Phonesavan and 'The Plain of Jars'

I arrived in a town called Phonsavan yesterday from Luang Prabang. I feared the worst when I arrived at the bus station and saw my bus; it looked older than me. It was a local bus so I was one of only three western people using its services. Fortunately it wasn’t too hot so the bus was relatively cool. Things did get worse when the driver turned on the TV and played what I can only think was Laos Karaoke except the same song played for about an hour at which point I think it was even too much for him and he turned it off.

At one point it started to rain outside which somehow made it rain inside, the whole bus was leaking and thoroughly soaked by the time we arrived after the 9 hour journey. Saying that as always in Laos there was some great scenery en route which took us over lots of mountains.

US Bombs

The Phonsavan region is well known for a couple of reasons. Firstly it was repeatedly bombed by the US during Indochina wars (which were around the same time as the war with Vietnam), even though Laos was neutral. Around 1.5 million tonnes of bombs were dropped over a 9 year period, killing thousands of people and unexploded Bombs (UXOs) are still blowing up people today. I went to see some films put on by the local museum about the problems facing the people in the area. Efforts are being made to clear the UXOs but large numbers are still on land which mean the people can’t use these areas for farming or building which in turn keeps Laos from developing as a country.

Very old Jars....Hundreds of em

Secondly Phonsavan is close to the Plains of Jars, which I visited today. The Plains of Jars are basically 2000 to 3000 year old Jars on hills and no one really knows why they are there. It’s a bit like Laos’s Stone Henge. Some theories are that the Jars were used to put dead bodies in to decompose and some think they were used for cooking and making Whisky.

There are a total of three sites. The third one could only be reached by going through some paddy fields which was pretty fun. All through the Jar site visits we had to stay on the marked tracks due to many bombs still in the fields. The guide told us that occasionally cattle walk into the long grass and get blown up. The fields are full of bomb craters and trenches from the wars.

Paddy Fields

We also were taken to a place called ‘Whisky Village’. We watched an old man making some rice whisky in his shed and were even lucky enough to be given a free sample... It’s not something I’ll be rushing out to buy any time soon and don’t expect to see this stuff in Tesco.

Moving again tomorrow morning to a place call Vang Vieng. More about that later.