postman

It’s been a long time coming has this, there’s so many sites to see and frankly I just don’t get as many chances to get out like this as I once did. I can remember getting out stone hunting at least three times a week, no weather too dismal, any time of day or night, no where too far, always throwing caution to the wind. Not any more. So, when everything comes together, sunshine, money and free time in the right place, it is exceedingly gratifying.

I parked by the 12th century church of St Celynnin, put me boots on, slung my camera over my shoulder left my window wound down and walked off across the field to the church.Oops.
The information board at the Lords house declares it as one of Conwy’s best kept secrets, I don’t know about it being very secret but it is in a very lovely place, it brings out a feeling of reverence in me that I like, it does not come upon me often, indifference and disappointment are my constant bed fellows. Getting out among the hills and ancient structures are a cure, and I swallow the medicine happily.

From the church a short ten minute walk north east brings one to the feet of the rocky island, there is a path for those who follow such things, I as ever made my own way there. From below the outcrop to the right I can make out a low wall with a gap in it, sheep does as she was bidden and goes the way I pointed. Then I follow her up into the settlement.
Determining the age of the low wall, and indeed all of the walling here is extremely difficult, Stewart Ainsworth from time team could no doubt make more sense out of it all than I could. So I just make my way up to the top of the rocks, the highest point is a small walled enclosure of undetermined date about twenty yards across. A small linear outcrop has a basin carved into one end, and the outcrop leads past a large boulder and down into the lower level. I just cant make out what is ancient and what is natural or what is modern so I give up, I’ll take lots of pictures and folk can make up there own mind, should they posses one.
For now I am content to simply park my behind down on the high boulder at the top, legs swinging childishly over the edge. It is a truly wondrous view, as good as it gets on this little island. I try to make out where the burial chamber Hendre Waolod is, down in the fields across the river, behind me Tal y Fan rears it’s 2001 foot high peak, but north west is my next target for the day, I could of coarse spend the whole day here, quite happily. But then I’d be disappointed in not seeing the other places. So I leave, on the way down I stumble a touch and nearly fall head first down the rocky slope, is it Cerrig Y Ddinas having a go for not staying longer, now that’s anthropomorphising.

Several hours later I return to the car, and find all is well, nothing of report here, you don’t get that down in the valleys.

For Directions see Hafodty standing stone next door.

It is just a short five minute walk down the track from standing stone to stone circle, the track passes right through the circle, having as much effect upon it as a light wind brushing through a wintry tree. Three stones are up standing, and three fallen, one of the fallen was becoming consumed by a brutal gorse bush, but excessive stamping has freed it somewhat. Though I’m not sure which three stones are the fallen, the big split stone is I think too bulky and out of place to be a circle stone, but the fallen stone nearest the biggest standing stone is too close to it to be in place.
Walking round the circle at a distance I could see that the stones are on an artificial platform, walking round the place looking at it from as many angles as possible is the thing to do, placing it in it’s landscape, and all that. Most enjoyable.
The views are most enjoyable too, I particularly like the scene down past Conwy castle to Bryn Euryn hill fort.

Wow! a stone circle with no field notes, shit, what am I going to say....... I played with fairies here then went on a trip in a flying saucer after we had tea with the Queen of inner earth. Come to Hafodty stone circle and see if you experience anything ......untoward.

From Henryd, the small lanes heading east and uphill are only just navigable, they are tight and often steep covered with leaves and the odd slow moving tractor, they can be tricky for those not used to such places.
Basically, it’s straight east from Henryd, ignore right turn take the right fork, straight on ignore next right, then take next right again, go up here, all the way baby.
The standing stone is in the field beyond the one on your right, north. If you’ve got better eyes than me you might be able to spot it from the end of the lane.
You could now jump the fence and the next wall and you’d be there, in the same field as the stone, but it’s not easy getting over the wall. Better following the path, which is easy to find and to follow. But it still isn’t that easy to reach, over a gate and then one wall, whilst all the time keeping an eye out for the good sir farmer. Who was out and about screaming at his sheep as they blithely went the wrong way.

Upon entering the stones field I hunkered down in a corner and waited for farmer to get off his land, or at least further away from me, duly, he did as I wished and I strolled over to this lovely stone. There are many shapes a standing stone can take, this is the tall, slender, smooth, and circular-ish in plan type(bar one straight side). It has stripes on it too, from rubbing ruminants.
This is a brilliant stone, perfect in shape, a tall phallic missile. At the big stones foot is a smaller stone, much smaller, it is a dead ringer now for Menhir de Champ-Dolent in Brittany ( themodernantiquarian.com/site/9945/menhir_de_champdolent.html ) it’s just missing a few feet.
Something just has to be said about the view from the stone, It’s just on the edge of Snowdonia national park, so as you’d expect it’s not a bad view, as they go. West goes up hill so not much there, North is Conwy, river, town and castle. East is down in to the often misty Conwy river valley, and south is the profile of Cerrig Y Ddinas defensible hill top enclosure, and Tal y Fan.

A totally fabulous site, with lots of other nearby little beauties.

I have been wanting to come here for over four years ever since Gladman came on a sunny June day, well I finally made it but suffice to say it was not summer nor was it a sunny day, frankly it pissed down all day long, but my waterproofing laughs in the face of piss, and indeed precipitation.

Head out of Newton Stewart on the A714 heading for Girvan, after about 8 miles and reaching Bargrennan look for right turn with Glentrool village sign post. Go up this small road for less than a mile, park at track entrance into forest on the left.
Like an idiot I left the map in the car, but seeing as it’s been said that to find the chambered cairn you only need follow the way marked posts with a white arrow and strip at the top. I decided to put this to the test.
So, going up the main forestry track, turn left at white tipped post, smaller footpath up hill, turn left at white tipped post across a clearing, the stones can be seen from here, as can the next white tipped post. Turning right off a path another path leads shortly to the cairn in it’s own little clearing. Uncle Bob was a happy chappy.
Even in the constant drizzle I could see the beauty here, the mosses and lichens are on steroids here, the ferns that are mostly absent from all but Gladmans pictures were dying for the year but leaving the cairn covered in a vibrant reddy brown covering. The close nit trees all round the cairn sometimes have paths leading into them, dark corridors into god knows what kind of other worldly place.
The cairn is a very good one, Greywether tells us that the other chambered cairns round here are named after this one, the signature expression of Bargrennan type tombs.
The cairn is maybe five foot tall, and it’s central chamber has a passage facing I think south south east. We enter the chamber, the pair of capstones are just high enough to sit up under them, it is a whole lot drier than outside. On the back stone in the chamber on its lower left corner is what looks like a large cup mark but it is I think natural, but it wouldn’t have gone unremarked upon by it’s builders. Graffiti is still being added, this year in fact, utter turds!
Eric’s just about had enough now and he’s making his way slowly back to the main path, not saying lets go now but he’s being fairly transparent. Just another minute I shout over, a walk around the cairn looking for kerb stones and such revealed one large stone with a large cup shaped depression upon it, reminding me of the smaller one in the chamber.

Time to go now, a few other places on my wish list have to be ticked off today, but not all of them.
Still raining.

I’d wanted to check this pair out for years now, but, predictably, other places get in the way. So, with nowt to do on a Sunday afternoon I decided to nip out, pop up and see what could be seen.
I parked east of the hill at the end of the road by the transmitter aerial, walked back down the road and took the footpath left up the hill. It only took about fifteen minutes, following the path that goes up to the top, there are lots of intersecting tracks, paths and lines, just go up, and this will take you straight to the tumulus marked on the map.

The tumulus sticks out rather and is immediately recognisable as a tumulus, there is also a small walkers cairn on it’s top. But the cairn from here is not so distinct, it will take more searching down. From the tumulus I go for a short walk north west to look over the edge of the hill side and over to Moel Y Gaer hill fort, it looks good with the Vale of Clwyd behind it giving way to the Sea beyond, I can see the Little Orme and Gop hill from here too.
Back at the tumulus I sit atop the walkers pile and survey the surroundings near and far, I still cant see the cairn so I go off searching, first I walk north past the line of the trig point, the only thing there is the line of Clwydian hills with a pair of forts Penycloddiau being the nearest. So I jump the fence and go over to the trig point, it’s on a slight bump perhaps that’s the cairn. It’s not, but I think I can see a vague bump over to my right, before I take in the slight bump there are some large stones over by the fence next to a large puddle, probably from a destroyed stone circle no doubt.
Bump time, this turns out to be it, maybe a foot high and mostly grassed over but definitely the cairn. Some small stones can be seen, but mostly one can only see the transmitter, the mast, the aerial, what ever it is, it is really tall.
And that’s all about there is to it, big mast, tiny cairn and a half decent tumulus with some good views all round.

This is a very interesting site, but not easily seen as such from the roadside, it’s a barrow within an oval earthen enclosure (called a henge elsewhere, but the ditch is external) with linear earthworks running out of each side. Best seen from the air, especially in image 2 here........ map.coflein.gov.uk/index.php?action=do_advanced&extenttype=BOX&minx=315122&miny=375241&maxy=375284&maxx=315214 .......
I was fully aware of this site, it’s on the list of places to go, but, I didn’t know that when I was there or I would have stayed longer and tried harder to see it.
A strange and complicated place.

Do not come here if your looking to see something, Coflein say of this the southern of the three barrows........A probable barrow, one of three in the vicinity, c.20m in diameter and 0.5m high....yeah right.
Two out of three barrows are only half a meter high and the third is totally destroyed, even at half a meter they merge seamlessly with the surrounding terrain.
So, if your barrow watching in this part of North Wales don’t pick one at random from the map, have a look on Coflein first, like what I didn’t.

I parked the car in the car park that’s next to Llyn y Dywarchen, hoping to take a bit of a short cut, but we went the wrong way, turned right around the rock Clogwynygarreg instead of left, this took us into a very boggy area and we were forced to take a very circuitous route. But in the end we got to a place where we could see the route, just up a steep long winded slope from here.

In the distance before us there was a group of people, we aimed for them, they were on the path. By the time we got to where they were they had moved on up the path to the stile, a sit down later and we were on our way to the stile. Above the stile is Foel Rudd, a peak at the end of an arm coming off from Mynydd Mawr, it is high above us but 125 meters below the summit cairn. It was about here that I started to get really out of breath, and my legs got very heavy, it never used to be this hard. At the top of Foel Rudd the whole eastern side of the mountain opens out before us, Moel Eilio is from here just a stones throw from Craig Cwmbychan and it’s cairn, that one we’ll see later. Y Garn and the Nantlle ridge has opened out into the long and scary view that it is, the view to Snowdon across Llyn Cwellyn has been there all along dominating the view east.
After another short sit down we are making our way towards the still sitting walking group, which has turned out to be a group of women, huffing and puffing our way through their midst one of them comments upon my nice camera, but I’m too out of breath to utter anything more then uuuhuuhn in a thank you type noise, no energy to say she has a nice something or other, just enough energy to keep following Alken, one foot in front of the other.
The ground is now a wide ridge, on the right the ground falls away gently to Cwm Planwydd, but on the left Craig y Bera’s cliffs of certain death drop straight down to the ground far far below, across that valley Y Garn rises up into a dome like massiff, it has two great cairns upon it, running off from those two cairns the Nantlle ridge runs off terrifyingly wonderful towards another cairn upon Craig Cwm Silyn.
Whilst we’re looking over the cliffs of certain death, a woman joins us, we exchange pleasantries and move on some more, a woman on a mountain on her own ? not seen one of those before. It’s really not far to the top from here, breathing has returned to normal and the legs have attained their normal weight.

Way up at the top and the cairn is before us, nobody else is up here yet, so we get a few photos in before every one else comes. The views are amazing, from the Lleyn peninsula to Caernarfon, which I mistakenly took to be Bangor, one can see a very long way in all directions, and it is a feast for the eye. The cairn has spread far and wide, but enough remains for numpties to have constructed three large but low shelters out of it. We pick one and have our butties, they don’t even touch the sides. The lone woman has arrived and is now taking her own photos, a woman after my own heart, I wish. Then the group of women arrive and take over the largest of the shelters, then a mixed couple and then another, on our way down two more women pass us, is this a girl’s mountain, 9 out of 10 walkers were women, you don’t see that very often. How very refreshing.
The women have taken over the top of the mountain so we decide to take our leave, a few more photos and were off down the gentle slope to Craig Cwmbychan and it’s good looking cairn.

The walk down from Mynydd Mawr is very easy, just a summers strole down a gentle hill, contrasting highly with the walk up it. The cairn upon Craig Cwmbychan is visble from up on the higher summit, it was probably smaller than it’s near neighbour, seeing as it’s only been built into one shelter instead of three.
Standing back from the cairn in almost any direction you can almost kid yourself into believeing that it is still whole and full. But closer to and it has a small entrance into what would be very welcoming shelter from howling winds and sideways stingy face rain. But today the weather is behaving impeccably and the shelter is just a desacration, I almost want to push the stones in but I’m far too knackered, Alken is lying on his back and i’m sitting on a big flat stone of the cairn admiring the view.
The view is admirable, large and dark is the Snowdon massiff, across the valley is Moel Eilio, itself crowned by a large cairn, a ridge runs from Moel Eilio in the direction of Snowdon. Across the hill tops we can see the distant Carneddau and the peak of Tryfan. The cairns on Y Garn and the Nantlle ridge float ethereally above a low arm of Mynydd Mawr. Craig Cwmbychan cairn sits right on the edge of it’s ridge, below it the ground gives way sharply down.
As good as this cairn is and as good as the view is it is still time to go, instead of making our way back up to Mynydd Mawr and going back the way we came, we struck off in a more direct route, going down at 45 degrees, through thick heather, large rocks, and hidden streams, it was not the right way at all.

As soon as the A55 duel carriage way fully opened, North Wales got a whole lot closer, on a good day the Clwydian range is just an hour away, and Snowdonia another half hour. So you can imagine how many times Ive passed by within a hundred feet of this large barrow, but the short cut to it is fraut with many perils, consequently it’s taken half my adult life to stop and run across the road for a quick look and go see.
To be fair there is a less dangerous route to it from the west by the roundabout and Cafe, but it is twice as far to walk as the short cut, the lazy git in me always prefers a short cut, there just so much shorter.
So, you come off the A55 at the Caerwys junction, like your heading for the Mcdonalds, but go past it (unless your hungry), and park on the left by an entrance to a small nature preserve. Cross over the road and jump the bramble ridden barbed wire topped fence into the field. Cross the field, going towards the A55, jump the fence and your next to the road, four lanes and a central barrier now need to be crossed. Here comes the peril, close your eyes tight shut, wait for the sound of racing cars to die down and run across waving yor hands wildly in the air. It’s just an option.
As we waited for a brake in the traffic a police car went past and I wondered if this was legal, having made it safely to the other side another fence jump and were just fifty yards from the barrow.
It’s a big barrow, sat upon a slight ridge overlooking the Vale of Clwyd and the highly forted mountain range there. It has a very good view to the south and a better one to the west.
If you stand in the right place the top of the barrow is a foot higher than me, and on the other side of it a foot shorter than me. If you stand on the top of the barrow you can see Mcdonalds.
There are many other barrows in the vicinty some up to three meters tall, some with ditches, some in bunches, and some in bushes. In the trees immediately south east is an ancient enlosure of undetermined (by Coflein) date.
I’ll be back.

My first time here was slightly hampered by small children and knock ‘em over winds, seven years later in thick sunshine I’m back for a full circuit, and a gander at that restored cairn. The walk from car to hill fort entrance is no more than fifteen minutes, it’s all up and the views expand accordingly. The entrance to the fort isn’t as impressive and imposing as the rest of the fort would suggest, that’s mainly because it isn’t the actual entrance, but rather the route of the Offas Dyke path. There are two entrances, both on the east side, so that’s the route I take, counter clockwise. The single bank starts off quite low and mellow, steadfastly it follows the edge of the hill up and over hillocks and spurs, in one place a massive hollow is come across, but the bank carries on. But by the time I reach the only entrance I can say is definitely an entrance they have grown to at least six feet in height.
Some shenanigans have taken place here at the entrance, a massive strip of grass has been removed and covered in a wooden fence, laying horizontal over the scar, a big pile of plastic covered something has been placed in the inner ditch, from the rubble taken from the forts defences someone has created a small throne, shenanigans I tell you.
The walk along the eastern ramparts is now gaining in some more height, the views to the east are long but a bit flat and farmy, there are also two banks now. Wheeling in the far distant sky is a Red Kite, an unmistakeable silhouette against the deep blue of the sky, this is the farthest north I’ve seen them.
Now the north end of the fort has been achieved the ramparts have grown in number again, four there are now, and very good they look too covered in unusually bright pink heather, in fact, over half the fort is covered in pink heather. From here I can just see the trig point on Moel Y Parc, behind which is a barrow and a cairn, I’ll have to go there one day and see if there’s much difference between the two. I stop off here for a look at the restored cairn, and decide that it is a very loose restoration, it looks good but longevity has eluded it’s restorers. Turning south I retrace the kids and mine steps from seven years ago, two large banks make it most of the journey down the west end, punctuated by a slight and possibly modern entrance with a stile, and some fairly convincing round house platforms. Then it’s back up to the false entrance at the south end and the view beckons us on to the next hill fort over Moel Arthur, but I went up there not long ago and it’s almost tea time ive gotta go. So I go.
This is a superb hill fort, one of the largest in Wales I suspect, and that cairn needs to be seen before it fades back into the well trodden hill top.

When I came here in 2007 I stood right next to if not on top of this bronze age cairn, and never noticed it. Of course I noticed there was the predictable small walkers pile of stones on the highest ground but, apart from that I remained clueless. Until Thesweetcheat went up there and found that the thing had been restored, of course that means I’ll have to go back for another look, four years it took since I found out about it. Not bad.
The cairn is right at the northern tip of the fort of the same name, and right next to one of the busiest footpaths in North Wales. It looks good but I’m not sure about it though, the stones of the kerb are loose and simply placed on the ground in a circle around the slight mound. Some of the stones have already started to spread, I replaced a few but they leave a big brown mark where the grass has died. Honestly, I cant really see it remaining long in the shape it is now, which is a shame because it looks good, from a distance.

I all but saved this one to the last, Kercado is the one that got away last time, the one that nagged at me most for not seeing it. So I cleared our schedule grabbed the camera and torch and promised the kids some crepes, mmmmm pancakes.
It didn’t go down well to find the age old creperie had been bought and turned into a curry house, Rogan Josh ? in the middle of the afternoon ?
The kids said no.
So we made our way over to the Tumulus, an underwhelming description if ever I heard one, and paid the disinterested youth. In receipt of said pay we received a quickly translated into English pamphlet about the “Tumulus”, so, armed to the teeth with information and exploratory tools we entered the woods.
A sign by the paying entrance fee area on the wall proclaimed the tumulus to be 4500 Before JC, Jimeny Cricket, now that’s an old place.
The bright and breezy walk through the trees took but a minute before we were brought face to face with Carnac’s beating heart. Perhaps, certainly maybe definitely the oldest of all the amazements currently found around Carnac, Spaceship mark says it’s 4800 years BC, Bloomin Crikey that’s an old place.
As we approached the entrance to the tomb a couple came out and went off round the back, giving us the chamber to ourselves for a while, we went inside. Carnac’s beating heart had a puddle in it, the analogy lost a bit there, then Eric hit his sister and he got sent outside to find a naughty step to sit on. Honestly, even in here ?
But neither stumbling splashes nor minor miscreants could mar this moment, I admired the huge floating capstone above us and I searched for carvings, but I couldn’t find them, perhaps the pamphlet could shed some light on them, oh right.. Eric’s got it.
Found during excavations were flint, diorite and jadeite axes, and middle and late neolithic pottery, restored in 1925. Jane says now that it’s as old as 5000bc, that’s 7000BP, Bum pack that’s an old place, and getting older all the while apparently.
I wish I could’ve stayed there for ages, but someone was hanging round the entrance, obviously our time was up, come in number 42.
So we followed the stone circle around the tumulus, people rarely go around the back, and here in the woods we found a good arc of small to medium stones. Burl says of the circle , it is an incomplete misshapen ring of 27 stones (we didn’t see that many), graded in height from a six footer at the ESE, the best preserved arc is at the south, there are no stones at the north, he strangely doesn’t mention the surmounting pillar, which must have gone up around the same time as the circle, I’m presuming. I wonder how far down it goes, does it touch the capstone ? what did it all look like before it was restored ? what did it all look like when the stone circle and menhir was put up ? Why does Doctor who always pick fit young girls to take to exotic locations ? they never fully appreciate it.

This is an absolute wonder of a place, somewhere to see in all seasons in all weathers, so with an afternoon in summer under our belts we pick Eric up from his naughty step and leave.
Our ferry tomorrow leaves at 11am, and it could take as long as eight hours to get there, so we leave in the middle of the night in the most torrential rain you’ve ever seen, got back into England to find scorchio sunshine, then we ran out of petrol with no money, aaargh, pain is the cleanser, pain is the cleanser!!!

This is the third and last of the three main alignments (heading east) . Thirteen rows of 555 stones running for only 250 meters, the tallest of which is 13 feet tall, I say only when comparing it with the other two sets of stones.
The smaller wooded alignments of Petite Menec are a further 3 to 4 hundred meters east.
Fences kept me away from the stones and a tour guide party just emptied itself out onto the road side, they’re all over the place, I’m off to see the dolmen. The wonderful dolmen of Kercado.

This cromlech is actually rectangular, and forms the starting point of the Kerlescan stone rows. Fenced off from the multitudes access is only by small guided tours. I intended to come back later in the evening for a wee sneak but never gone the chance. So I only saw it from the road, fleetingly, between tourists and stables.
Fortunately Sir Aubrey (why not) describes it thoroughly, abbreviated thus...........
Tall granite pillars in a rectangle 78m x 74m, on the right side, from the road, the east side of the rectangle is a straight line of 18 stones, the south side nearest the road is a shallow convex arc of 11 stones, the left west side is equally convex and also of 11 stones. There are no stones at the north side, but close to it is a neolithic long mound called a tertre with a tall menhir at it’s western egde. The three sided structure is therefore more of a horseshoe.

I wish I’d had time to come back later, it sounds a very curious site.

The Kermario alignments are my favourite of these three road side alignments, they’ve got several things going for them, the dolmen in the corner of the field, the ruined windmill that’s been turned into a very effective look out point, eleven hundred meters of rows of megaliths, we shouldn’t call these stones because it doesn’t have the word mega in it. Then when you think your going stone blind, when your seeing stones every where and feeling punch drunk on the old stuff, you can take a break have a crepe and a beer and buy postcard or a porcelain dolmen. Then head back out into the utter nonsense that is the Carnac stone rows. Do make sure you take a look at the dolmen in the corner it shouldn’t be overlooked and the windmill ruin is definitely the best place to appreciate the megaliths.
At the end of the Kermario rows is the right turn that takes you to the Kercado tumulus. The mustest of sees.

I was following road signs to get to Carnac from the D768 near Mane Kerioned, I wasn’t sure where in Carnac it would take me, so I sat back and enjoyed the evening. It was about 9pm and we’d had a long day, the sun was sinking below the trees but not the horizon, but I just wanted to “do” the stone road, the D196, the road that passes all the stone rows.

So there I was taking my time, minding my own business driving down just another country lane, when the trees either side of the road gave way to open fields, open fields with more standing stones than you’ve ever seen in one place in your life, I guarantee it.
I immediately knew where I was, at the far west end of the Menec rows, 400 meters away from the Cromlech that starts the stone rower heading east.
I had to quickly pull over at the side of the road, we were in the rows, the road cuts straight through it all, abominable I know, but it’s done, and where else in the world can you park your car in a world heritage site, cant be many.
I pulled the car round the corner and parked in a more proper layby, jumped out and twoddled over the road to the fence that still keeps summer visitors out. Slack jawed incomprehension, speechless, and utterly mystified I took just two pictures and returned to the car.
“Have you seen all them stones” I asked the kids,
They admitted that they were hard to miss,
“and they carry on for another two miles right next to this road” I enthused, this got them,
“Really? why? ”
Aint that the question that keeps you going.

This Allee Couverte is situated right by the side of the road on the D196 or Route de Kerlescan (or the stone road), so it really cant be missed, despite all the lovely long rows of stones.
But, it’s on the wrong side of the fence, the fence that keeps people from wandering at will among the stones. Still, it’s a very half hearted fence only waste high, easily jumped in a moment even by , say, a twelve year old boy.
Four large white rounded stones lie across the waste high orthostats and traces of the cairn still cling to the sides of these. It has the almost obligatory south east facing entrance, whether the winter solstice sun shines down the passage like nearby Kercado I couldn’t say. Perhaps it was enough just to point the right way.
Because of the fence cutting the stones off from the road the surrounding flora has really flourished, ferns, grasses, a bit of gorse and buttercups on grass inside the dolmen.
We were going to come back later in the evening when everyone not obsessed has returned to their normal holidaying activities, but something came up and we never made it.
Out of season would be most ideal, i believe it is open to the wanderer out of season, but exactly when that it is I’m still a touch unclear. Mid October would be nice.

Just south of Plouharnel on the D781 to Carnac, another dolmen throwing itself in front of me, so what can one do but swerve dangerously into the adjacent farm entrance, and dump the car for a very short while.
Leaving the kids in the car for a few minutes I carefully legged it across the busy road for a quick sniff about. Sometimes having an ancient site right next to a house can be a bit disheartening, but this one is right by a house and so close to the road that it looks like it’s playing frogger, a simple spirit might mistake it for a bus stop.
Were it anywhere else it would be fabulous, a nice big capstone held up with uprights pointy and squat, with cairn material or dry stone walling at the back of the chamber. Next time I come to Brittany I’m not going to bother with a hotel I’m going to sleep rough in a dolmen, a different one every day. Not sure what the kids are going to do though..

When I were a lad at school, my two favourite books in the library was a Fabulous beasts book and an Ancient mysteries book, in the latter was the Carnac stone rows and a dolmen, this one, at Crucuno. So this was perhaps the first dolmen I was ever aware of, and now 32 years later, here I am, and I can scarcely believe it. They say that you should never meet your heroes, but I say tosh and cobblers, get in your car and get your arse into gear, go, go now.

It’s as simple as driving on the wrong side of the road to find, and many and much parking places to be had just yards away. It was taller than most other dolmens we’ve seen, no bowing and crouching here. The way the capstone fits onto the uprights, and the way they are set into the ground makes it feel to me to be a perfect example of whatever type of dolmen it is, a show room model.
The house next door, very next door, is still dilapidated, signs tell us of it’s dangers, either tear it down or fix it up, please.
I’ve heard it said that the village idiot used to live here, what ? with that great big puddle ? poor chap. But the village idiot is a bit not nice, I prefer another way I’ve heard of describing him, a simple spirit. Could’ve been talking about me.

There is not much I can add to Ravenfeather’s notes, except maybe that it’s located half way between Elven and Tredion on the D1, west of the road, there is room to park for maybe four cars. A five minute walk through some very pretty woods.
This was another one of those places when you see a picture of it and you know that if you get the chance you’ve got to go for it. We had the chance, in fact it was very close to Vannes where we were staying so we went for it. I’ve gone a bit out of order adding these pics and notes, this was in fact the last place we went to before we came home. But ive added them next to Ty Ar Chorriket because the two are very similar except of course for the big capstone, it’s like they combined two different ways of building a burial chamber. Which is I like.
It’s not marked on my map, but it is well worth the minimal effort involved. Could have stayed here a while but daughter is in the car waiting and it’s nearly tea time.

Wow!
From Duarnenez follow the D7 west, looking for a right hand turn that almost goes back on itself, signposted from there. There is quite a large parking area next to the path that leads to the woods, about 50 yards distant is the information board, you can see the front section of the Arc Boutee from here 20 yards away.
Wow!
This is another place Moth and Jane made me go to, just one look at it and I knew that the next time I get the chance I’m definitely going there. As far as the kids were concerned we were going to a big aquarium today, but of course I could squeeze in a couple of burial chambers and a couple of menhirs too.
It was fairly early in the morning and my two little bundles of joy were sleepy in the car so I had the place to my self.
Wow!
They’re just bonkers in Brittany aren’t they, you don’t get stuff like this at home, not even close.
The early morning sun filtered through the canopy above, a few birds were singing but it was otherwise silent, it doesn’t get much more perfect.
The stones were slightly bigger than I was expecting, there was enough room to actually get in and shuffle along the passage on your haunches. There are also many other stones scattered around, but I only went about fifty yards away.
I love it, the improbable way it’s all put together, the kerb stones pointing away from the passage make it have a W appearance head on. It is just so absurd and fantastic.
Wow!
If you are in the area, or even if your not, we weren’t, make this a must see, it is a delight to behold. I cant understand why Castel Rufel is more famous

Today we have been to Brest, to Oceanopolis, Brittany’s biggest aquarium, our hotel in Vannes is about a hundred miles away. In between the two, more or less, is Ty Ar Boodigay. Ever since Moth and Jane went there nearly five years ago, the name has been rattling round my head, and, even if the precise picture of it had faded in my mind the memory of a perfect chambered cairn had remained, I must see it, I decided, next time I’m in the area (like I come here all the time?).

It is a drive of over forty miles from Brest to Brennelis and I’d be needing some petrol, so I chose to go along the main N12 duel carriageway from Brest to Morlaix, but there was not one petrol station (at home I’d have passed at least three), very close to running out I went into Morlaix, a big town, but not big enough to have a petrol station though. I thought of going to Barnenez cairn instead, but stuck to my guns, in the end I found a petrol station after much panicking and flustering, and soon we were heading south on the right road, with petrol a plenty. Bloody Frenchies.
Brennelis is a very small town in Brittany’s rocky hilly interior, it is as hilly as it gets in Brittany but it’s nothing like Snowdonia or owt, a bit like Bodmin moors high places.

The official car park quickly passed us by on our left, so we turned back and parked up, it was a big area but we were all alone. Nice.
The chamber is visible under a tree and close to the car, half a minutes walk. The back end of the chamber is arrived at first, something has been removed from the side of the chamber and you can scramble in through the wide gap.
But I like to walk all the way round before I go in, but all the way round can’t be done because of a low wall that slightly truncates the barrow, that and a bit of graffiti inside are all that’s wrong with it.
Around the front is the entrance, and it is a wide and welcoming entrance that beckons you in, I suspect that a cap stone or two may be missing from the very front. Inside it is dry, light and airy, and there is a standing stone. What ?
Where have I seen one of those before ? well Bryn Celli Ddu for a start, and like that one the stone is not structural in any way, very mysterious.
It’s late in the afternoon now and it’s almost time to go, it has been a perfect time here at Ty Ar Boudiket, a picnic would be ideal, a cold beer or two sublime.
Swallows squealing round, warm dappled sunlight filters down through the trees, it is lovely lovely lovely, I am very sad to have to leave, but I’m already looking forward to the next time , and the holidays not over just yet.

Just 8km away from Kerloas, these two sites were very high on my wish list, the 1st and 3rd tallest stones in Brittany. There was much more in the area I wanted to see, but these damn French roads are perfectly designed to take you in the opposite direction to the way you want to go. After the big Aquarium at Brest (titter) we got horribly messed about, I’ve developed a special hatred for French road designers, they are all manner of unrepeatable
swear words. A pox upon them.
But, the ancient Bretons must be applauded for their stone shifting efforts, it is nothing short of superhuman. Few places in Britain or the rest of the world can be compared to Brittany. It is the stuff of dreams come true. The biggest stones in the world, the highest concentration of stones and dolmens anywhere. One cannot enthuse about the place enough.
The French have tried really hard to make the rest of the place a nightmare though, they’ve taken all the best ideas the modern age has to offer then fluffed it up royally.

Oh yes the stones, they’re allright I suppose.

Trip advisor indeed.

Parking is easy, finding the signposted duo is easy. Eric elected to go barefoot, he’s turned a bit feral so far from home. From the corner of the field the up right menhir is arrived at first, it is only a little shorter than Kerloas and Dol, but you’d need a tape measure and some extending ladders to prove it.
Tall and lean and made of stone, it is a perfect example of a menhir.
But the other stone has had an accident, it’s fallen over, not all the way though, you can get onto the stone and walk all the way to it’s tip, thus making an inspection of the tip of the stone ultra easy. Eric and me sat with our legs dangling over the edge, swinging back and forth, like kids do. We stayed until someone else came, a little man with a big camera, over compensating some might say, we gave him the field and headed off to Morlaix, after getting turned around in Brest (tiiter) again.

Kerloas, the field of sadness, grief or mourning, which ever meaning you take it is not a happy place.
But today it is a very happy place, I have the stone all to myself, but should we call it a stone ? it is made of stone, granted, but a tall thin mountain would be more like it.
Is this the tallest standing stone in the whole world ? excepting Egyptian obelisks, which to my mind don’t count. If it isn’t, ive yet to hear of a bigger one. Some say it is 9.5 meters high, which is exactly what they say of Champ Dolent menhir, so it is equal first place, but then Kerloas has been truncated, cut short by as much as two meters, the broken bits apparently carted away by local farmer.

As I walk around I cant help smiling at the incredulous hugeness of it, 350 tonnes, dragged over 3km and then stood upright. Blammo, is your mind intact, nowhere near.
The two bumps carved on its lower flanks are very intriguing, his and hers fertility rubbing points, tosh I’d say, I tried, I’m too short by nearly a foot. So I decided it was for medicinal purposes, I rubbed my back where I had my operation and I’m glad to say that it does not hurt at all, it could just be good doctormanship instead though.

Not far from the big car park, very easy to find, well, your not going to miss it are you.
I combined it with a trip to Oceanopolis, Brittany’s biggest aquarium, the kids loved it.

It was getting late now and I was on my way back to the hotel, but as I was driving past I saw a sign saying Mane Lud Dolmen, and like I said, when a dolmen throws itself in front of you, it is impossible to resist a quick look, and it was I’m afraid to say a very quick look.
I came at it from the opposite direction to Moth and Jane, who seem to have been every where around here. The parking place is large, room for twenty cars at least. The path goes off towards some houses, it takes maybe five minutes from car to dolmen. It is a weird path, going where you don’t expect it to, it ended in a small cul de sac, the dolmen is just round the corner. The mound is massive, this is another one of Copes Carnac Grand Tumuli. But the chamber can be accessed now, and it’s a doozey. Roofed over by a whopping but broken capstone, the chamber is accessed via some modern steps at the far end of the big tumulus. The property next door has built their shed right next to the chamber, it forms one side of the passage into the chamber. It was really getting dark now and I didn’t have time to inspect the interior thoroughly, if I did I would have seen some faded ancient carvings. Oh well, next time, for there will be a next time, ive still only seen half of what the Carnac region has to offer.

Our fantastic Mr Cope groups Er Grah together with six other big tumuli, calling them the Carnac Grand tumuli, it is a phrase I cannot find elsewhere (granted I haven’t tried very hard) so it must be one of his own, possibly.
If it is of the same ilk as Mane er Hroek and the tumulus St Michel then the chamber would have never been able to be entered, they buried the chamber beneath tonnes of Cairn with no passage, so no getting in.
The chamber here, is just visible, the capstone sits proudly just above the cairn. The capstone is again taken from a toppled menhir, but whether it is from Le Grand menhir Brise is a matter for discussion.
There is still no way of getting under the capstone, nor even to try and peak through any gaps as there is no cairn climbing allowed. I know ive sneaked in and there is no one here to tell me off, but some sensitivities remain, and anyway, I’m trying to keep my head down.
The cairn is a massive construction, even now, but originally it would have been much higher, perhaps twice as high as the capstone. Much stone robbing has occurred.
My advice is to get here early, be the first through the door, pay your money, stay a while, and don’t be afraid to stray onto the grass. Bloody Frenchies.

Due to sneaking in after hours there would be no getting into the Table des Marchants, which is a shame, I tried the gate blocking the entrance but it was of course locked. Ive been in before, but there was a sign saying no photography, like an idiot I obeyed the sign now I have no photos of it’s wondrous interior.

But is it wondrous ? Older pictures of it show it as a simple, massive, but simple dolmen. But today there is a long passage, impressive entrance, and strange stepped cairn covering it all, it all looks great, but its very modern. The dolmen was covered solely to protect the carvings, so, what they’ve done is erect a modern folly over an awesome megalithic site, I think I might have preferred it the way it was.

From Mane Rutual I walked up the road to the gate where you can look over it at the three marvels here, Er Grah, Table Des Marchands and Le Grand Menhir Brise. From the gate the big broken stone is tantalisingly close, there was no one around, so, like a very bad boy I jumped over the gate in a trice and had the trio to myself.
If I’d paid to go in I wouldn’t have been able to walk on the grass, touch the stone, or even have a good look around it. But as it’s after closing time there would be no getting into the Marchants table.
It’s all about give and take, ive given Brittany over a thousand pounds, I wanna see the stones and no little gate is gonna stop me. Am I a bad ass or just determined?

Le Grand Menhir Brise was the biggest standing stone in France, possibly in Europe, only Egyptian obelisks are taller, but I don’t really class them as standing stones. If you know of a bigger one please let me know. It may have stood 14 meters high, if it ever stood at all. Some parts of the broken stone have been removed to be capstones for nearby and not so nearby dolmens.
The four remaining pieces are most impressive, and no matter where you are in the complex your eye keeps being drawn back to the great broken stone.
Three pieces are still in such a position that you can see they still lie where they fell, but the fourth and biggest piece has somehow twisted around and away from the other three. It is difficult to imagine where the parts that were removed came from as the four parts seem to fit together.
It is a most perplexing and mysterious thing. Oh, and it’s very very big.

The kids had made some friends at the hotel and their parents granted me two hours leave to go see some stones, so with no small amount of glee I bombed it over to Locmariaquer. Followed the signs for Table des Marchands, went straight past it, turned right at the cemetery down a very thin road until I saw the sign for Mane Rutuel. Parking here is precarious to say the least, there is not much room at all.
A path leads you in between some houses and past their gardens, there was someone at the burial chamber before me, so I strolled as slowly as I could. That’s the thing about sites around Carnac, you very rarely get the place to yourself unless your there out of season, but I guarantee that they never stay long. The young English family didn’t even go in, what’s the point ?
This long Allee Couverte sits in an area barely big enough to contain it, there is just enough room for three to walk abreast around it. After walking around it I bent low and passed through the entrance.
There is a lot of concrete here, more concrete than in any other site ive seen here, it’s not particularly pretty. The passage opens out slightly into a round-ish chamber, tall enough to stand upright in. But beyond the round-ish chamber is the concrete chamber, it seems cut off from the rest of the monument, like it wasn’t used at all, almost all the wall stones are concrete, graffitied and littered. It is best appreciated from the outside, where the concrete is almost invisible.
The massive capstone that sits at the end of the passage is truly gargantuan, the carved human figure on it’s under side was not visible to me, mostly because I didn’t know it was there. Was this capstone one of the menhirs from the alignment up the road ? it is very rectangular, unlike most other Carnac Menhirs. So I don’t know.
But that is where I’m going now, even though it’s closed for the day.

As we attained the furthest reaches of the Kerzerho alginments a sign quietly and confidently pointed the way to Mane Braz. I cant resist it, how far can it be down some footpath, not far surely. We quickly use an adjacent corn field for it’s universally accepted “other use” and set off down the thin tree lined pleasant foot path. Every now and then a stone can be seen in the trees, soon there are a dozen or so stones off to our right, these upon later inspection turn out to be the Alignment de Kerjean. We take a quick look but soon are back on the path to Mane Braz.
Ten minutes in and we come to a crossroads in the forest, we go straight on, well, I thought, this is definitely further than I anticipated.
Following a couple far in front we veer off the main path, there is no sign, but it has that feeling.
The big main dolmen comes into view first, it is a large complicated affair. Two entrances there are, one in what I presume to be the front, and one on its left hand side, it seems very much intact, there is even cairn material clutching to it’s sides.
That I thought would be it, but there’s more, a second dolmen is just twenty feet away, with its unroofed entrance facing the same way as the side entrance to the other dolmen. This second dolmen has two capstones, but this maybe broken.
There’s more, a third very low passage oriented in the same direction as the others, only one capstone remains at it’s far end, it is very low.
Then there is a little bit more, beyond the third low dolmen is another low passage leading to an unroofed chamber, it is also very low, because of the undergrowth I couldn’t tell which way the passage went , but I think it went in the opposite direction of the other three entrance ways.
But the big main dolmen was the best of the bunch, apparently the whole group would have been enclosed and covered by a single mound, how cool would that be.

You get so much out of this place, it is a show stealer, we stayed too long and had to jog back as my daughter was left in the car with no more company than an ipod.

From Dolmen du Rondosec I carried on up the D781 towards Erdeven, it is impossible to miss the stone rows as the road goes right through them, the tall stones will be crowding round on your left and right as you drive through them, extracting from me various whooa’s and woww’s. These are impressive.

There is a large free car park, and the stones are right next to it. The stones are fence free, those wicked Frenchies have fenced off most of the Carnac stone rows but these are warm and welcoming, and always approachable. I mingled and wandered freely, there are many tall and shapely stones, but unless your looking down a row they can appear higgledy piggledy and random. Understandably I soon went stone blind, a small stone kept following me round asking strange questions, it said it was called Eric, I told it I had a son called Eric, he was here somewhere.
To escape the stone blindness, and the other people we walked off down a shady footpath, there is I think just one row left to follow through the trees. Over the hedge I could see a team of six or so metal detectorists. I wondered if they were officialdom or shameless antiquity thieves, then I wondered if there was much difference.
The path we were following soon widened out and revealed one of the best places in megalithic Brittany.
The shady trees let enough light through their thinly leaved canopy so it wasn’t glum and oppressive, they were also tall, but only just taller than the standing stones that stood beneath them. There was only two standing up but there was also two lying down. they were all giants, these are Les Geants de Kerzerho, and they are mighty.
One of the fallen stones is very rectangular and blockish, but the other one is very worn on its top edge, now that it’s laid flat it’s got worn some more, now it resembles a mini canyon system. Only you can get close to it, onto it, into it, usually it’s many feet above your head but you can get close to a part of stone hunting that is usually out of reach.
The tallest stone looks as though it’s about to fall apart at any moment, struck by lightning maybe, or re-ercted and stuck back together, I dont know, but it is a good one.
We keep on walking, but soon we run out of stones, there is one last giant and then the foot path goes off to who knows where.
Well a sign points to Mane Bras, “ooh” I think,
“I wonder how far that is?”
It was quite far actually, but the stone rows of Kerjean are on the way so it wasn’t dull.

From Plouharnel, take the D781 north west to Erdeven. In a few hundred meters a sign will point you left down a small side road, the Dolmens are behind the houses of the main road, parking is right next to the big mound.
When we got there, there was some Germans looking round, so I got out of the car slowly and quietly, so as not to spook them. I strolled round the perimeter of the round sandy mound, it’s about twenty meters across. Soon enough fritz was had completed his perusal and gone off back to his home-made motor home, and I was left on my own. I could hear the kids laughing in the car, Swifts screamed and reeled about overhead, the sun was no longer at it’s hottest, all was right with the world.
The big mound contains three Dolmens within it’s structure. The eastern most of the three internal structures is mostly covered by capstones, within the end chamber is a small side cell in the corner.
The middle tomb is is perhaps the best and biggest. The chamber is pretty much a wider extension of the passage, the capstone is big and the floor is dry, so I sit and enjoy the comparative silence.
The third eastern most tomb is later and much smaller than the other two. The chamber is unroofed and full of earth, it would not be more than three feet wide. The capstones still left over the passage are so low that no egress is possible.
What a fantastic thing this is, so very very old and still so intact, despite the sunny seaside town nipping at it’s heels.

There is a footpath from the Cromlech to these alignments but if you are vigorously opposed to walking get the car turned round and turn left back onto Rue de Kerbourgnec then at the T junction turn left and the stones are nearly two hundred meters on your left.
I promised the kids there might well be stones near the beach but there will be no walking, so far the stones have not disappointed. There was no walking at all for them as they are staying in the car, leaving me to wander hither and thither with the only contention being some young Frenchies smoking an electronic cigar on the bench at the side of the plot, but every time I wanted to take a picture there was always a wide stone to block them out.
Twenty three or four stones stand arrayed in five interrupted rows, arranged in a fan shape. But today they align on nothing more than modern suburbia.

These are very good stones, tall, wide, twisted and gnarled, they are very shapely stones, very bright stones , it seemed to me they would not look out of place at Avebury somewhere. One stone reminded me of Maen Penddu in North Wales. I wonder how many have been lost, I read somewhere that they once went down into the sea and out again the other end of the bay, but seeing as that’s eleven miles away near Arzon, it’s preposterous.......isn’t it ?
A great and mellow site, and a corner shop down the road, probably.

I came directly from Dolmen Roh an Aod, down the D768 whilst looking for left turn Rue de Kerbourgnec, then it’s immediately left again into stone circle avenue/Rue Du Cromlech, just say what you see.
Parked on the road outside some nice houses across the road from the stones, no prizes for spotting the stones here.
This is both amazing and terrible, look at all those stones, there’s more than enough to get your megalithic pulse going, they are big enough to demand respect, if this were complete it would be astonishing. But.
But look at what they’ve done to it, it’s been incomplete for so long that they aren’t even sure whether it was a complete stone circle or a horseshoe open to the east.
The house or what ever place inside the circle stops you from getting in the circle, you can only see the stones from one side, the fence is so close to them.
But then i’m used to the wilder parts of our country, where you can walk for miles with out even seeing a house, all these houses are, well, they’re undesirable, to say the least, unless of course you live there.
But the stones are ace, and it’s brilliant to see them at all.

JC’s directions got me there perfectly and without incident, as you pass the very small right hand turn off you can see the dolmen, but keep going to the large apparently free car park.
How utterly ridiculous and yet completely brilliant this strange little dolmen is. I cant imagine what saved it from the greedy little stone wrecking paws of the local inhabitants, lightning strike ? conscientious clergy man ? or loud booming words from above ? what ever, it is here, and one would hope for a lot longer.
I have not seen a dolmen constructed in this way before, most curious, the entire edifice is corbelled. Some burial chambers have corbelled roofing and we think that’s pretty good, but the builders of Roh-an-Aod decided to make the whole structure a lesson in corbelling. You cant help trying to guess how many roof stones are missing, we got it to be anywhere between one and three. Was there a passage ? or was it always straight into the large circular chamber.

When Eric and me got there, a car was being unloaded into the house with the external stairs that one has to climb in order to get “that” picture, looking down into it. So we waited and he drove off, but the house is far from deserted these days, so a quick up and down, vroooaaum, and were done. Were off to the beach now, one that just happens to be by a stone circle and some stone rows, vroooaaum.

It’s very easy to find this site, it’s off the D767, follow signs for Larcuste (Google dictionary wants to change this to Testicular). It’s a tiny village, when the road turns hairpin sharp left, stop and park at the corner of the field on your right, room for maybe three cars.
Barely a five minute walk around a field next to a field full of corn, they like corn fields round here.
Then there they are, two little beauties. There used to be, once upon a time, four cairns here but two are no longer showing at all above ground, and the two that are here have been restored, some time ago.
But it doesn’t matter, I love these two, they remind me very much of some Cornish sites, Bosilack, Brane or maybe it’s the flora that grows upon them, either way they are sweet and beautiful little cuties.
They are arranged north and south of each other upon a very slight hill top, they call this a hill top ?
I’ll show them when I get home.
The southern cairn is entered from the east, a passage leads for maybe twenty five feet, off both sides are three chambers, six in all, in case my descriptive powers are too limited. The three on the south side of the cairn still have their capstones, on the north side one chamber is covered the next is half covered and the third is not covered .

The north cairn has two passages entered from the east again, leading to separate circular chambers. The southern chamber is not covered at all, but the northern chamber is, it has a large undulating capstone with two worn basins upon it. there are also supposed to be some vague carvings of crooks and serpents, but I never saw anything. Dated to 4000BC, so that’s old, very old, but still not the oldest, nor is it even close.

Our Hotel was on the outskirts of Vannes, and it seemed when looking at the map that no matter where you went, in any direction you like, and you can find a Dolmen or a stone row or a standing stone to stop off at on the way. This Dolmen was on the way to the Carting track so I took a right turn off the D767 going north to Locmine turning at a sign saying Bignan. The Allee Couverte appeared right next to the road on my right hand side. Parking was within ten feet of the site.
Leaving the kids in the car I climbed up the bank into the woods, there is an information board, which surprised me as it’s not really a well known place, I had to add the site myself. There are only three capstones left I think and they are not perfectly in place, you cannot get into this burial chamber, robbing me of one of the best parts of a burial chamber, getting in.
I was glad I got to see this place despite it’s half destruction, but I was quite galled to find on the portal that there are two burial chambers here, the other is in the woods across the road no more than a hundred yards away. It is not an allee couverte but of a type that is more of a tumulus with exposed chamber, wish i’d known.
Next time.

Situated right next to the road, the D768 from Auray to Ploharnel, and less than half a mile north east from the roundabout, cant be missed.
Has anyone else noticed how half the places in Brittany begin with either of two syllables, Plo ‘n’ ker, can we read into this ancient communications with people of Peckham. Probably not.
If the D768 is in fact an old Roman road I cant understand why it runs nicely and harmlessly by, if the Romans were so very bad why didn’t they destroy all three Dolmens?
Did you get that? three Dolmens? three of them in an area no bigger than a big back yard.
The underground one is arguably the most interesting, the stairs that go down to it is only two feet from the side of the road, careful, it’s also five or six feet below you too. Passing into the chamber we notice that some one has been chalking in the ancient carvings, these carvings are more abstract than the ones ive seen so far.
The chamber is dry and dark, the sound of passing traffic is muted, if you listen carefully you could perhaps hear mothers voice and distant music.
Above ground you might mistake the massive capstone for a random half buried rock, from some angles there appears to be only two Dolmens here, the underground tomb is most interesting.
Right next to it is the more knackered of the two allee couverts, it is low and only has two capstones. But just a few meters away is the big impressive one, it still has four capstones in place and one of them is really big. Some allee couverts are very long but these seem to have been quite short ones.
There is, it has been said, the remains of a stone circle here too. But i’m just not sure, four stones are all I could see and three of them were in a row not an arc. When these Dolmen were complete and perfect, would all three have been covered by the same mound or would they have all had their separate mounds.
This is a cool and mysterious place that brings to mind lots of questions, as is the whole of the Carnac area. Back home if you see a big stone near a stone circle you cant help wondering if it is some thing, but in Carnac it is usually always something, your just falling over somethings, they are everywhere.

Parking is on the D768, right next to the Mane Kerioned Dolmen complex. But then you need to cross the busy road and then walk off down the road that turns off the D768, for about 100 yards. looking for a track going off to the left and a hand written fading sign saying Dolmens. Follow the main track straight to the honesty box covered dolmen.
The evening light was shining through the trees and the bird life was going for it vocally, the burial chamber was oh so good, but, good lord but the kids aren’t half messing about. If we were at Stonehenge they’d have chucked us out, but we’re not, we’re in some woods completely alone, the stones are ours, all ours.
There is enough of it to make it quite an easy matter of recreating the whole edifice in ones imagination. You could remove a few more stones and then you’d have three quite perfect dolmens, the kind they have in Wales and Cornwall. One of the capstones is very large, reminding me of Browne’s dolmen in Ireland, it’s not that big but it does remind me.
Soon the kids have tired them selves out and lain down on the grass, I take my photos and get under the capstones, job done. Lets go and see some more.

Today we have mostly been Karting and to Chateau de la Hunaudaye (A really good castle ruin), with a burial chamber on the way there and back. Then on the way from the race track to the castle I spied a road sign pointing to a menhir. I’ll have a look on the way back I told myself.
So after the obligatory Pancakerie, I turned left and followed signs for Menhir de Guihalon, it wasn’t on the list, but you cant resist a chance encounter can you ?
We pulled into a small car park, parking for at least ten, should be a good stone then I thought. We quietly padded down the path through the woods, trying to be as quiet as possible because not ten minutes ago a big deer ran across the road in front of us and , well, if your quiet and observant you might see another one. I’ll try anything to keep ‘m quiet for ten minutes.
The stone was a big one, a really big one, then, ooh hang on I know this one, ive seen pictures of it somewhere else, Google Earth or the Portal maybe. I count it as a score and start the slow circuit round the mighty menhir whilst Eric sits quietly shushing us twenty yards away in the woods. Philli keeps nattering on to me about some boy band, maybe, but i’m not really listening so she picks a rock, sits on it and watches.
It is, Burl says, five meters tall, he also calls it Tregomar. He also, rather infuriatingly for me, mentions two other very nearby menhirs, two, and two and a half meters high, poot, I’d have looked for them if I’d known.
But really the menhir of Guihalon is enough for the megalith lover all on it’s own, the woods lend a mysterious atmosphere, the other rocks around the menhir make the place feel more like a temple.
The stone is big enough to have several different kinds of lichen and mosses, up one side it’s orange, up another bright green. Oh, and it’s really big, but ive mentioned that already.

Really big.

To my mind the word tumulus conjures up images of often low grassy chamberless mounds, but this most certainly is not what I’m used to.
Heading towards Le Bono (no relation) on the D101 go over the bridge and turn right at the sign posted roundabout more or less as soon as you enter the non Dublin related town. The tumulus is down this road on the right, you cant miss the big car park.

I decided to get out early before the kids get up and see this one, and as it was a beautiful morning and the car park was empty it was looking to be a good one. It’s a short walk of fifty yards through pine woodland to the tumulus. I’ll keep using the word tumulus, but only with a hoot of derision, and a snort of superiority, they might as well call it a pile of stones.
I entered the clearing in the woods into glaring early morning sunshine, which as you’ll know is the best kind, the entrance to the mound is facing me, that’s a south east direction, vaguely with the summer solstice sunrise.
Torch in hand I enter the passage with a stoop, having not done my homework properly I didn’t know if there was any art work in there or not so I only half inspected the wall stones. Like Pierre Plats the passage bends to the left, well, here it’s more of a right angle turn really, but still, do all angled passage graves bend to the left, which way does yours bend?
Sitting at the end of the dry passage in the dark, it was quiet, cool of temperature, and cool of demeanor too. I mean how cool is it to travel somewhere in a 21st century vehicle through a 20th century town and in less than a minute your back in the stone age, in a place where few stone-agers have trod, or sat.
But there is more to this ridge than just the big burial chamber, so I exit the tumulus and stroll north east to the information board, in doing so I’ve just walked past three Iron age Tombettes or tombelles. The one closest to the info board is what we’d see as a tumulus, a low grassy mound, but the two between it and the big one have kerb stones round them, unfortunately they have been cordoned off and the undergrowth left to grow, and grow it has. I decide to walk off in the other direction, south west. Here right next to the big one is what looks to be the best of the four definite tombettes I found. This one is a circular grassy platform, with a slight trench in it’s centre, terminating at the circles edge with a recumbent and two flankers, which is weird because just over there is four boulders in a kind of none circular circle.
Further into the woods are some big earthfast boulders, one of them has a carved linear groove upon it, another had the dubious pleasure of having me sit on it for a while whilst happily surveying the trees and seeing a Jay and a small bird of prey shooting after an even smaller scared little birdie.
Now having read the information board I can say that there are some carved stones in the passage of the big one, specifically it says the twelfth stone on the left going in has a carving on it. It is rather faint and not as good as Pierre Plats’ but I think I found at least one more. On the right, ten feet or so going in is a lovely rippled bubbly chocolate kind of stone, it is I presume natural but the one next to it is I think definitely carved as well.

Only one person came past whilst I was there, Frenchie called over to me and said something in his native tongue, seeing as I know as much Klingon as I do french it was totally incomprehensible to me. Perhaps he was asking if I had a torch, or maybe watch out for the werewolf.
Then a woman and her teenage kids came up the path, but I’ve had my go and it’s time to go any way, were going karting this afternoon. I wonder if there’s anywhere good to call in at on the way.
Ha ! I know there is.

You know how sometimes when you re-visit a place years later and maybe the stones are bigger or smaller, or it was further to walk than you remembered, or something will be different to how you remember it.
This is not that place, it stayed unretarded and unchanged in my memory, it was just how I remembered it, and it was just as perfect a place as it was eleven years ago.
Last time I came the rest of the family stayed in the motor home and I got to come here on my own and spend some quality time alone with a pair of perfect strangers, Christophe the guide and Pierre plats herself.
This time the kids elected to stay on the beach and create some sand sculptures, apparently they’re too old for sand castles now, which works well for me because Christophe aint here so we are totally alone now.
Being alone at such a place as this is a rare thing in a Breton summer, but rather than rush round I take my time with her. First of all I take a good long look at the big standing stone in front of the passage entrance, the side that faces the sea is ragged and gnarled, bitten hard by the power of windy seas. But the reverse side is still smooth, and peppered with cup marks, one is as deep as a golf ball, one is half as deep and maybe ten more fainter still. Then I take a walk to the back of the passage on top of the capstones, there could be sixteen capstones but some maybe broken, so do you count it as one or two now.
You can see the curve of the capstones as they cover the priceless art work underneath, at the elbow to the passage a side passage turns left, you can see it’s two capstones from above as well. At the junction of these two passages the capstones have on their upper surfaces carved grooves, one stone has about nine another has only two. Their purpose eludes me, but I suspect they are not original. Whilst i’m at the far end a man enters the passage, then I can hear him swear in English about his wet feet, evidently there is a puddle of substantial size in side, he doesn’t last long and soon rejoins his partner for their evening stroll on the beach. Now it’s my go inside.
A great man once said “Entering a burial chamber is a lot like making love to a beautiful woman” or he would have done if he ever did so. But I am and the thought isn’t a million miles away from my mind.
The first carved stone you pass is the entrance pillar itself, not arty carving but you can tell it’s been done. The puddle inside is quite extensive but some one has put stones along its length to step along, tottering along I make it to the bend in the passage and the junction with the left turn. In side the smaller passage which doesn’t go much more than ten feet it is dry, but there is debris from other visitors. I rejoin the main passage and look out for the arty bits, of which there is many, they are coming thick and fast and soon I’m looking for them on all the stones. It is a megalithic treasure trove this place the carvings are still so neat and fresh, I angle my torch, like so, to pick out the shapes more clearly, they are quite breathtaking. Now I’m at the end of the passage and a side slab cuts off the end six feet in an almost chamber, it’s quite dry at the back and I sit for a while with my back to the wall. Someones coming, but the puddle dissuades them form disturbing our embrace and penetrating further, no puddle can dampen my ardor I’m in up to the hilt.

“Entering a burial chamber is a lot like making love to a beautiful woman”
Is it ?
I’m sure that it is.

Just then Eric comes looking for me and pokes his head in through a gap in the roof, caught again, our time is over, all too quickly, he informs me ive been here for an hour, how time flies when your having fun.

Is it ?

This place was strangely not on my list, but as I was en route to Les Pierre Plats and saw the sign for it as I was passing, I thought I might as well go for a quick shufty, it’s not often a dolmen throws itself in front of you.
I cant really say where it is, as I was not really sure where I was, such is the clarity of French roads signs. I parked on the side of the road right by the path between houses, it is less than a minutes walk.
It is now becoming apparent that one gets very little time to ones self at these places in the summer months, and Mane Er Hrouek is no exception, I’m beginning to pine for a little solitude.
A family was preparing to leave as we got there, so we went straight into the tomb. The walled walkway down beneath the cairn is modern, the chamber itself was never open, it was always intended to be buried and passage-less. The walkway bends to the right and goes down to the chambers entrance. It is not possible to stand up in the chamber, unless your a Krankie on your mothers side, inside the chamber it is cool and damp, which is a nice time compared to the heat outside.
With the light off it is rather dark, only a very little light gets all the way down to the chambers entrance. Whilst hunkering down in the half dark I hear some German voices approaching, our time in the underworld is at an end and we relinquish the tomb to it’s new admirers.
Outside the day is still bright and were left blinking in the afternoon light, as the chamber is erm occupied ? we go up on to the top of the cairn. Below us and in between the walkway entrance is just the biggest of scoops of cairn material, enough stuff has gone, that you could build another really big cairn with it. There’s a million ancient sites around Carnac but some have been seriously defiled in the past.
The whole of the site is quite unphotographable, there is too much vegetation on and around the mound, big trees, gorse and assorted bushes, but neither the giant scoop nor the flora can hide the massive size of this place.
On our way back to the car we pass yet more people coming up, too many people.

Having just come from Champ Dolent menhir we had by necessity to get round the town of Rennes, this proved to be a challenge of considerable size, I have since become convinced that the French have arranged there road system in such a manner as to utterly confound the foreign traveler, perhaps in response to the conflicts of the previous century. But in the end we found our way out of Rennes and going in the right direction, then we got lost again. How i HATE DRIVING IN FRANCE.

After much, no, prolific growling, swearing and head smacking we got to our destination.
The car park has, since my last visit 11 years ago, shrunk by half, in order to erect a none necessary visitor shop and information hub. Really not needed, but at least they haven’t started to take money off us.
There was only one car in the car park and the owner was in the shop, so, superbly we had the monument to ourselves.
This was my favorite place last time we came here and it was highly essential that I come back next time I was here.
It really has it all, the stones used seem to be perfect for the job, the size of the whole construction is massive to say the least. The inside is high enough for Masai warriors to do their bouncy dance, heck it’s big enough to drive a car through. The entrance stones are stunning, I sat against a tree for some time staring in disbelief at it’s perfection. Then some people came, just about the only buzzkill that I find it hard to cope with, then a load came all at once. Bugger, that’ll be time to go then.
Winter solstice is the time to be here, at sunrise the the sun shines through the entrance and illuminates the interior, and presumably the gaggle of amazed megalithiticians as well, I hope to be one some day.

When first arriving into Brittany the natural first place place to go to is Mont St Michel, it is a magical Hogwarty dreamy kind of place. But when the hoards of tourists (and I cant stress the word hoards enough) choke the only street, it is time to come here, to the Menhir, thee menhir, of Champ Dolent.
At 32 feet, it is just over 6 feet taller than the Rudston monolith, Britain’s tallest stone, but hey, it’s not a competition, is it ? It is so big it just giddies the mind and it becomes impossible to look at its height and girth with out smiling, they were a bit bonkers in Brittany weren’t they ?
There were a few people here today, but none of them stayed long, when ever someone comes we take a seat on a nearby table and watch them take the inevitable selfie, sorry to use such a contemporary term, I am in no way a modern man.
It was harder to find the stone this time, don’t know why, and the bushes that lined the short path to the stone have gone, opening the whole place right up.

Burl says the Granite monolith was taken from a massif 4 km to the south, and erected on the Schist plateau, it’s name is sometimes translated as “the field of sadness” which is interestingly samey as Kerloas “The heath of sadness”.
The Menhir of Dol is said to be related to the Menhir De Noyal, 17km south east, related by the Devil throwing them both from Mont St Michel.

Menhir de Champ-Dolent is essential viewing for any stone hunting trip to Brittany. It is a true marvel.

This site is marked down on the map simply as homestead, which I thought would have meant it was medieval or later, but Coflein confirms that it is prehistoric. So that’s any where from late iron age to half a million BC, it’s probably late iron age....... probably.
I would have had a look around before now if I’d known it’s age, but that homestead appellation threw me off it’s scent.
Alken and I were en route from Carnedd y Saeson back to the car park when from out of the mists came this circular-ish enclosure. It was obviously man made and old, so we hung around a bit taking photos. There was at least three dwelling places with in the enclosure, some big stones mark the entrance to the houses. The north facing entrance is clear and either side has much walling material.
Quite a good site, a walk up Foel Dduarth would present a very good place to look down on it, coflein has some good aerial photos.

Now this one, ive been waiting a really long time to get round to seeing. The weather had dissuaded us from going anywhere too high up, also, seeing as the furthest ive walked since my back operation is down the road to Sainsburys, and with hindsight and extremely achy legs, i’m kind of glad we didn’t go too high.
But, like Blossom found, it is a long and winding up hill road to the kerb cairn. We dithered a bit at the start trying to find the right route up, inadvertently following the same route up as Blossom.
It was very warm, we were waterproofed against the drizzle, but in summer you either stay cool or you stay dry, not both. It wasn’t long until we entered the clouds and the outside world disappeared.
The map clearly shows the cairn on the east side of a forestry track junction, but I could see stones on the west side, closer inspection proved the map to be wrong. The cairn is indeed on the west side of the T junction.

The kerb cairn even three years ago was losing a battle against the surrounding heather, but it’s a little worse now, three more years and you’ll struggle to find anything at all. What I’d like, would be to take me bike up and stay there all afternoon trimming and pruning. The ride back down would be eye opening to say the least. It would benefit hugely from a tidy, how exactly i’m not sure, but i’d definitely like to see it better. Maybe someone else would.
Up to fifteen stones stand in a circle, some here some there, lots of gaps though. Some stones are contiguous, some are isolated. Some are over a foot tall, and some had to be teased out of hiding.
An off center hole in the cairn is,probably the site of the cist, only one long stone remains now, cist cover or one of the side stones we couldn’t tell. The shape of the stone at one end looked like the wear you’d expect from a standing stone, but it could just be the shape of the stone.

I really liked this kerb cairn, but it was a long walk and almost hidden by the heather, the ordnance survey and the low clouds. I’ll be back.

It’s been a few years since Blossom helpfully highlighted the existence of this cup marked outcrop, and ive been dying to come here ever since. Unlike Bloss though we parked at the very pretty Nant y Coed nature reserve, below Dinas settlement, north east of the cups . It is much closer.
It was about a twenty minute walk, but the way wasn’t immediately obvious, there is much going on with the map, but with much persevering we soon came across some worn out hut circles that showed we were on the right path and close to the cup marked start to the day.
The weather, it has to be said, was not exactly conducive to teary eyed views of the countryside, the clouds were low and we were in them, there was light drizzle, we were waterproofed but badly overheating. Visibility was down to twenty yards maybe.

So I was fairly amazed that we actually managed to find the cup marked outcrop. Alken remarked upon the number of cups we could see, about thirty maybe at a guess. I didn’t realise there was so many, naughty Blossom never said how many there were. Some are shallow, but most are perfect examples, some could be tricks of the light, all had water in them, some had poo in them. The out doors is soooo dirty.

Blossom mentions that there are supposed to be other stones with art carved upon them, we couldn’t find anything either. Then we find out about an Arrow stone in the next field and I wonder if that is it.

Shame about the weather, good site though.

This ones been on the radar for a long while now, my excuse for not getting here sooner is it’s kind of on it’s own in the middle of no where, much map reading and constant observation of road signs will in the end bring you out in Bleasedale. I thought it would be bigger, there’s a Bleasedale close at home, it’s got more houses than the whole village. We passed the school and parked by the church, there is room de plenty, no one said we couldn’t park here, no one was about at all. The path /road passes Admarsh barn on our left, and carries on until Vicarage farm, turn right before you get there, cross the field heading through a gate for the small wood. Tad-daaaa !

It was late in the afternoon after a long day stone hunting when we arrived, we were a bit knackered it has to be said, but the blue skies, fluffy clouds and the flowery fields pulled us on with no exertion needed from us at all, er, the dogs were pulling a bit so that may have contributed too. The whole wooded area is fenced off, keeping the sheep at bay, and a kissing gate lets one enter the enclosure. Immediately right is the over informative information board, I tried to read it all, honestly, then I gave up and took a photo instead, and read it at my leisure at home. There is much to read.
From the information board the ring is about fifteen yards away, I let the kids wander at will with the dogs whilst I wander round and round, looking at it from all angles, and I mean all of them, I laid down on my belly in the ditch, climbed three trees, not easy for a scardy cat with Sciatica, and then I laid down on my back in the centre of it all. My but this is a pretty place, I know there would have probably not been trees all round it, and that they hide the view of the hills with it’s eastern sunrise notch (incidentally, there is a possible cairn right next to said hilly notch called Nick’s chair, the devil is (not) often called “Old Nick”), but, I really really like it here. The tranquility is complete, even the kids are quiet and the dogs are lazing in the occasional sunny spot, birds are singing all over the place and in the fields all around at least a half dozen Curlews cry there forlorn sad song.
I didn’t really want to go, another two hours might have done it, but it really was a long day and we’re still a hundred miles from home.
A perfect place to visit if you want to break up a long drive on the M6.