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My wife and I visited England in January, 2010. Stonehenge was somewhere I wanted to visit my whole life and it made me really happy to be able to take Sheila. The roads were (according to the radio, at least) dangerous to drive on, but we saw none of that and managed to drive over half the country to see it. As you drive up on a small country road you look over a field to the left and you only then grasp the enormous size of the thing, it’s apparently as large under ground as it is on the surface and when you consider these huge rocks were brought all the way to this spot from the closest geological match for them in Wales (160 miles away), it’s all the more surprising (although honestly the rocks could have easily been transported there by a Glacier). It is definitely somewhere that I am glad I have visited and I feel quite honored to have been there, too.
I took a few photos and here is one I’ve edited. I firstly made it a grayscale image, then altered the balance to make the white of the snow and sky more white so the stones stand out.
A full gallery of unedited (as they were taken) photos can be viewed here. The gallery contains a number of panoramic shots which are a result of stitching together multiple photographs.
Hi,
Love the pics, a couple of minor points about the text:
“it’s apparently as large under ground as it is on the surface”
Actually not – the stone holes are remarkably shallow (although the subsurface archaeology is fascinatingly complex) and even the tallest remaining stone’s stonehole is less than one third of the stone’s length.
“(although honestly the rocks could have easily been transported there by a Glacier)”
In fact an extensive analysis of river gravels from the relevant areas to look for ‘erratics’ has pretty comprehensively shot the idea of glacial transport as the means for the bluestone to get to the site – absolutely none were found. As to by which particular route they were rafted/dragged/rolled – the jury’s out.
A.
Hi,
Thanks! I was not sure where I heard about their size underground, but thanks for the info. :)
That’s interesting info on the Glacial deposits, too. :)
Tim