On the road to Mandalay...

Well actually it was on the rails to Mandalay! We were up early to catch the 6am train from Yangon to Mandalay...

I could barely manage a smile at this time of the morning!

It was just getting light but still misty when we were out of the city and into the farming area and the workers were already in the fields...

The train itself was quite the experience, we had booked a first class car which meant we got a seat to ourselves instead of a wooden bench, not quite luxury seating!

This little guy was happy we shared our oranges with him!

People settled in for the long ride with the windows open for fresh air...

It wasn't long before the first vendor arrived, it looked like she was selling something similar to Mexican tamales...

As the day got brighter we could see other workers like these labourers who were unloading this boat with buckets full of soil, the people here work very hard...

Some of the views of the landscapes as we passed...

As you can see the area is very dry as the rainy season has not started here yet and when it does the landscapes are very green.

Where there was more irrigation the fields were greener...

The beast of burden here is the water buffalo...

The people were also on the go as we passed by...

The school girls in their uniforms.

Children on the side of the tracks...

Since we passed through many towns on our 400 mile journey there were many opportunities for vendors to sell their wares...

These guys were selling fried food that looked good the first time it went by but three hours later not so good!

She was the drinks lady, happy hour started early on the train!

There were also food available through the windows...

Some of the activity as we went along...

The pictures show a simple, rural way of life as we bumped our way along and felt quite grateful that we got to see a little glimpse from our seats that day.

The day was very long as we didn't pull into Mandalay until late at night after 15 hours on the train. 

And it was a very rough ride as at times we literally bumped out of our seats! It was funny that my FitBit thought I had walked 39km since my wrist was moving up and down so much!

When we got off the train we were surrounded by the Mandalay taxi mafia who first wanted to put us in the back of a truck, no way says us, then into a taxi with no back seats, again no way! Finally a young taxi driver says he knows where our hotel is located so we go with him, he charges us twice the going rate but by this time we just wanted to lie down! Tomorrow we will explore Mandalay.

So the end to a long but interesting day!