When you visit Yangon with kids you’ll find more than beautiful pagodas to explore, so give yourself a few days to enjoy it. Once the capital of Myanmar, and under British rule for 124 years, Yangon is a fabulous city to discover with kids na dhasots of parks and lakes to explore. Our favourite things to do in Yangon with kids include the Sule Pagoda, wandering the streets searching for colonial buildings and secret alleyways, walking around beautiful lakes and playing on exercise equipment, and visiting an abandoned lake-side theme park.

Most people will fly into or out of Yangon or both as it’s an easy way to enter Myanmar and it’s cheaper than flying through Mandalay,  with more airlines and flights times.  We did both and took the opportunity to stay a little more fancy at the Sedona Hotel Yangon while we were there as we knew we’d be budget while we travelled around.

If you’re planning to go to Bagan make sure to read our review of flying over the temples in a hot air balloon.

Before you go:

Make sure to get a VPN

You’ll need a VPN as some sites like Wikipedia are not available and it also protects your data. You can read about why you need a VPN here and get three months free using Express VPN.

Insurance

Just don’t travel without insurance. I really like Travel Card and I’m using them on our next trip. I used Cover-More for 20 years and they were fabulous with medical but I did have trouble with a robbery claim, so make sure to read the fine print.

Get a guide book

It helps to have a guide book while you’re out and about – we recommend Lonely Planet and you can get the LP Guide to Myanmar here from Book Depository (42% off and free delivery!)

Phone and wifi

I also have an unblocked phone and got a local SIM so I always had internet connection. I bought my SIM at the airport and topped up once I ran that down watching movies on the long-haul buses. I used MPT but apparently they’re all tg same quality and price.

Five dollars lasted days and days. Wifi was mostly good in Myanmar and in Yangon it was great. Hotels all have it so you will be fine with your connection.

Download the Grab App

In the larger cities you can use Grab for taxis and tuk tuks. It’s so helpful that it tells you the price before you book. Make sure to download the app and set it up before you go.

Getting around

Grab taxis are easy to book and we like them because the fare is provided when you book and you don’t have to haggle or worry about the route being taken. That said taxis are generally cheap and you can agree the price before you go.

There are no tuk tuks in Yangon but taxis are cheap.

It’s easy to make your own way around Yangon, but it’s definitely worthwhile to have a guide. This five star rated tour is bursting with all Yangon’s highlights including the Sule and Shwegadon pagodas, Kandawgyi Lake, Maha Bandula Park and its surrounding colonial buildings, the markets, China town and more.

Here are our best things to do in Yangon with kids:

Visit Sule Pagoda

This was by far our favourite pagoda. It’s smaller and more intimate than Shwedagon – Yangon’s most well-known pagoda – and we preferred it,  we felt such peaceful vibes here. We hired a guide for $10 and it was such a good decision. We learnt so much about Buddhist traditions and were able to make offerings at our birthday stations, send a boat to Buddha with donations for the pagodas upkeep, learn about the Buddhist go go jie spirits and just have a lovely few hours in the pagoda.

It’s a very calm place for kids and not very crowded. The people here love showing children what to do to make offerings and help them understand traditions. We loved it.

It’s so easy to find Sule Pagoda as it is in the centre of Yangon city – when the British created a grid transport and road system in Yangon they made Sule its centre. You can enter at the north, south, east or west entrance.

It cost 5000 kyat to enter (about $5AUD), you must leave your shoes and make sure your knees and shoulders are covered.

Shwedagon Pagoda

We also enjoyed Shwedagon, a dazzling white and gold pagoda that stretches over 100 metres tall and is adorned with jewels and bells you can hear rining in the breeze. It’s more than 2,500 years old and 100 metres tall, and is said to hold strands of Buddhas hair, making it an important pilgrimage site.

You pay 10,000 kyat (about $10 AUD) per person to enter and take a lift up to the many pagodas and temples. They’re truly beautiful and each one has its one history and special story. There are so many to visit in this complex it’s also worthwhile to have a guide, but you can also just wander around and enjoy the vibe and the many people that visit – especially at sunset when candles light up the pagodas and pilgrims join in prayer.

Colonial buildings

When the British arrived in Yangon in 1824 they built many, many colonial style buildings in the grid network from the Yangon River back. These buildings are all in varying condition since the departure of the British but mostly since 2005 when the capital of Myanmar was moved to Nay Pyi Taw. With increasing tourism many of these gorgeous old buildings were bulldozed for high rises, but thankfully the government has now banned demolition of any building older than 50 years.

The buildings along the Strand Road  like Customs House, the Rosewood Hotel, The Strand Hotel and the Ports Authority are in beautiful condition, and there are many more around the city.

When you wander the streets further back you’ll find the more decrepit buildings with peeling paint, discoloured walls and plants growing out of cracks. They’re beautiful also and home to many local people.

The Yangon Heritage Trust  is a collective of historians, architects business people and who work towards preserving the city’s history and sharing its stories with visitors and runs excellent walking tours.

You could also try this five star night walking tour that takes you through Yangon’s streets as the city comes alive at dusk, sampling local food as you explore the cities back streets and alleys.

You can read more about Yangon’s colonial buildings here at the Yangon Heritage Trust’s website. 

This two-hour locally guided colonial building walking tour from Klook is highly rated at five stars and operates daily.

High tea at the Strand Hotel

For $20 USD you can enjoy a selection of treats at the Strand. After looking at all the colonial buildings I really wanted to sit in the Strand’s tea-room and soak up the atmosphere and it was a really nice way to spend an hour or so…plus I treated myself to a glass of bubbles – almost broke the bank but it was well worth it.

Wander the backstreets and alley gardens

The streets of Yangon hold colonial treasures like the alley gardens and also show life in Yangon. Many are trade specific – you’ll find sections for electronics, for paper, and for jewellery. You’ll see daily life and inquisitive locals who greet you as you wander. It’s beautiful to pass by – maybe stop for some noodles or tea, find a coffee shop and enjoy a day just exploring the local streets.

The alley gardens from 27th – 42nd streets (around Sule Pagoda) are little patches of concrete alleys that have been brightened with greenery, murals and play things for kids to give them a play area and a sense of nature within the concrete. Emmie loved exploring them and your kids (and big kids) will too.

Magic Land

Magic Land is a abandoned fun park on the banks of the Inya Lake just across the road from the Sedona Yangon Hotel. From what I can find it was closed by the government along with a couple of other buildings for breeching regulations for building near the Lake. It now sits abandoned, next to a driving range and is easy to enter. Just follow the path along Inya Lake and take a left into the drive just past the abandoned construction. Follow it towards the driving range and to where you can see the ferris wheel. There’s a small gate around the ferris wheel but its open wide enough to get in for some pics. You’ll see abandoned trains and a whale and some cars from other park rides here too.

Play on the exercise equipment

Emmie loves all the exercise equipment around the lakes as I think most kids do. It’s lots of fun to jump on and swivel, pump your arms and swing your legs. You can find these sets everywhere. This was around Inya Lake near the Sedona.

Visit the mall for a bit of R&R

If you’re back in Yangon after traveling around Myanmar you may feel like a bit of shopping or a movie – and Yangon has a number of fancy malls to satisfy your cravings. We went to the Myanmar Plaza opposite the Sedona Yangon Hotel and bought some Sketchers for our hike (50% for $50 AUD) and there are lots of western shoe and clothing stores plus a big supermarket. This mall doesn’t have a movie theatre but you can see a movie in Yangon centre at Junction Square

Ride the circular train route around Yangon

We haven’t made it onto the train yet  – we will do it when we get back to Yangon – but it’s a loop of local life, a three hour round trip on the local that passes through 39 stations off the tourist track and gives a glimpse of life in Yangon. You can do this circuit yourself or take a tour with a local guide to help you and share information about local life in Yangon. You’ll see colourful trackside markets, local food vendors and people going about their everyday life.

Take a food tour

This three-hour food tour will introduce you to Burmese cuisine and share history of Burmese food, it’s influences and the most popular and unusual dishes. You’ll explore the wet markets, eat a variety of dishes from snacks to desert and lean about Myanmar’s foodie history.

Day trip to Kyaiktiyo Pagoda

Kyaiktiyo Pagoda is one of the most respected religious sites in Myanmar and it’s also one of the most impressive. This golden rock – covered with gold leaf left by males only  – is a Buddhist pilgrimage site and the rock is said to balance on a strand of Buddha’s hair. It’s around 200 kilomentres from Yangon and easily reached as a day trip. You can take the cable car or truck up to the half way pouint on the mopuntain and from there you must walk bare foot to the top.

You can book a discounted five star rated group trip here or book a private tour here. Most hotels and guest-houses will be able to offer similar tours also.

Both tours stop at the Taukkyan War Cemetery for Allied soldiers who died in battle in Burma during World War II.

Check out more day trips from Yangon here.

Where to stay in Yangon:

Sedona Hotel Yangon:

We loved the Sedona Hotel Yangon because for us it was an oasis to escape to after traveling for months in South East Asia before we started our Myanmar adventure, and then we returned to it at the end of our trip.

It’s about 15 minutes out of the centre of town but it is right on Inya Lake, has an amazing pool, beautiful rooms and fabulous food – breakfast is amazing. It’s affordable for the luxury you get and we loved it. You can check prices and availability here. 

Closer to town, check out the Rose Garden Hotel for around $100AUD a night with a swimming pool, breakfast and just moments from Sule Pagoda, colonial buildings and the alleys.

Hotel G Yangon is in an excellent location and has beautiful modern rooms for around$80 AUD a night including breakfast, while if you’re after budget accommodation check out the Ten Mile Hotel which has a pool, breakfast and large clean rooms for around $32 a night.

Check out more Yangon accommodation here.