juamei | Blog

[visited 19/5/3] - What a lovely site. Ignoring the rape of the landscape from the mines, the views are tremendous & the ambiance just right. I parked at the start of the Five Wells farm track & walked the 10 minutes across the fields, setting myself up nicely for the landscape to open up in front of me as I reached the summit. When you are at the site, stand on the mound and rotate 360 degrees, warmed the cockles of my heart that sight!

[visited 19/5/3] - Following an abortive first visit at night earlier this year (I was considering whether to tresspass when a dog licked my hand & I was so freaked I gave up :), I arrived here with the rain just starting. Luckily it was only a twenty minute shower and gave me a chance to eat some lunch.

So the skies temporarily cleared and I quickfooted it to the henge. In one word, wow. I loved the visual effects the makers had created, not being able to see the stones from outside the henge & aiming straight at the meeting of the two hills in the distance. I was lucky enough to have the sight to myself and if I hadn't been on a fairly strict timer I'd have stayed much longer. As it was more rain & more sites to see drove me back to the car.

And so onto the incident which prompted the unwritten actual fieldnotes to start 'Still shaking & ouch'. Whilst at the henge the kindly farmer had put cows, sheep & lambs in the field between the henge & the farm. I'm not sure but I think cows like to protect lambs in the same field & I am definately sure that a cow trotting into me is gonna hurt more than the electric fence I gripped two handed after leaping over the nearby stone wall. Watch the cows, keep watching the COWS!!!

[visited 19/5/3] - This is another delightful sight with what I've just found to be Robin Hood's Stride very close by (ooh thats a very interesting rock outcrop). The stones definately look like the sorry remains of a circle & reminded me quite strongly of Bathampton Down. Very easy to reach from the road & lots in the area, well worth a visit as you'll probably get this to yourself like me!

[visited 19/4/3] Whilst in the area I thought I had better take a look at a genuine archaeological fiddle at The Cove, as these things are getting increasingly rare. I was disappointed to see no info board & no activity but the complex metal work around the stones was fairly entertaining. Lots of other intrigued looking people as well.

[visited 19/4/3] Another ruined circle with Sarsens in hedge rows nearby and lonely survivors standing proud. Bizarre to find it so close to Avebury however, WK avenue is clearly visible, yet somehow seems to ignore this circle.

No purpose is apparent given the location, but who said anything had to make sense.

[visited 19/4/3] An interesting and bracing walk from Avebury, especially with a fierce cold wind straight into your face for the majority of the walk. But cross the ridgeway and head down over the gallops into the fields of stone and the heart lifts.

I walked to the south of the copse, then round the back with the density of stones ever increasing. It was a cold day but I spent about an hour here, searching for the elusive Polisher. I had to give up in the end, if only cos my Avebury carpark ticket was in danger of running out. However I didn't go home entirely empty handed, I found two stones with holes in and a nice sense of well being.

[visited 19/4/3] So first of all I went to the church in Alton Barnes, St Marys, which a pleasant enough Saxon church but not what I was looking for. A bit of intelligence took me to All Saints, the church in question located surprisingly in Alton Priors.

I can happily confirm it is indeed on a mound, there is a 1700 year old yew tree in the churchyard (according to the certificate inside the church) and there are indeed sarsens under the floor boards. The church is no longer used but is still consecrated and is maintained by The Churches Conservation Trust.

I was pondering on how I was gonna find the sarsens, but one is located to the right as you enter the church, under a handy trapdoor. I presume one is located under another trapdoor near the altar, but someone seems to have built a plywood stage over it...

This is well worth a visit if you are in the area and (I think) is open everyday in the summer. There is a note on the door telling you where to get the key from if its locked.

[visited 19/4/3] Yet another hacked apart site with only sporadic clues left as to what on earth was actually here. It’s easy enough to find due to the large stone standing defiantly by the side of the road. I found further stones in the hedgerow & field to the North, where the OS map marks a few stones. My notes say 6 or 7 in hedge & 5 in the field, the OS map has 7 in the field.

As to what I think was here, well... 3 in the field seem to be in an arc, giving the other two as outliers or even a row. Presumably the howevermany in the hedge were dragged there from the field. And the one by the road?

One final note, I _think_ you could see Avebury from the one by the road.

This was a cleanup day around South London, visiting a few sites that I hadn't before. I had a good day for it and some pleasant company, so the day was an undoubted success. We did a loop from West to East, starting at Diana's Dyke, then Gally Hills, Croham Hurst and finally attempted to get onto Caesar's Camp.

Having done my list within the M25 and it was only 3pm, we headed outside to North Kent. First up was Squyerres Park but another nono, so we finished up at Oldbury again which is rapidly becoming a fav of mine.

All in all a nice productive day.

A quick word though, if you intend to do this South London wander, make sure you take in Morden Park at the start and Chislehurst Caves & Winn's Common at the end. Actually, depending on your start time, you might want to reverse the route as well. That way you can be first in to Chislehurst caves & set up the day nicely.

This was a cleanup day around South London, visiting a few sites that I hadn't before. I had a good day for it and some pleasant company, so the day was an undoubted success. We did a loop from West to East, starting at Diana's Dyke, then Gally Hills, Croham Hurst and finally attempted to get onto Caesar's Camp.

Having done my list within the M25 and it was only 3pm, we headed outside to North Kent. First up was Squyerres Park but another nono, so we finished up at Oldbury again which is rapidly becoming a fav of mine.

All in all a nice productive day.

A quick word though, if you intend to do this South London wander, make sure you take in Morden Park at the start and Chislehurst Caves & Winn's Common at the end. Actually, depending on your start time, you might want to reverse the route as well. That way you can be first in to Chislehurst caves & set up the day nicely.

This was a cleanup day around South London, visiting a few sites that I hadn't before. I had a good day for it and some pleasant company, so the day was an undoubted success. We did a loop from West to East, starting at Diana's Dyke, then Gally Hills, Croham Hurst and finally attempted to get onto Caesar's Camp.

Having done my list within the M25 and it was only 3pm, we headed outside to North Kent. First up was Squyerres Park but another nono, so we finished up at Oldbury again which is rapidly becoming a fav of mine.

All in all a nice productive day.

A quick word though, if you intend to do this South London wander, make sure you take in Morden Park at the start and Chislehurst Caves & Winn's Common at the end. Actually, depending on your start time, you might want to reverse the route as well. That way you can be first in to Chislehurst caves & set up the day nicely.

[visited 27/12/02] If ever a sacred site existed in Dorset this is it. Parking by Littlebredy farm (SY595883) at the mouth of the valley, I set off expecting a few large rocks in a field, I got a wonderful example of nature.

First off is the remains of a banked enclosure; guardpost, salesroom or temple, who knows. Then the train of stones starts, slowly at first like a small recumbent stone row and then it picks up as you head round into a small jumble of stones. Keeping on going the jumble continues into the undergrowth, not many stones visible, kinda like someone had created a freeform megalithic sculpture.

Then it happens, you reach a fence and on the other side is a huge number of stones stretching 1/2 a mile distant along the valley floor. There are some stones bigger than any upright in Dorset, just scattered about liberally. The stones go up one side of the valley wall and the suggestion to my mind is the hill to the left with these huge rocks poking out of it could be full of megaliths.

About half way along the valley floor is a cleared circular space about 15-20 metres across. Its not complete however as at least one stone pokes towards the centre, perhaps whoever cleared it stopped removing stones... It looks man-made and is I presume the 'mystical stone circle' the information board at the start of the walk talks about.

Heading back I spotted what could be another circle, though my brain may have been making circles out of anything at this point! This is at the end of the first field, just before the path heads to the right. You need to stand in the far corner from it to see some of the stones as they are hidden from the other direction by a small bank. This 'circle' is much smaller, maybe 2-3 metres across.