The Plain of Jars

Truly a mystery, the Plain of Jars has puzzled people for years. No one knows who put them there or why. It is this mystery that makes the jars appealing to me, and I finally had the opportunity to visit them in this trip. There are three primary jar sites that are open to tourists. Apparently there are more sites but they have not yet been cleared of unexploded ordinance, and remain dangerous. The three sites I visited were only cleared in 2005. The first site, which is the largest, contains the biggest jars, but was also the most heavily damaged during the war - the area is littered with craters. There is a cave in the middle of the site which some have theorized could have been a crematorium to burn bodies, which were then put inside the jars. I was a bit disappointed with the site, mainly because the area it was in was not particularly nice, and devoid of vegetation, and also because so many of the jars had been damaged. The first site is also the easiest to get to, we turned onto a horrible dirt road to go to the two next sites. Th road was particularly bad due to the torrential rain that fell the night before.

After a jarring hour, we arrived at the second site, which was quite pretty. In this site, the jars are on two nearby hilltops. The first hilltop, in particular was pretty, with there being lots of trees. One of the trees had grown from beneath a jar and the remnants of the jar were entwined in its roots. On the way to the third site, we stopped at the stripped hulk of an old Russian tank used during the war. It was not particularly impressive, as only the shell remained.

After another bone-rattling journey down the dirt road, we arrived at the entrance to Site 3. Right at the entrance was a restaurant, where we had our lunch of noodle soup. After lunch we walked through some picturesque rice fields to the jars. This site was also quite interesting, due to the concentration of jars, which were placed very close together. I made sure to get tons of photos at this site.

For dinner, I went with Paul, the guy I was sharing the room with, to the Indian restaurant in town. The meal we had was surprisingly good and cheap. It was much better than the Indian meal in Beijing, at a fraction of the price. After dinner, we fell asleep watching a boring movie on HBO.