Such sincere smile, we had to buy some flowers from this lady. Life's hard on the rowing boats when you have to paddle your wares under the hot sun.

As the sun sets, the skies changed its appearance, undisturbed and embracing. 

Isn't this gorgeous?
 The lake's reflections water painted.

The colorful boats we rode as the sun set we headed into our gorgeous luxurious villa for the night.

Resorts "floating" on the waters and cordoned off.

Floating restaurants...

1. Indein village
Finally after an hour's boat ride, we reached another famous attraction of Inle, west of Ywama village. Indein in Burmese means shallow lake and is famous for its collection of ancient ruined pagodas- Shwe Indein Pagoda.

Little tinkles sold with a variety of shops lining up the market. From pearly shell carvings....

....to marble utensils

Of course there are local Buddha sculptures.

The locals have very interesting expressions and features which were made great portraits.

 One thing special was the water painting sketch by the locals, which was simply amazing. The price was jacked up for the tourists and we bought ours from other road side locations.

 How alive is that? Such fine workmanship.

These were some of the painting works on sales and they do not come in cheap, especially colored ones.

Some sights we saw were heart wrenching.  For example this lady who had to lay her goods for sales on the hard-baked ground, under the BLAZING HOT sun.. My guess was these locals could not afford 'rent' for a proper shelter in the market.  I stood observing for 10 minutes and fortunately there were locals patronizing this lady, for which I was glad.
I contemplated buying something from her but... I am not sure what would I do with the vegetables?
( Not too sure if those were veggies)

Anyway, let's move on to the 'food' side of the market.

Met this really sweet grandma with her baby grandchild. Was super hesitant if I could take their pictures, so we approached them and gestured with hand signs. Nevertheless, the locals were really sweet and allowed us. So happy. I wish we could have given them Polaroid copies but I don't have those cameras. :(

 And... another very lovely lady with her cute cute baby. Very thankful to them for letting us shoot their portraits. Burmese are kind and friendly by nature, hence just ask ( or rather hand sign to them if they don't understand English) and more often than not they will allow you to photograph.

Need a nap? Who cares about business anyway? :)

This's the common communal space where we noticed they would just sit around..

Breakfast anyone? 

We met the locals having some very interesting morning cuisines.

These were tofu, shredded.

From the end of the market and onto the wooden bridge connects toward the Pagoda

Climbing along the covered stairway from Nyaung Oak will bring you to these ruined ancient pagodas of Shwe Indein Paya constructed in 17th and 18th century. This marks the start of over thousand steps up to the main shrine.

 The ruined pagodas and the surrounding beautiful landscape area from the hilltop, while ascending.

Souvenir shops lined the walkway and stairs up.

Capturing this pair of mother and son.

After thousand of flights up, we reached the pagoda. 

Like every other shrines, ladies have to be in long pants/skirts, else wrapped up in longyi if you don't have one. Men have to be in long pants. 

There are hundereds of ruined pagodas in the premises leading up to Shwe Indein Pagoda. 

The pagodas near the shrine was amazingly beautiful, covered in gold or bronze color.

And so we headed to another location for lunch...

The dining place was so scenic it looks like a blooming painting.

 It was akin as if we were in Holland.

Tomato as big as a lemon.

3. Meet Long-Necked Ladies

We met the ladies from Kayan, known as the Kayan Lahwi who had on brass neck coils. It was really not part of the itinerary but we were in luck to have been there to witness these indigenous group in Inle. They were there obviously there due to tourism demands however we very glad to see these pretty ladies up close.
 Though I totally do not agree on this tradition of Kayan, I admire these young ladies' spirits and courage.

Showing a demo on traditional weaving. 

The brass coils were unbearably heavy. It must be real tough for these girls, having to wear them for a lifetime.

Though we did not buy anything and giving tips wasn't compulsory, I did give quite a token to each of them personally. Similarly, if you were to patronize any "tourist" attractions, please give them generously, in USD of course.
I think it's better to benefit them directly instead of purchasing goods which they might not stand to gain anything. 

Alright, I am ending this long winding post!
Thanks for reading, or scrolling. I hope you enjoyed the photos and gained to understand more about Inle Lake. Till next time!