The Plain of Jars, Site 1
April 04, 2010
By: thenhbushman
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Category: Laos, Travel
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Photos by MJ Klein and Hui-chen
Continuing with our series on our 2010 Thai/Lao trip, we visited the Plain of Jars, site #1.
But, as promised, we’re going to show you where we stayed, first.
We stayed at the Auberge Hotel in Phonsavan. We asked for a room with a view of the valley and we highly recommend that you do that too. You’ll see why in a moment! The price was USD 60 per night and the value was great for that price, which includes breakfast. For those of you who like to view maps or have a GPS, the coordinates for the Auberge are N19.44269 E103.22148.
The room has a fireplace and the office will send someone over to light a nice fire for you.
This is the main “parlor” of the room and during the day the view out of those windows is really something to see.
The bed was large and comfortable.
As you can see, the valley drops off behind the room.
The trails to the various rooms are well lit at night.
Now, for the view!
You have to see it for yourself to appreciate it!
We left in the morning and went to our first site of the day, the Plain of Jars Site 1.
As usual, there was a sign showing the site statistics:
- Area sub-surface cleared: 24,375 square meters
- Area visually searched: 225,000 square meters
- Vegetation cut: 21,832 square meters
- UXO found/destroyed: 127
- Scrap found: 31,814 pieces
Upon arriving at Site #1, we found the initial area to be quite crowded, as several tour buses had arrived before us. Hui-chen and I decided to check out another area and come back to the first area after it cleared out.
This is a view of the main area from the first area. Yes, that is a bomb crater on the left.
Closeup of the bomb crater.
As you can see in this photo, I wore my GPS on the epaulette of my shirt. So, each photograph is geotagged with the location from my GPS at every location where a photograph was taken. For those of you who enjoy looking at maps, you may view the map on the flickr page (by clicking on the photo to go to the flickr page) or you may copy the photograph’s information and view the location for yourself in Google Maps or Google Earth. This article itself is geotagged with the location of Site #1.
There are way too many photographs to show them all to you now. To see all of the Plain of Jars photos, you may visit the Flickr photo set by clicking this link.
Site #1 has several sections. The jars are organized into several groups. No one knows why. These jars were away from the main group.
We found this one jar with a lid, but we can’t tell you anything else about it, unfortunately.
Up on a hill was another small group of jars. Hui-chen and I hiked up the hill to take a look at them. We found a bomb crater and a split jar, presumably damaged by the bomb going off.
Side view of the split jar.
Monk with a digital camera.
This monk was leading a group on a tour.
There is a cave at Site #1, and researchers have found evidence of human remains in the cave. This has lead to the conclusion that this cave was used for cremations because there is also a man-made vent hole in the top of the cave.
Once the other tourists had cleared out, we went back up to the first area and took a look. We found the biggest jar at Site #1.
This jar is a monster!
After visiting the Plain of Jars Site #1, we visited several other archeological and historical sites in the area. We’ll bring you the story on those sites in our next installment.
Thanks for reading! We look forward to your comments! Please feel free to re-tweet this article and leave a recommendation below.
Articles in series 2010 Thai/Laos Trip:
- 2010 Thailand-Laos Trip
- Day 1, Arrival in Thailand
- 2010 Thai-Lao Trip, Day 2
- Day 3 & 4, Traveling to Laos
- Day 5, Vang Vieng
- Day 6, The Elephant Tower Of Ban Na
- The Plain of Jars, Sites 3 & 2
- The Plain of Jars, Site 1
- Day 8 Sites of Interest
- Visit To A Lao Village
- Back to Thailand
- Last Day In Thailand
- Thai-Lao Trip Food: Day 1
- Thai-Lao Trip Food: Day 2
- Thai-Lao Trip Food: Day 4
- Thai-Lao Trip Food: The Next Few Days
- 2010 Thai-Lao Trip Food: The End
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April 4th, 2010 at 6:21 am
The Plain of Jars, Laos. the mystical stone jars in Site #1: http://bit.ly/bFqB26
April 4th, 2010 at 6:21 am
The Plain of Jars, Site 1:
Photos by MJ Klein and Hui-chen
Continuing with our series on our 2010 Thai/Lao… http://bit.ly/dpUYfE
April 4th, 2010 at 6:31 am
RT @thenhbushman: The Plain of Jars, Laos. the mystical stone jars in Site #1: http://bit.ly/bFqB26
April 4th, 2010 at 6:34 am
RT @globetrotteri: RT @thenhbushman: The Plain of Jars, Laos. the mystical stone jars in Site #1: http://bit.ly/bFqB26
April 4th, 2010 at 6:45 am
RT @globetrotteri: RT @thenhbushman: The Plain of Jars, Laos. the mystical stone jars in Site #1: http://bit.ly/bFqB26
April 4th, 2010 at 6:45 am
The Plain of Jars, Laos. the mystical stone jars in Site #1: http://bit.ly/bFqB26
April 4th, 2010 at 10:27 am
RT @EverywhereTrip: RT @globetrotteri: RT @thenhbushman: The Plain of Jars, Laos. the mystical stone jars in Site #1: http://bit.ly/bFqB26
April 4th, 2010 at 2:30 pm
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April 4th, 2010 at 2:48 pm
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April 4th, 2010 at 4:22 pm
Sweet pics! The camera did a great job handling the light. Time for me to invest in a DSLR!
.-= Michael Turton´s last blog ..China, Taiwan Defense Cooperation? =-.
thenhbushman
reply on April 4th, 2010 5:11 pm:
Michael, from what i’ve seen, you do quite well with your Canon! the sites are amazing places and we’re so happy that we got to see them, finally! thanks.
April 5th, 2010 at 2:52 pm
RT @globetrotteri: RT @thenhbushman: The Plain of Jars, Laos. the mystical stone jars in Site #1: http://bit.ly/bFqB26
April 5th, 2010 at 10:46 pm
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April 6th, 2010 at 4:34 am
Beautiful photography, and the site is really magical. Nice accommodation too – I miss having a fireplace – they are so much fun.
thenhbushman
reply on April 6th, 2010 5:38 pm:
hi Stefan. thanks for your complimentary comments. yes the Plain of Jars is magical, and we enjoyed it so much that we’d like to go back there again someday. the hotel was nice too and i enjoyed sitting in front of the fire. thanks and take care.
April 6th, 2010 at 2:10 pm
Mj excellent pics as always mate and what a beautiful site. I have read so much about the jars and what people think they were for and such.
I look forward to more of your trip. Thanks for sharing mate.
Brunty
.-= Brunty´s last blog ..Basketball and Relaxing, Isaan Thailand. =-.
thenhbushman
reply on April 6th, 2010 5:39 pm:
hi Brunty. thanks. we enjoyed the place so much, i was just telling Stefan that we’d like to go back there again some day. the jars are facinating, and i’ve read that there are literally dozens of sites but only the first three have been cleared of UXO. maybe some of the other sites will be cleared soon and we can enjoy them as well. we have a few more days to report on and then we’ll get into the food photos
. thanks and take care.
April 13th, 2010 at 10:54 am
RT @TopsyRT: The Plain of Jars, Site 1 http://bit.ly/bwwilM