Stonehenge, Wiltshire
England Pictures

Another Stonehenge photo below | England Tourist Attractions Map

Stonehenge cremation burial remnants have been carbon-dated to 3030-2880 BC [5,000 years ago], about when Stonehenge’s ditch-and-bank monument was cut into Salisbury Plain. Between 150 and 240 people were buried here over a 600 year period in increasing numbers, along with ceremonial weapons, leading archeologists to believe that this may have been a monumental tomb of a single family, perhaps an ancient royal family.

The World Heritage Site of Stonehenge is set in gently rolling, rural Salisbury plain, Wiltshire county, an hour or two driving from London. It's a wonderfully bare but fitting location, though slightly degraded by two smallish roads passing nearby. Naturally, as one of England's top monuments, it's heavily visited, though the English Heritage organisation have done a good job in concealing the visitor centre and car parks and keeping internal fencing to the minimum.

Excellent multi-lingual personal audio players are included in the reasonable entry fee and offer clear and comprehensive information on all aspects of Stonehenge. The walking route circles the stones at an acceptable distance, though touching is forbidden. Stonehenge photos are of course, permitted.

Stonehenge is closed on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day and also difficult to access on the days before and after the summer [June 21] and winter solstices [December 21] as the police try to control 20,000 or so overnighting Pagans, Druids, Gypsies, New Age Travellers, Ravers and wackos of every description from getting high on the stones, literally and metaphorically.

Phyical access to the stones is not permitted [due to potential vandalism] except on midsummer night [the Summer Solstice, see below] or by permission from the English Heritage organisation [www.english-heritage.org.uk].
If a tourist feels like getting touchy with ancient stones and not around in mid June then the best thing to do is to head for Avebury where similar stones - though smaller - are charmingly located and accessible.

Stonehenge area map picture

Typical Summer Solstice regulations and access [but no guarantees they'll be the same this summer]:
The summer solstice occurs around 5.00am on June 21st. The car park opens at 8pm on June 20th and is free, as is entry to Stonehenge, opening at 10pm. Car park admission closes at 8am on June 21st and the site closes at 9am June 21st.

No backpacks, sleeping bags or other large bags are allowed onto the site, nor are large amounts of alcohol. Personal use quantities only!
Also no glass [i.e. bottles of booze. Plastic is OK], dogs, cycles, camping equipment, chairs, fireworks, fire making equipment or amplified musical instruments are permitted on the site, though kids in push chairs are OK.

Special car parks, ambient lighting, heated braziers, drinking water, toilet facilities, meeting points, stewards, first aid, emergency services and refreshment areas and local camp sites are organised by English Heritage. Weather guarantees are not, and so it rains.

Public buses run from Salisbury Railway and Bus Stations to Stonehenge from the evening of June 20th to early morning of June 21st. Return runs go from about 6.00am until 9.00am June 21st.

Visitors are permitted to touch the stones but not the climb, stand or lean on them.

At the 2004 summer solstice 150 police battled with 300 individuals determined to climb the stones, resulting in a hospital trip for 12.
Meanwhile King Arthur Pendragon, Battle Chieftan of the Council of British Druids, presided over a night-long flaming torch dance near the Heal Stone - the summer sunrise marker - backed by dozens of well-lit drummers, while psychedelic cloaks whirled, Tibetan Hand Bells chimed, fragrant herbal aromas wafted through the damp air and the lunatics took over the asylum.

Stonehenge opening times are roughly:

16 March - 31 May, 9.30am - 6pm.

1 June - 31 August, 9am -7pm.

1 September - 15 October, 9.30am-6pm.

16 October - 15 March, 9.30am - 4pm.

Stonehenge area map picture

Stonehenge's first design was a simple circular earth bank and ditch with a central sanctuary. About 500 years later a wooden structure was built there and then around 2950 BC a powerful Neolithic chieftain was spurred by his priests to upgrade this to a monumental religious edifice by dragging eighty large bluestones on sledges 240 miles [385km] from Wales, shaping them and arranging them in a double circle.
Larger Sarsen stones [a kind of sandstone] and lintel stones arrived a few years later from Avebury, a mere twenty miles [30km] away.

Although the large vertical stones were clearly tipped into pre-dug holes, then levered upright, how primitive man persuaded the massive lintel stones to settle on top of the verticals - into pre-carved joints - is something of a mystery.

The Stonehenge circle is aligned to midsummer sunrise and midwinter sunset in addition to some special moon phases, but this astronomical alignment probably had more to do with the timing of pagan rituals than determining optimum agricultural timing, i.e. when to sow seed or when to harvest.
Ancient peoples living in very close contact with nature had a powerful belief in the Earth Mother and Sky Father, thus the heavily female symbolism of Stonehenge's concentric stone arrangements - resembling a womb and vulva. To guarantee fertility of crops, animals and families the Sky Father needed to penetrate the Earth Mother, and this is clearly visible about 5am from 18-24th June when the sun is bright [visible from the roadside through the fence]. The shadow from the phallic Heel Stone enters the vulva arch to touch the Womb [or Cult] Stone [pictured above, though not at sunrise!].

There are no museums at the Stonehenge site but 7 miles [10kms] away Salisbury Museum [Cathedral Close] has an excellent collection of artifacts, as has Devizes Museum [Long Street].

The Future of Stonehenge: Stonehenge is managed by English Heritage and the surrounding landscape by the National Trust. These two organisations are planning, with the help of the Highways Agency, to put the larger of the two roads in a tunnel, and to close much of the other road, thus restoring Stonehenge to its original solitary glory.

A new visitor centre will be located 2 miles [3km] from the stones with considerably more facilities than the present centre, and a land train will take visitors who prefer to ride to the site.
There is no schedule for these improvements yet as the cost of the tunneling will be monstrous and no one is volunteering to pick up the bill, but it's likely to happen within ten years. Until then, well, this is still one of England's top sights but try to see it on a sunny day out of season.

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Stonehenge, Wiltshire England Pictures

Stonehenge, Wiltshire
England Pictures