CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
A 692 km round trip from Luang Prabang - roughly 12 h 26 in the saddle. The stops in between: Site 28, Site 25, Site 21 and Site 2. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,250 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
Before the sun is properly up, a line of monks in saffron robes walks barefoot along the main street of Luang Prabang, and townspeople kneel on mats to put handfuls of sticky rice into their bowls. The alms round, tak bat, is the daily heartbeat of the town, and it has been going on for centuries. Luang Prabang sits on a peninsula where the Nam Khan river meets the Mekong, ringed by green mountains, and for several hundred years it was the royal capital of the Lao kingdom of Lan Xang. The old town, with its gilded temples, wooden houses and French colonial villas, was listed by UNESCO in 1995, and it is one of the best-preserved towns in Southeast Asia.
Read the complete Town of Luang Prabang write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Town of Luang Prabang is where the day begins. Next is Site 28.
The Plain of Jars is one of the great archaeological puzzles of Southeast Asia: hundreds of carved stone jars, some taller than a person and weighing several tonnes, scattered across hillsides and meadows of the Xieng Khouang plateau in northern Laos.
Read the complete Site 28 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Site 28 comes up about 223 km into the recorded legs. Next is Site 25.
Local legend has a cheerful explanation for the stone jars of Xieng Khouang. It tells of Khun Cheung, a legendary king who won a great victory and ordered the jars carved so that his people could brew lao-lao, the rice spirit, in huge quantities for the celebration. Archaeology prefers a funerary purpose, but the story says a lot about how people here like to see their past, and it is a good one to share over a glass of the real thing in the evening.
Read the complete Site 25 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
At least about 274 km into the recorded legs you reach Site 25. Next is Site 21.
The Plain of Jars is one of Southeast Asia's great riddles: across the Xieng Khouang plateau in northern Laos, thousands of huge stone jars lie scattered over hillsides, in groups of a few or a few hundred, some taller than a person. They were carved from sandstone and other rock during the Iron Age, roughly between 500 BC and AD 500, and the most widely accepted theory is that they were linked to funerary practices, perhaps used to let bodies decompose before final burial. Local legend has a happier explanation: the jars were made to brew rice wine for a victory celebration of a mythical king. The sites were added to the World Heritage list in 2019, and Site 21 is one of the many numbered groups in the countryside around Phonsavan.
Read the complete Site 21 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Site 21, about halfway. Next is Site 2.
The Plain of Jars is not one site but many, and Site 2 sits on a hillside about fifteen kilometres from Phonsavan, the market town that serves as the base for visiting them. Phonsavan, with some thirty-seven thousand people, is a plain, post-war place of tin roofs and wide streets, rebuilt after the original town was destroyed in the bombing of the 1960s, and the jar sites lie scattered around it, along dirt tracks, in grassland and light forest.
Read the complete Site 2 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Site 2 sits at 196 km, about halfway. Next is back through Site 21.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Site 21 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Site 21 comes up about 384 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Site 25.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Site 25 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 418 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Site 25. Next is back through Site 28.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Site 28 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Site 28, late in the day. Next is Town of Luang Prabang.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Town of Luang Prabang write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 692 km.
Town of Luang Prabang → Site 28 is 223 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Site 28 → Site 25 is 51 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Site 25 → Site 21 is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Site 21 → Site 2 is 38 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Site 2 → back through Site 21 is 38 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Site 21 → back through Site 25 is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Site 25 → back through Site 28 is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Site 28 → Town of Luang Prabang is 240 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.