standing stones

As we planned our England trip, our highest priority for sightseeing was anything Bronze Age or earlier. The UK is peppered with standing stones, stone circles, menhirs, dolmens, and quoits. The Stone Pages was an invaluable source, and it’s fun to browse even if you’re not trip planning. Once we actually started traveling, our theme changed a bit, but we still managed to see a megalithic England with an emphasis on Avebury and Stonehenge.

Before our trip, we received much unsolicited advice to visit Avebury, especially making it a priority over Stonehenge. I had seen Stonehenge and other stone circles on a previous trip to England so I was aware that there were equally impressive, but different, types of stone circles. 

Avebury covers a larger area than Stonehenge. In fact, it encompasses an entire village (above; though it's difficult to see the stones, this photo was show part of one half of the outer circle). Many of the formations are similar to Stonehenge, including the avenue of stones leading to the entrance as well as stones that are believed to have played a part in sacrifices. Avebury consists of a large outer stone circle, which once held 98 megaliths, and two smaller circles, each with approximately 30 stones. In some ways, Avebury and Stonehenge are sister sites in that their stones share the same source—the Marlborough Downs. 

This ancient tree is allegedly where J.K. Rowling wrote Harry Potter. Gnarly.

More on Avebury: This site has incredible photographs (check out the wallpaper section!) and massive amounts of information. Please visit, if you’d like to learn more.

Stonehenge is all that. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise. The stones are massive. Look at the lintels. One cannot help but wonder how the monoliths got to this site, how they were propped up, and why. How many people did it take to hoist those lintels?? What exactly was the purpose of this place? 

Notice how you don't see many tourists in the photos? It wasn’t difficult to filter out the masses once we were on the path. The bottleneck at the entrance, however, was so bad we almost left. I’m glad we didn’t. Twenty years ago, I never paid admission or crossed the road to get as close as possible to the monument, and I’ve regretted it since. 

John and I must have taken a photo every inch we advanced in our circumnavigation, trying to capture Stonehenge from every angle. And, yes, that Spinal Tap song played on an internal loop for days after.