Elva Plain Stone Circle View all content for Elva Plain

Its been a really long time since I was last here, so long that I have no digital photos of Elva Plain, it must be near twenty years. As I remember I parked right near the farm and asked permission to park there while seeing the stones. This time I parked on the road just outside of the little Rake Wood, walked up the road, turned left and up to the farm, at 6.15am there was nothing doing so I walked on through to the field with the stone circle, and applied myself to the seeing of stones. The weather had been very favourable for the last few days, so standing at a stone circle on the spring equinox with a clear blue sky, I was cock of the rock, twirling in absolute splendor. On the western horizon the near full moon sank into a pink haze, it reminded me of a spring equinox at Ystumcegid in north wales many years ago, funny the effect a sky has on ones mind. While I was zooming at the full moon the sun broke into song behind me, I twirled once more and hurriedly crossed the circle, photo photo photo. At last, a successful equinox sunrise, you, me and the stones, it's not as good when one of us is missing. During the sunrise there was much birdsong, except for a skylark and blackbird I'm pretty ignorant of most of natures calls, but one stuck out in particular, it wasn't a bird, it was a Gibbon, it was doing it's morning territorial whooooooing and wowwwwwwing, a welcome addition to whats shaping up to be one of the good stony days out. The sun burst out of a notch on the horizon, made from a shoulder of Skiddaw and another hillside further away. The hills frame the whole western view, it made me wonder whether the sun used any other notches at either end, for solstices. But then looking behind me to the west it looked more of a sunset oriented site, a clear sight line to the sea, not ten miles away. The stones are low, possibly all knocked over, a couple of stones are mostly underground just breaking the surface like a small stone whale. By the biggest stone, half a dozen smaller stones huddle together for security, as if the bad man might come back again and another stone would go astray. If they could all be spread out once more the aesthetic of the circle would be much improved, but it is what it is. Bewildering sunrise dealt with I set about adequately photographing the circle, it's about now I should mention the rocky protuberance on the top of Elva plain hill, like Fitzcoraldo before me I saw it and thought "oooh proto temple". Should such things exist, that could be one. With camera on tripod and extended to it's fullest I wander round hoiking it up in the air for an elevated picture of the stones. It works well. On my way back to the car I surprised a small child in the farm, he wasn't expecting to see me that was for sure, his two dogs didn't seem to mind me and I tipped him my disarming smile, perfected over several decades of trespassing, I do it for a living you know.

Posted by postman 22nd March 2022ce

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