Kalaw, Shan State

Kalaw is a typical small town founded as a hill station by British civil servants the heat of the plains, located in Southern Shan State. Situated 1400 meters above sea level and so the weather is cool all the year round with calmed atmosphere and chili cold in winter. It makes the town feels like a high-altitude holiday resort and many of the Tudor-style houses and English gardens of colonial-era architectures. The town is surrounded by lovely hills which are a relatively easy day or overnight treks to the villages of native inhabitants such as Danu, Danaw, Palaung, Pa-O and Taung Yo tribes. On the Kalaw Market Days, you will find many vendors from nearby villages and tribes come to sell their products. The town has a significant population of Nepali Gurkhas and Indians, whose ancestors came here to build the roads and railway during the British administration.  Kalaw is known to be one of the few destinations in Myanmar that genuinely caters for backpackers rather than tour groups as well. The most attractive sights in Kalaw are Christ the King Church (historic church that dates back to the colonial era and famously had the same priest for 69 years), Hnee temple which homes to a 500-year-old, gold-lacquered bamboo Budha, the Kalaw Market with several stalls sell dried fruit and local liqueurs that in every five days swelled by traders who descend from the hill villages outside of town, Shwe Oo Min temple with natural cave which is home to dozens of gold Buddha statues, and a Mosque of sizeable Muslim population in the Kalaw area.