Reed About Beer: Phonsavan, The Secret War (More from BeerLao)

The journey from Luang Prabang to Phonsavan did take the whole eight hours but the local bus travel was OK. Pretty full and with more sick bags handed out the views were stunning on the narrow winding roads. The landscape is just vast and beautiful even when the bus is too close to the 1000 ft drops.

Beautiful Laos

A fair drop off the roadside

The only downside is listening to the sick bags being put to use from the locals. We are now under the impression that they are not very good when it comes to travelling by automobiles. Retching away is just not a great thing to listen to at any time but we are troopers and again arrived safely at our destination in the late afternoon.

I know I keep mentioning arriving safely on bus journeys but there is just something about South East Asia and driving. It seems they can’t drive probably don’t have driving licenses, no road rules and insist on pushing the beaten up shacks on wheels to their limits. Brakes are not really used and they just love overtaking on blind corners. Enough said! The thing is the driving style just seems to work for some reason. Just one that I have not figured out yet. Prayers are still needed and touch wood we have just survived yet another journey.

Crazy Drivers. In front is a Lorry stacked with Pepsi. Maybe 1/2 ft from ploughing through it on a mountain bend

Phonsavan is in the Xieng Khuang Province, which is one of Laos’s worst-hit areas during the nine-year US air assault but the area has its own beauty with its wooded alpine hills and chilly mountain climate. The place has a some what depressing feel about it but you have to look beyond this at the cratered hillsides where you then see an area full of ancient history especially with it being the home to the mysterious Plain of Jars.

Bomb Crated Hillsides

With being beaten to the ground during the Secret War Phonsavan will not be winning any awards for architecture because it was rapidly rebuilt with Soviet-style, flat topped shop fronted streets haunted by careworn faces. The place is sparse with travellers though, which makes it an endearing place with a feeling of authenticity.

No beauty awards

& this is pretty much it! Lots to do around the town though

Phonsavan is a tiny little town...and having an idea from The Lonely Planet that we wanted to stay at Kong Keo Guest House. Limited with options we headed that way with two fellow travellers. In fact Tina who had her own tour guiding company in Cologne, Germany and Pat a retired gentleman from the U.S were the only other people to actually get off the bus.

It's dark when we head to the Guest House

A bullet shell for a key ring

We checked in at Kong Keo which had a great setting, lodging in a wooden garden bungalow for 70,000 Kip per night. The place also had an outside bar and communal area with fires burning out of bomb casings, which were needed because Phonsavan was freezing. It might have been 20oC during the day but by night it dropped down to 10oC which for us now was a shocker. While enjoying the hostel BBQ dinner at night or breakfast in the early mornings the jeans and hoodies were worn continuously and for once while sleeping the sleeping bags were not enough. Additional blankets were required to survive the night. I think this was due to the high altitude or maybe we have been away to long and are just becoming soft.

Jungle Garden at Keo Kong. Reminders of the War are everywhere

Cold Breakfast Outdoors. Check out the BeerLao Tablecloths

As usual we hadn’t done much planning for Laos but coming to Phonsavan was all about learning about the Secret War with the US and the World Famous UNESCO Site, The Plain of Jars. Mr Kong who owned the Guest House or King Kong which is how he liked to be known was a mountain of knowledge and we booked a day trip along with Tina and Pat to be taken out for the day with uncle Kong to visit the bomb crater sites a bomb village, waterfall trek and the Plain of Jars site 1.

Uncle Kong's Tour Board. We Go No 2

Quick stop at the local market for supplies & lunch

Travelling out in the mini-van to the crater sites was a real eye opener to actually visualise the destruction caused and how the landscape is still ruined 40 years on. Uncle Kong gave us a real insight into the Secret War and what actually happened as well as what it was like to actually live through the atrocities. You meet local people in Phonsavan and anywhere in Laos and that person will have lost loved ones or even whole families. I actually felt naive to the war and the fact that I really didn’t know anything about it or the long term effects that it has caused before arriving here. I was in shock struggling to process the effects of war and this lead us onto the next part of the trip where we visited an actual bomb village.

B52 Crater

A little larger than I am

Like a visit to the landscape of Planet Mars

The village was amazing and the villages had been so resourceful with the things that remained from the war. Old bomb casings dropped by the US Air force had been used for everything you could imagine like plant pots, animal troughs and stilts for houses etc... The village was a fascinating place and so tranquil. It was very strange feeling walking around the houses, schools and iron monger workshops wondering if it was safe and if it had been cleared of UXO’s (Unexploded Ordnance) and you couldn’t help but imagine how it must be for the people of Laos who still to this day have to live with the worry that when out farming their land the possibilities are still there that they might come across or worst hit an unexploded bomb. It was terribly sad, even lost for words of how horrific and obsured the war was.

Bomb Casings used as House Stilts

& as a Garden

The Bomb Village was very quiet. The hairs stood-up on the back of your neck!

Grinding Corn Old-school

Blacksmiths hard at work

One of the local children a little intrigued

Passing a wall made from Bomb Casings as we left the village

Between 1964 and 1973, the USA conducted one of the largest sustained aerial bombardments in history. Flying 580,344 missions over Laos and dropping two million tons of bombs. Around 30% of the bombs dropped on Laos failed to detonate, leaving the rural areas littered with unexploded ordnance. In Eastern Laos especially living with this threat really is a part of everyday life. Work is being done to try and help with these issues and since 1994 the British Mines Advisory Group (MAG) has been carrying out clean up operations. The problem is over the last sixteen years only a tiny percentage of the bomb pieces have been removed from the land. At the current rate it could take over 100 years to make the country safe.

www.magclearsmines.org

Following the bomb village we tried to clear our minds of the things we had seen and learnt about in the morning with a waterfall trek. A great lunch of sticky rice and fresh fruit for some much needed energy before we pulled on our Sumatran plastic trekking shoes (what a buy?). The trek enabled us to climb up and through the waterfall and the scenery was breath taking. Pat in his 70’s had no problems probably less so than the younger contingent. I hope I am as fit and healthy when I get to his age.

We arrive at the base of the waterfall. 10 more levels await us on our assent

Lunchtime. Sticky Rice in Bamboo with a Hunters Knife- A First but Delicious

Not sure what we are smiling about. We have a waterfall to climb...

& climbing it was!

Uncle Kong giving a helping hand to Tina with Pat closing in

Nearly at the summit. Beautiful scenary but blowing hard now

Finally at the top. Well worth the Trek

That brought us to the final part of the day and a visit to the Plain of Jars Site 1 only. There is another two Jars sites. This is the attraction that makes the area famous and even though most backpackers don’t bother travellers looking for some culture make the journey west off the beaten track. The Plain of Jars was very interesting to see even though nobody has a real clue as to why they are there! In a way this makes them even more intriguing. Site 1 holds 250 Jars mostly between 1m and 3m tall carved out of stone on the hillside. Estimated to be 2000 years old they remain a mystery, without any organic material like bones or food remaining. Local myths say that the stone jars were used back in the day for holding water or maybe as an offering to the gods or for burial purposes as stone coffins or urns. I like to think they were used to brew the local Lao-Lao Spirit or even Beer. Why not!!! It is as good a guess as any. MAG had cleared the site to make it safe even though you had to stay within the specified markers. Once again a strange feeling, that if you ventured off the path in Laos you could meet your maker, surreal really but what a wonderful day out in Phonsavan with a great group of people. Exhausted we head back to the ghost town to enjoy an evening spread that King Kong laid out for us Lao Curry and Mash. We even tried the infamous human petroleum Lao-Lao Spirit and of course a couple of BeerLao.

The Plain of Jars Site 1

Not quite what we were expecting but nice Jar's

Welcome to Reed About Beer's Fermentation Tank!

Interesting but so random

Remember while in Laos always stick to the footpaths

Stay between the White Markers- Red Marks Danger!!!

After our day trip I started to feel a little unwell and this kicked in the next day. Out in the town Kate had to pretty much carry me back to the guest house and put me to bed. Full of a fever, dizzy, blind and green in colour I was beginning to think I had Malaria or a bad bout of food poisoning. After doing so well so far on our travels I was dying and 18 hours in bed was required with every item of clothing on plus woolly hat, two sleeping bags and two blankets. I survived the night and the staff members were very caring. In the end I started to come around and feel slightly normal again and the local prognosis was altitude sickness. I have never suffered this before even when skiing on the top of mountains but that’s better than Malaria.

Not to worry we decided to spend a few more days in Phonsavan and it was a place that we really liked. A great welcoming family atmosphere at Kong’s place and we managed to visit and watch the documentaries about the war at the MAG Centre which was certainly an eye opener. Three videos are shown from around four in the afternoon and include a harrowing documentary called Harvest.

The MAG Centre on Main Street-Phonsavan

Information in-side before the Documentary's

The MAG Logo says it all...

For our last night and with more backpackers around a fantastic free BBQ was put on for us all, including some free BeerLao’s which was a perfect way to end our stay as well as sitting around the bomb fires teaching English to one of the young student workers Ponsai. Even if it was a mix of true Burnley and Leeds dialect.