hauteboy

When I first heard about the Myanmar fare sale in early May, I immediately jumped at the chance. I had visited Myanmar on a day trip about 8 years ago when my wife and I were visiting Thailand. At the time it was difficult to get a visa for Myanmar but it was possible to do a day trip across the border without requiring a visa. Myanmar has been opening up the past few years and tourist numbers have quadrupled. Airlines have been adding or increasing service to Yangon, ANA, Korean and Singapore all started flights this year. I wanted to visit before it became overrun with tourists like Angkor Wat. There is a well established gringo trail from Yangon to Bagan, Mandalay and Inle Lake. I definitely wanted to at least see the temples of Bagan. A few weeks before I left on my trip I heard that President Obama was planning on visiting Myanmar while I was there.

I booked the routing RGN-BKK-NRT-JFK-SCL in J on TG/JL/LA with a long layovers in Bangkok and JFK. When visiting Chile I wanted to go up to Bolivia and do the trip to the Salar de Uyuni. I would then use miles to get back to the USA. When I booked the RGN fare I was about to leave on a trip to Central Asia.. so booked something quickly without checking connecting flight schedules. After I returned from my Central Asia trip I discovered there wasn't a connecting SCL-LPB flight the day I arrived.. meaning I'd have to spend an extra day getting up to the Salar and I would already be short on vacation days. I then debated postponing that portion of the trip and changing the ticket to have a stopover in JFK.

Getting to Myanmar was also an issue. At first I planned to use my UA miles, 60k in biz one-way USA-RGN is a good deal. I ended up booking a perfect routing, AUS-IAH-DOH-RGN on UA/QR, however the reservation sat for a few weeks without getting ticketed. The QR segments eventually dropped out of my itinerary and were no longer available! Looking at plan B, there was a good one-way fare from the US to South Korea, including Jeju island which I wanted to visit. I ended up booking a AUS-SFO-ICN/GMP-CJU economy flight on United/Asiana, then using miles CJU-GMP/ICN-BKK-RGN in business class. Jeju island is a volcanic island off the southern coast of South Korea. It was host to some of the games during the World Cup. It's also been selected as one of the New 7 Wonders of Nature. It was recently added to the Traveler's Century Club listing of 'countries'.

Austin recently built a Formula 1 race track and I had bought tickets for the race in November.. unfortunately I hadn't verified the dates and I realized that the race was the same weekend that I was planning on leaving for Myanmar! So I had to find some way to sell my tickets before I left.

I used the embassy in DC to get my Myanmar visa which was very easy. I sent off $20 and a couple of passport photos, 10 days later I had a new visa sticker in my passport. The Myanmar visa has the passport picture on it, I've noticed many countries starting to do this.

I had heard that finding hotel rooms during high season is next to impossible, so I went ahead and made reservations for hotels in Yangon and Bagan a few months ago. A few weeks before the trip i emailed one of my hotels and had them arrange internal flights on Yangon Airways and Air Bagan to/from Bagan. I had also just heard about Balloons over Bagan, but they were already full for all of November a month before my trip! I kept listing my F1 ticket for sale on Craigslist and other places.. I got a few bites but mostly flakes. It came down to the day before I was supposed to leave and I still hadn't sold my ticket, so I would be looking to eat the $325 price... but luckily I was able to sell the ticket literally last minute (but had to take a $125 loss...)

Here are links to my previous blogs:

Peru/Galapagos 2005: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...agos-trip.html
Mongolia/Caucasus 2005: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...-mtskheta.html

Andaman Islands (India) 2007: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...a-ixz-maa.html
Guianas (South America) 2007: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...h-guianas.html
North Korea 2007: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...oryo-trip.html

Ethiopia 2008: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...-airlines.html
Central America 2008: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...a-managua.html

St. Petersburg, Baltics and Belarus 2009: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...d-st-pete.html
Canadian Rockies 2009: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...n-rockies.html

West Africa 2010: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...ir-france.html
Guam/Palau/Micronesia 2010: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...n-pacific.html

Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Kuwait, Bangladesh 2011: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...atar-econ.html
Afghanistan, Pakistan 2011:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...ord-iah-y.html

Nigeria, Cameroon, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea 2012:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...al-guinea.html

Central Asia Stans + Balkans 2012:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...q-balkans.html


My flight itinerary was the following:Nov 15, 2012
Flight: Austin (AUS) to San Francisco (SFO), United CRJ, econ
Flight: San Francisco (SFO) to Seoul, South Korea (ICN), United 747, econ
Nov 16, 2012
Flight: Seoul, South Korea (GMP) to Jeju, South Korea (CJU), Asiana, econ
Hotel: Yeha Guesthouse City Hall, 22000 KRW
I arranged a very early pickup from Supershuttle this morning at 4AM for my 6:30 flight. The F1 race was this weekend and I imagined that the airport would be very busy. The security line was longer than usual but luckily not too bad as it was still only 5AM. I had a bit of breakfast and headed to the United lounge before going down to the gate. I suddenly panicked when I realized I had forgotten my camera charger... and the camera battery I had was nearly spent. That meant I would have to find a replacement charger or buy a new camera outright for the trip, but there was nowhere to do so at AUS. I hoped there was an electronics place in SFO or Seoul.

Boarding time came and went and the plane wasn't even at the gate yet. Finally the plane is towed to the gate and we departed 30 minutes late but not too worried as I'd had a two-hour connect in SFO. The flight was fine although on a CRJ I feel a bit cramped. The flight is uneventful and we landed northbound in SFO. From there we had to wait a few minutes for a gate to become available, another 10 minute delay. The International gates were a bit of a walk from gate 71 but luckily there was a walkway and did not have to reclear security. Better luck, I found a Best Buy kiosk that had cameras! There was a Canon I was interested in, but the kiosk said none were available! Next I headed to the United Club for awhile as the departing flight was showing a 40-minute delay. I was more worried about that connection as I only had a 3h15m connection in Seoul and that involved switching airports from Incheon to Gimpo. United was unable to provide my Asiana boarding pass and Asiana's webcheckin didn't work either.

As i was walking down to the departure gate, I found another Best Buy kiosk and was able to buy the camera, ironically for the same price that I had paid for the F1 ticket. The delay kept getting longer and longer, the plane was at the gate but they had to clean and load the galleys. Finally we departed nearly 1.5 hrs late. The flight was on an old United 747 so no in-seat power or IFE. I spent the time sleeping and reading.. nearly finishing one of the two books that I had brought to last an entire week! I should have loaded some movies on my laptop for this situation.


United SFO-ICN meal


United SFO-ICN meal

We finally arrive at ICN an hour late at 5:15... at the farthest gate on the satellite terminal. It's a long walk to the terminal train which I just missed. Finally get to immigration at 5:30, so I have only 2 hrs now to make my connection at Gimpo. Immigration line is short but is moving very slowly and it is 5:45 by the time I am through. I had carried on my backpack so luckily did not have to wait on baggage. I ran through to the airport train where I found they do not accept credit cards. I wasted a few more minutes finding an ATM and getting change (the ATMs only spit out 10k won notes). I bought a one-way ticket at the kiosk for 4150 (3650+500 card deposit) only to find I had just missed the train. Luckily they run every 15 minutes for the 33 minute ride to Gimpo. So assume a minimum connection time of 1hr and preferably much more to make it between airports!

The train arrived, very clean and smooth ride for the 37kms to Gimpo airport. There are two train lines from Incheon, an express which goes nonstop to Seoul station, and the regular train which makes several stops along the way to Seoul station, including Gimpo airport. I finally arrived at Gimpo around 6:40 where I immediately manage to smash my finger badly when I tripped running up the escalator. From the station it is still a long walk on moving sidewalks to the domestic terminal. I rush to the checkin desk where they ended up putting me on a flight to Jeju departing 15 minutes later. Between Korean and Asiana there are flights to Jeju every 10-15 minutes throughout the day. There are also flights on Asiana from Incheon which would have made things much easier.. but Friday is the one day that they did not have that flight!

As it was I could have made the 7:35 flight as there was no line for security and I was through into the terminal by 7:50. Once through to the domestic terminal there was not much to do but wait. There were a few cafes where I grabbed a drink and calmed down after the mad rush. I didn't notice any OZ/*A lounges there but I didn't walk through the whole terminal. Boarding the flight was via bus. The 1hr flight was completely full even though there are frequent flights.

Asiana GMP-CJU

I had checked my bag for the Asiana flight and when we landed the bags were out on the belt super quickly. I was in a bit of a hurry to get to my hotel, it claimed the desk closed at 10PM and it was already after 9PM. I was really worried when I came out to the taxi line and there were 50+ people there waiting ahead of me! It took nearly 30 minutes to get a cab. It was drizzling and chilly. I arrived at the guesthouse at 9;55... only to find out that they close at 11PM. So a big relief there. The YEHA guesthouse was very nice and clean. Guests had to take their shoes off in the reception area. I'd reserved a dorm room but only the top bunk was available. I'm not such a spring chicken anymore and probably should have sprung for a single room. Getting up in the bunk was a bit of an effort.

YEHA guesthouse

It was too late to eat by this point, I wandered around the streets for awhile but all the restaurants were already closed. I ended up eating a big bowl of ramen from the guesthouse. The next morning I planned to do a tour of the island. Originally I hoped to rent a car and drive around, they require an International Drivers License which I had brought along. But I was pretty exhausted from the travel and started looking into getting a taxi to take me around for the day. Pretty expensive at 150,000 won ($130) but I didn't have much else choice. The guesthouse actually ran a daily bus tour that sounded interesting but would get back into town too late to make my flight the next evening.