A byootaful Life

Stonehenge was one tourist site I really wanted to visit while Phill and I were in England. I’d never been to Stonehenge before and I was eager to do make the road trip out there. The site has so much history and mystery and I wanted to be a part of that somehow, even if it was only by visiting the stones, taking photos and just enjoying the moment. I know that some people don’t find Stonehenge that interesting and I guess it is just “a bunch of rocks” if you want to look at it that way, but let me tell you – I was very impressed with our visit and it was well worth it!

Phill and I and some friends picked up a rental car from the middle of London bright and early in the morning and (very slowly) made our way out of the city in peak-hour traffic trying to navigate with a faulty GPS system … now that was interesting. After an hour and a half of bumper-to-bumper London traffic jams, we finally got on the right road. After a few hours of driving through delightfully English scenery of fields and black and white dairy cows, we drove up a hill which revealed this amazing sight as we began to descend:

Can you see it there in the distance? I swear Stonehenge just randomly popped up out of nowhere! I’d read that it just appears and I guess they weren’t lying! I don’t know what I expected, but it was nice to see a world-famous tourist site pretty much untouched, without signs and flashing lights and queues and stalls selling keychains and bracelets. The only traffic jam we found ourselves in (which we at first thought was due to being close to Stonehenge) was actually due to a car accident. We easily found a parking spot and scrambled out of the car, cameras at the ready.

Stonehenge is surrounded by a tall fence, which inevitably leads to this:

Seriously people, it’s £6.60 to get in and you get a free audio guide and as much time looking at the stones as you want – just pay! The entrance fee goes towards maintaining the site and, compared to some tourist attraction ticket prices, this was a small amout to pay for entrance. Incidentally the old man in the blue shirt in the foreground here was looking at me like I was crazy. Here I am, standing metres away from Stonehenge and I’m apparently taking a photograph of him, haha!

We had arrived around 12:15pm and quickly moved through the queue, collecting our audio guide and walking through the underpass to the other side of the road where Stonehenge was waiting. There were only a few tourists walking around the stones, which meant I had many opportunities to snap almost people-free photos, which was awesome. There’s nothing worse than photos with random tourists in it, especially the bored, frustrated-looking ones with bad sunburns.

The stones are roped off but the rope is very low to the ground and not imposing upon photographs or your view at all. I also didn’t find the distance between the path and the stones that large. A few of the reviews I had read made me feel like I would need to bring binoculars – this, obviously, was not the case. I think tourists must remember that this is a sacred and protected site. Of course they will rope it off to protect it from the public. They want it to be around forever.

The grass was quite brown and dry, but in some photos it did come out greener. I think Phill was a little disappointed after seeing so many beautiful photographs of lush green grass surrounding the stones – I had to remind him that we were in England during summer, which is, contrary to popular belief, actually hot and dry.

I loved the clouds in the sky. In a way they reminded me of Australia – so did the heat. It was damn hot out there in the field with no protection from the sun. We walked twice around the stones, as there’s no pressure to leave. It was actually quite relaxing and I did enjoy listening to the audio guide, which gave some very interesting information. I particularly thought it was well worth listening to some of the popular conspiracy theories about how Stonehenge was built and for what reason.

You can see the Slaughter Stone in the foreground of the above photo, named for its red stain caused by rain reacting with iron. You can’t really see the red in this photo and to be honest, I wouldn’t have noticed anything special about it if I wasn’t listening to the audio guide. It’s amazing how much detail is in the layout of Stonehenge and every few steps around the circle gives you a completely new view of the site. I think the above photo shows my favourite view – Stonehenge looks less “ruined” as the stones are still resting on the top which gives you a better sense of how it might have originally looked.

I really enjoyed our visit to Stonehenge. Have you been there? What did you think of it?