Day 8: Jars and Dust

Monday, 10/28/2024

Woke up early at 5:30am as some noise had woken me, and as I was not really tired, I just stayed up and started my morning routine.

I packed up everything, got gear on and then went down to put the bag by the truck and setup the bike.

This involves putting the tank bag on, attaching the Go Pro (weather permitting) and putting my helmet, gloves and jacket on the bike so they are ready to go.  Will also move the bike into a good departure position if the mechanic had not already moved it to do his morning routine with the bikes.

In this case I did push the bike across the parking lot to be closer to the dining area where we could see it better while having breakfast.

Went in for breakfast, nothing fancy, and then went up to check the room one last time, then turned in my key and waited by the bikes.

Once we were all ready to go, we left the hotel around 7:30am for a short ride across town to the edge of the city for our first stop of the day.

This morning, we will visit the Plain of Jars historical site.

This UNESCO site contains a large number of massive stone jars carved out of local rock that have been used for thousands of years in various burial and cremation rites.  The site was first explored by western researches in the mid 1800’s.

Approximately 2000 jars in various sizes and conditions have been found along with other burial goods and burn sites in local caves.

This particular location is also known for taking several bomb hits during the 1960s conflict, many of the craters still visible in the ground.  This location was also used as a lookout and fortified with anti-aircraft guns, trenches, and tank hides during the war.

Some of the jars were destroyed or badly damaged during the bombings as well.

We walked through the small museum first at the visitor center which had much of the regions history and findings, along with many bomb casings and other information on that time period.

We then rode our bikes up the road to the parking area for the main group of jars.   When busier, they take you by large golf carts, but they let us ride our bikes up today.

We went up to the first group on the hill top where the trenches were also visible.  Spent most of our time there, then as we were ready to leave, I quickly walked over to the second group lower down to get some photos as it was a larger and less damaged area in my opinion.

Jars on the hilltop.

Larger, 2nd area of jars lower down.

Photo by Joe.

Photo by Tan

One thing to note about this region is that there are still large numbers of unexploded ordinance (UXO) in the ground around here, including some of the Plain of Jars sites which are not open to the public.  These left over explosives continue to injure and kill locals (mostly farmers) to this day.

When done, we got back on the road, taking a few side roads to get back to the highway again.  We then headed toward Luang Prabang, our destination for the night.

The road was pretty much as it had been so far; hilly, curvy, narrow, and very rough in many spots.  I would say we now are getting as many dirt/rock sections as pavement and the dust is this fine baby power like stuff that just coats everything.

But even the paved sections were rougher than in previous days, and we had a hard time keeping any speed up.  The support truck actually stayed with us much of the day as we were not going much faster than he was.

The loose dust made the corners very tricky as it let your wheels slip easily and when airborne could cut visibility down to zero.  Things got really bad when behind a truck or other large vehicle, but even the bikes kicked up quite a large cloud.

Photo by Tammy?

Photo by Tammy?

Photo by Tammy?

One of our riders, Atti, was actually blinded enough by the dust that he hit the sharp edge of a concrete section on a curve and went down.  He was right behind me and I heard the noise, but did not see it happen.

We all stopped, and I even turned around and rode back up the hill a bit to see if any help was needed, though was so much dust you could barely see what was going on.

Bike seemed okay as the guys lifted it, but Atti had hit his knee good, tore his pants and scraped his skin some, but he did not act like anything serious had happened.

We got back on the bikes and rode farther down the hill which was steep, and narrow, with lots of curves and a fair amount of large truck traffic, to get out of the dust and find a better place to pull over and fully assess the damage.

Atti was able to ride his bike down which was a good sign both were going to be okay.

During our stop they cleaned and bandaged his wounds and checked out the bike really good, and then we were back on the road.  

We were all getting tired, and had only done a fuel stop and a short break before the crash.  Our morning break had been along the side of the road where we got drinks and snacks from the truck and watched the local farmers work while a few went over and joined them for a bit.

Stopped along road for a quick snack and drink break from the support truck supplies.

Few of the group went to "help" the farmers.

About an hour after the crash, the bad roads claimed the rear tire of our guide Tan, so we had to stop while that was repaired.  We did find a fairly large pull out along the side of the road with a decent view over the valley, but also had large mounds of garbage dumped along the edge as well.

Long hard at work fixing another flat.

Once the tire was good, we continued on the way with some amazing views across the valleys and hills in the area.

We eventually came down to a nice area with a great view over the valley and some generally flat space along the side of the road.  We decided to just stop here for our picnic lunch as the truck had enough room to get off the road and the bikes were narrow enough to not interfere with other traffic.

The guides prepared the sandwiches again while we all walked around a bit, talked, and enjoyed the views.

View from our lunch stop on the side of the road.

Tailgate lunch. (Photo by Tan?)

After we got going again the road seemed to get worse.  I finally fell back near the rear of the group to lessen the dust so I could see where I was riding and see what was around me.

Dust was coating my helmet visor so bad, and with the low angle of the sun I could not see anymore, so had to ride with it up, which made it difficult to breathe when too close to the group.  Also bugged the eyes and was coating my glasses too.

We did an afternoon stop in a village at an intersection and walked down among the local market stalls.  Some cool stuff, but nothing I needed other than something to drink.

Break stop, walked the market on the hill across the street.

Back on the bikes we moved onward, no improvement in the roads, and the sun started to go down as we neared town and traffic also picked up.  The roads also became some of the worst we had seen so far, more like off-road than highway.

Traffic insanity.

Now add Dust!

We stopped just outside of town for fuel again.

Coming into the Fuel station.

Fill it up please!

Just a wee bit of dust today.

We then arrived into the central parts of Luang Prabang and traffic got really heavy, but at least the roads were decent here.

Was a lot of playing dodgem with scooters and cars weaving in and around stopped vans and trucks and lots of people walking about.  Most of this part of town I was rarely out of 1st gear.

When we arrived at the street we needed to reach the hotel, we found it closed for a street market.  Not sure if guide did not know this, or we were just later than expected, but could not use this road.

We had to turn around at the intersection and find another way around the large hill in the center of town to get on that road again where the market was not blocking it.

This extra mile was slow going, and as we approached the turn for the hotel the market was again there, but not blocking us this time, but still made the riding very tight.

Just barely able to make our turn before market starts.

Once we turned off, then it was a short distance to hotel.  We pulled up and one of the staff (expecting us) ran out and pointed us down a narrow alleyway between the buildings where we parked the bikes along a wall.

Down the alleyway to park.

After we received our room keys, we all went to the rooms to clean up and do our usual things.

Villa Phathana Hotel - Luang Prabang

Room for the next 2 nights.

We still had bit of time before dinner, so I decided to clean my gear from the caked dust in the shower.

Took about 45 minutes to scrub with the wet brush without soaking the gear, boots and gloves and then taking time to clean myself as well now that I was covered in muddy dust.

We met in the lobby at around 7:30pm for dinner.

We walked a few blocks to a nice restaurant, the usual fare, but it was good.

After dinner, I walked back toward the hotel looking for a SIM card, but after doing some looking and thinking it over, I decided to forget buying a Lao SIM as we were already at the half way point, and the cost, while not high, is not really worth it as I had found decent wi-fi at nearly every stop.

I was still able to mark our stops using the GPS and then update later when I found internet.  Worst case I figured I could tether to my work phone which was using a roaming plan if need arose in an emergency.

I decided to walk down the length of the street market instead of going back to the room right away.  I figured this would be a good place to find some small things to buy to take home and was hoping to find a cloth or towel I could keep in my jacket pocket to wipe down the visor if it got too dusty.  Using my gloved hand helped, but did not clean well, and probably more likely to scratch the visor more.

No luck on the cloth though, most vendors were selling clothing, art works, magnets, decorative items and jewelry.

I did find a small stuffed cat keychain and another little stuffed cat with the name Laos on it, so bought them as I wanted some item with the country name on it.

I then stopped for a few drinks (some lemon tea) and then went back to the room.

Got things ready for bed, then copied over the last 2 days of the journal from my app notes.

Pierre had an extra pen he let me have earlier in the day.

I was too tired to write the current day, so again voiced it into the app and will copy it tomorrow.

We will be meeting tomorrow at 8:00am after breakfast to go over to catch our boat for a ride up the Mekong River to visit a temple cave site.

Goodnight.