor is being requisitioned to cook it for us.\u00a0 My guess is that we will all be passing on this gastronomic experience.<\/p>\n

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Actually, I have to say it was surprisingly good! Anyway, then it was everyone onto the tarmac to find their bags!!<\/p>\n

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“That’s mine”, “No it’s mine”.\u00a0 “No you’re both wrong, it’s mine!”\u00a0 (Actually, it was ours!)<\/p>\n

Apparently, our plane will arrive at 2pm.\u00a0 But, of course it didn’t.\u00a0 The plane arriving at that time was going to Lashio.\u00a0 Some place in the sticks north-east of Mandalay.\u00a0 So Yan, being the good guide and organiser that he is, commandeered it!\u00a0 I’ve never seen anything like that before.\u00a0 All the passengers on the plane who thought they were just one hop away from home were kindly requested to get orf!\u00a0 Get orf and wait for the plane from Bagan – the one with the dodgy tyres!\u00a0 I have to say they didn’t look overjoyed at the prospect of an overnight stop at Heho!\u00a0 Of course that would only happen if Air KBZ really couldn’t mend the punctures!<\/p>\n

Coincidentally, the airline’s motto is “Flying Beyond Expectations!”\u00a0 I guess that just about covers it!\u00a0 The “electronic” information board had to be seen to be believed.\u00a0 Here HE is!<\/p>\n

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“The flight leaving for London is now ready for boarding at gate 2.”\u00a0 They only have two gates.\u00a0 Both unlocked, unguarded and, in the case of gate 1, unused.\u00a0 Other important announcements were made on bits of paper taped to the windows – Like this one…<\/p>\n

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Bear in mind we are travelling on 10 February!!<\/p>\n

Anyway, avoiding all eye contact with a bunch of disgruntled Lashionians, we boarded our plane.\u00a0 No-one had the correct board in pass.\u00a0 Glenda had one belonging to some random bloke.\u00a0 No-one was allocated seats next to their partners.\u00a0 One stewardess was trying to get people into their allocated seats.\u00a0 Another was saying just sit anywhere.\u00a0 It was comical in a time-very-sensitive sort of way.\u00a0 Lots of us were due to miss onward connections from Yangon.<\/p>\n

We eventually got airborne, with the captain steering round a road block of angry previous occupants of OUR plane.\u00a0 Fifteen minutes into the flight we were served the meal that the LashIo passengers had been eagerly anticipating.\u00a0 So, not only had we nicked their plane, but we were eating their afternoon tea as well!<\/p>\n

Rumour had got out that a plane had been hijacked at Heho.\u00a0 A pair of previously good friends had already announced they would not be paying the ransom.\u00a0 Thank you Barry and Sybil!\u00a0 Clearly they hadn’t got the message that it was us in charge of the errant plane.\u00a0 That we had not been on the receiving end!<\/p>\n

Apart from that (and two missing shuttle buses in Yangon plus a local woman who refused to get out of our private shuttle), the trip to Singapore was pretty uneventful really.\u00a0 Everyday stuff!\u00a0 Just stay cool!!<\/p>\n

So that’s the end of the Myanmar trip which happened 13 days ago!\u00a0 The Australian sector will be reported in less detail…<\/p>\n

Now…<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

A wealthy American guy walks up to a pretty girl in a bar and says “Would you sleep with me tonight for a million bucks?” “I guess so” she says.\u00a0 Would you do it for one dollar?”\u00a0 “What sort of a girl do you think I am?”\u00a0 “We’ve already established what sort of girl you are!\u00a0 Now we are just haggling about the price!”<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

En route for Heho airport, we passed the gangs of workers still hacking cliffs to bits by hand and others still making the road, also by hand!\u00a0 We stopped briefly at a paper and umbrella “manufacturing” workshop. Then we arrived… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1361","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-myanmar-2019"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1361","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1361"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1361\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8147,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1361\/revisions\/8147"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1361"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1361"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1361"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}