8-Day Myanmar Nature and Heritage Tour with Kalaw Trek and Inle Lake

• Your Myanmar tour guide will pick you up from your hotel.

• Visit Sule Pagoda and downtown Yangon, which is ideal for a walking tour, and continue to the Strand Hotel, the first hotel in Myanmar.

• See Botahtaung Pagoda.

• Proceed to see the Chaukhtatgyi Reclining Buddha.

• Late in the afternoon, proceed to Kyauktawgyi Pagoda, considered one of the most beautiful pagodas in Myanmar.

• Head towards Kaba Aye Pagoda and then explore Scott Market, a shopping paradise for tourists.

• Step inside Chinatown to see Platform Market.

• Make a photo stop at Karaweik Hall Royal Floating Barge.

• See Shwedagon Pagoda with its glittering gold stupa. At the pagoda, observe local pilgrims and monks offering their prayers and enjoy the amazing sunset view at Shwedagon Pagoda.

Overnight at the hotel.

Accommodation: Hotel

Meals included: Breakfast

• Around 7 am, drive to the jetty with your Myanmar tour guide.

• Take a local ferry across the river to Dala. Once across, ride a local taxi for about 1 hour to Twante. The road is bumpy yet very interesting and provides a glimpse of life on and along the famous Twante Canal. A scenic landscape of vast paddy fields and small pagodas rising from the hillocks contrasts with Yangon and its noisy streets.

• Visit the following sites:

  • Shwesandaw Pagoda

  • Sandawlay Pagoda (Ancient Pagoda)

  • Myanmar Ceramic Museum (small museum)

  • Weaving textile factory at Shan Su village

  • See the ancient moat and city wall of Twante

• Have lunch at a local restaurant.

• Explore Twante Market and the pottery-making site of the village, where earthenware is produced, and observe this very traditional craft. It is fantastic to see potters using giant kilns and making pottery in the conventional way.

• Hire a boat to cruise along the Twante Canal for about 45 minutes.

• Sip a cup of tea at a local tea shop.

• In the evening, around 04:30 pm, hop in a taxi to return to Dala.

• Transfer to the bus station and spend the night on a bus ride to Bagan.

• In the morning, visit a selection of the most important monuments, such as Shwezigon Pagoda, the first and most important architectural pagoda.

• Proceed to Ananda Temple, a masterpiece of 11th-century architecture. Most of the artifacts are still original and preserved in the temple, and Myinkabar Gubyauk Gyi is the best mural painting temple in Bagan.

• See several other monuments.

• Then enjoy the sunset at one of the monuments.

Overnight at the hotel.

Accommodation: Hotel

Meals included: Breakfast

• Transfer to Kalaw by bus. Along the way, you can see crop farms, natural beauty, and panoramic views. The journey will take the whole day.

• Your Indonesian guide will pick you up from the bus station and drop you off at a hotel.

Overnight in Kalaw.

Accommodation: Hotel in Kalaw

Meals included: Breakfast

• After breakfast, begin the trek with beautiful views of rice terraces in the valley surrounded by pine forest. Stroll through the pine forest on the way to a Pa-O village.

• Along the way, meet local people working hard in the garlic fields and during the rice harvest. See a fantastic view of the highest mountain in the area, with several villages at the bottom.

• Hike to Pattu Village, passing through thick pine forest with great views, and visit a forest monastery.

• Learn about local life, culture, traditions, families, home businesses, and monuments.

Overnight in the village.

Meals included: Breakfast

• Start the trek from Pattu Village and reach Tongle Village in the morning. Along the way, meet local people working hard in the fields of garlic and rice. See the fantastic view of the highest mountain in the area, with several villages at the bottom. Learn about their lives, culture, traditions, home businesses, and monuments.

• Transfer to Nyaung Shwe (Inle Lake).

Accommodation: Hotel in Inle

Meals included: Breakfast

• Transfer to Bagan airport and then catch a domestic flight to Inle Lake.

• The guide will pick you up from the airport. Then visit Shwe Yaunghwe Kyaung Monastery and Kan Gyi Kyaung Monastery in Myaung Shwe.

• Drive through pine-clad hills to Taunggyi, about 1 hour and 31 km away, the capital of southern Shan State and a former British hill station.

• Continue for approximately 2 hours from Taunggyi to the countryside inhabited by the Pa-O people. Here lie the 'lost' ruins of Kakku, a pagoda encircled by dozens of small stupas. Little is known about the origins of this unusual place - the Pa-O believe that the original pagoda dates back some 2,000 years.

• Wander through the stupas, decorated with fine stucco work and Buddha images - some in good repair, others not.

• Visit a Pa-O village and a large monastery on the way back to Taunggyi.

• Continue from here to Nyaung Shwe, where you board your boat and transfer to a hotel.

Overnight at the hotel.

Accommodation: Hotel

Meals included: Breakfast

• Arrive in the morning at Yangon domestic airport. Then transfer to Yangon International Airport for your departure.