On a grassy ridge in the highlands of Xieng Khouang Province in northern Laos, hundreds of huge stone jars sit scattered among the grass, some as tall as a person, some tipped on their sides and some leaning against each other. This is the Plain of Jars, and Site 52, also called Ban Phakeo, is the most dramatic of the places where the jars can be seen. It has several hundred jars spread over hillsides with wide views across the valley, and it is the one that most tour groups choose. UNESCO listed the Plain of Jars in 2019.
No one knows for sure who made them, but archaeologists believe they are about two thousand years old, from the Iron Age, and that they were used in burial rituals, perhaps for storing the bodies or bones of the dead before cremation. The older Lao legend has them as drinking vessels for a race of giants celebrating a great victory, with rice wine fermenting in the biggest. Either way, the landscape has a haunting quality that stays in the memory.
There is also a harder history here. Xieng Khouang was one of the most heavily bombed areas in the world during the Vietnam War era, and unexploded ordnance still lies in the ground. Cleared paths through the sites are marked with white and red stones, and the rule is simple and absolute: stay on the marked paths. Many of the local people in the area have been affected by this, and the centre in Phonsavan explains the work of the clearance teams.
The ride up is a highlight in itself. The mountain roads across northern Laos are twisty, often damaged, with sudden landslides in the wet season, and the climbs into the highlands take you from tropical heat to cool, thin air. Phonsavan, about twenty-five kilometres away and a town of nearly forty thousand people, is where to find fuel, food and a bed. Nights can be quite chilly at that altitude. The dry season, from about November to February, brings clear skies, though the early morning mist on the hills can be remarkable. Wet season roads are slippery and the grass turns thick and green. Local lao-lao rice whisky is the usual end-of-day toast, if you are not riding.