Happy New Year everyone! We had a suitably chilly New Year in Phonsavanh in NE Laos. Ponsavanh is the closest to a Wild East frontier town you can find. One long main street, in the middle of an undulating brown plain, studded with crater pockmarks from the intensive bombing the region endured during the Vietnam War, when the US Air Force used to off-load surplus ordnance to save fuel on the way back to their Thailand Bases. You have to be careful where you tread round here, the area still has countless unexploded bombs. This was brought home to us when, on visiting the Plain of Jars sites we had to keep strictly to marked paths so has not to risk being blown up. A fab, scenic journey through the mountains to get here, through small villages clinging to the hill side and Poinsettas growing like weeds along the sides of the roads. The residents of the regions decorate their house fronts and gardens with old artillery-we saw shell cases used as fence posts. Despite its end of the world feel, Phonsavanh was a pleasant enough place to stay; we found a good restaurant (with a door to keep out the cold!) and ate there both nights. The Plain of Jars sites were incredible, as old and mysterious as Stonehenge or Avebury. Hundreds of stone jars, stood in groups, of various sizes, some of granite, some sandstone. No one knows why they were put here (they were hewn in a quarry in the mountains, about 10m away and brought to their present site) and the jars certainly aren't telling!
We returned, in the rain, to Louang Phabang yesterday. Today is a mooch around town day. We amused ourselves by looking at the tours on offer that we hadn't gone for. Basically, if it involves an elephant, it's available! You can look at them, ride them, bath them. We liked the tour entitled 'Elephant Kayaking'. Now that would be worth seeing!! Off to Thailand tomorrow.
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