Tour : Rabbie's Stone circles and cotswolds: Stonehenge-Avebury-Lacock-Castle Combe
Stonehenge is in Salisbury plain, which has been used for a while to practice miltary manouvers, also with european partners. We did see a tank and the French flag flying.
I cannot do enough to emphasize how utterly in the middle of nowhere this thing is -- 1.5 hrs from Bath by car -- and how uninteresting the landscape is.
The heel stone seems to have been there first, and can be used to sight along the rest of the stones for midsummer and midwinter, which are the two days a year when tourists are allowed closer. In the 70s and earlier, it was privately owned and there were plenty of hippie/druid craziness apparently. Now it's just herds -- behind us, 50 Dutch schoolchildren -- of people moseying along, circling the thing. The stones are definitely massive. The "Blue stones" (blue when they are mined, and darken over time) atop the other stones came from as far away as Wales and Scotland. The main stones were probably from Marlborough, circa 30 miles away.
We had 2 hours to go see the stones and whatever else we could manage and get back to the bus. One could easily have taken an extra hour and seen the museum/exhibition, which we had to skip.
After Stonehenge (Wikipedia says from stanenge, gallows?), we had a very quick stop at a "chalk horse" scratched into the hillside (I think in Georgian times?) and went on to another interesting stone circle, Avebury.
The Ashbury stone circle is so big there's a town in the middle, the only stone circle like that. Several stones have been knicked over time and, honestly, looking at the nearby houses it's pretty obvious where those stones went. Tolkien supposedly was inspired by the ancient Beech trees for his Ents. The massive earthworks around the circle is pretty impressive -- and handy for fencing in sheep these days. Some of the stones had stories -- one had fallen over and since been righted, only to find a smooshed skeleton underneath with scissors in his hands (presumed a barber).
We met at the Red Lion -- and were dropped at the next Red Lion in Lacock in the Cotswolds. The Cotswolds are a vague region kind of west of Oxford and east/northeast of Bath. Lacock is really well preserved, a LOT of 'historic' films have a scene set there. E.g. Pride and Prejudice (1995)'s "Merryton" was Lacock, and the scenes of Darcy as a college student were filmed in the Abbey. I was exhausted from the heat, having dressed for British weather not actual summer, so we missed the Abbey.
After Lacock, a very quick stop at Castle Comb ("coo mb"), which has no castle. "Slow horses" was filmed there. Pretty, but also desolate.
In summary: the Cotswolds might be nice to cycle through, but not really a destination on their own, imo. There are enough stone circles in England to do a tour JUST dedicated to them, which might be fun. Being able to walk up to and actually touch the stones was pretty cool.
Previously: Bath Walking Tour and Roman Baths audio Tour.
Next:
- Day 3: Getting from Bath to Bakewell (Bath -> Chesterfield by train, then 1 hr by bus)
- Day 4-6: 3 Day Bespoke Tour w/Live for the Hills
- Day 4: Peak District
- Day 5: Lake District (change lodgings to Kirkby Lonsdale)
- Day 6: Yorkshire Dales (change lodgings to York)
- Day 7&8: York
- Day 9: get to London, v&a
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