Like little and large, the duo of peaks that is Mount Popa and Taung Ma-gyi looms high on the edge of the Pegu Range of central Myanmar. Both are sacred but for different reasons, the latter being a whopping 1,500-meter-tall cone that soars over the meanders of the Irrawaddy River. It was once an ancient site of animist worship; one that's become subsumed into the newer Buddhist faith. That's why its ridges are peppered with mysterious nat shrines – chapels to the unspeakable spirits of now-dead human saints. Mount Popa itself is much smaller than the great volcano it spouts from. Just a plug that's risen to 600 meters above sea level, it's a flat-topped needle of rock that hosts the glimmering outlines of several pagodas. 777 steps weave to the temples on the summit, where prayer wheels click and macaque monkeys can be seen swinging in the canopies far below. Mount Popa tour guides are at hand to offer guided journeys up the wonders, and to help unravel the mysteries behind the ancient religiosity that they signify.