i finally made my escape from that dirty old town and took to the road once again. i had some time to kill before the flight so i chose to head to stonehenge with the idea of spending the night amongst the stones... stonehenge, ancient pagan burial site, healing place, astronomical calendar, sacrificial site... whatever it was or had been, it's presence was like a magnet for me and many others.
i got to heston services on the m4 in a persistent drizzle, already cursing that i hadn't bothered to take a waterproof jacket. but i only had to wait 30 minutes or so before an old citroen van pulls up."going down the m4?" i asked. "sorry, i'm taking the m25 and then m3...." came the reply. "m3... how far down... a303?". "yeah, a303...". my first stroke of luck for the day. justin was an old traveller sort too, and when i told him i was going to stonehenge, he talked about his experience at another sacred pagan site which also lay on the ley line connecting stonehenge, avebury and sarum. "yeah, i don't how to describe it... like you're conscious but also in a different... world..." i could see he was struggling for the word. "like you're dreaming but conscious", i offered. "yeah, i 'saw' knights in armour coming out of the mist at the same time my girlfriend also 'saw' something but in the opposite direction".
justin dropped me off at popham services on the a303, the drizzle had eased a bit and it wasn't long before someone approached me..."where are you going?" "a303... towards andover". that's how i got the lift to amesbury, thanks to charlie, he dropped me off at the roundabout and i walked a mile or so into town and straight to the library. and just in time as by now, it had really started to piss down. i asked the librarian for the ordnance survey map for the area and spent some time mulling over the map, looking for convenient locations to camp for the night if it was not possible to be by the stones.
when the rain had stopped, i stopped by the co-op for a packet of hobnobs and munched through the whole packet whilst taking the back road from amesbury to the site. it was when i got to the top of the hill and made my way down the busy a303 that i got my first look at the stones and the ant-like creatures beating a circular path around them. by the time i had finally managed to cross the road at the bottom of the hill and walked up to the visitor centre that i realized that the fence triangulating the whole site was still there and the visitor centre was charging 6 pounds 60 for the right to view the stones from the visitor path. i took a break at a picnic table before deciding where i was going to jump the fence in the night.
i decided to make a pre-camp just up the road in the woods before coming back down to get to the stones at night. and as i set off from the car park, i spotted a dirt road by the side of the site, by the sheep enclosure. i could see a caravan/campervan, a van and a couple of cars and so i decided to have a look... it was a good view of stonehenge from here too and i said so to the guy sitting in his car at the top. charles was his name, he was a pensioner and he was also just admiring the view, the late afternoon sun casting a nice light on the stones. i told charles of my plan and he said that it was not possible... "see that yellow hi-viz jacket down there... that'll be the security now... they're closing the site for the night and for sure there'll be others, they'll do shifts for the night... sorry lad, but you'll not get close to the stones now. no free festivals anymore! only on the solstices and equinoxes, then you're let in free for the ceremony with the druids. along with thousands of others drug smoking hippies! the real druids, they go avebury now, it's a more authentic ritual there." we talked a while longer but i was trying not to be too disappointed about not being able to spent the night amongst the stones. "yeah, if you want to spend the night somewhere, i'd choose those woods up there (where i had intended to pre-camp), you can go down that path along the cursus, you see where those bullocks and cows are", pointing into the distance. "or you can stay here, there's one guy here permanently in his van, the council are trying to evict him... or you can try down at the end of the path to those woods there but i was there and there's another guy there with some dogs...."
in the end i walked along the road and to the woods and found a place to watch the sun go down before i put up my tent... and the pole snapped so i had to improvise a bit before i could get into it to sleep for the night. it was a cold night and my sleep was punctuated with wakeful shivering spasms. i was up early enough to see the sun rise above the hill lighting up the misty pastures. i packed up and took the road back down to the site. passing by the fence, i spotted a 'hi-viz' coming the other way on the stones' side. "good morning", i beamed, "any chance of getting in for free?". he chuckled, "no chance! look, we're on cctv right now." i told him that the site should be open to the public completely free and he said that was just one opinion. "you will get people here daubing graffiti on the stones, some of the stones have even been taken in the past... they need to be protected...". "i could jump the fence". "there are cctv cameras everywhere, in the bushes, in the centre, all around, it's a 3000 pound fine you'll be in for....". i could see he was not going to be receptive to persuasion. (it was always the same with security. they were right little jobsworths. i remember the one at the top of the eifel tower - i had asked in my poor french if i could kip there for the night. i still can't work out if i was really naive or really cheeky in those days when i first tasted the thrill of backpacking on a shoestring). it was around six and although the centre was closed, there was a group already in and passing amongst the stones. probably touching them too. academics, most probably. lucky bastards.
i took a last look at the stones, the red sunrise casting a beautiful light on them, before i took the same road back to amesbury and the road out to salisbury. about a 20 minute wait before adam, a student from poland, gives me a lift to salisbury. i waited for the post office to open before posting my tent back to brother's place. it was no good to me now and i was inwardly pleased that fate had taken 3 kilos off my back and given me more room in my new smaller 45l pack to carry real essentials like grub! rearranging my pack, i found the crisps and cookies and chocolate bars that charles had given me and had breakfast.
a walk through the cathedral grounds and a quick peek inside before i found the road to bournemouth. i wasn't there 10 minutes before i got a lift. the country was going to the dogs but at least the hitching was still very good. darren was a real chatterbox and kept me entertained with his stories the whole way to bournemouth. like salisbury, this place was new for me. it was the first sandy beach i ever saw in england! i decided to walk to the airport, i had some time to kill. i found a chippie along the way and couldn't resist a last fish 'n chips lunch. by the time i got to the airport, my feet were aching. it had been a long day of walking and after months of relative laziness, my body was letting me know i had to get back into shape. not that i didn't know already... the winter fat accumulated around my waist was a daily reminder that i was at my heaviest ever. still, i knew also that i would need these reserves for the way ahead!
ryanair gets a fair amount of bad press. still, it is the cheapest way to get out of england if you book early enough. gone are the days when i would hitch across the channel with the truckers. it was a free trip but the last time i tried it, i got dropped off by a hungarian trucker at calais. this is now a real no-go area for hitchers, especially if your skin colour resembles that of the so-called illegal immigrants waiting to clamber aboard a truck heading into fortress britain. but that's another story. no hassles at check-in or security checks and i spent the last 2 quid on some fair-trade organic dark chocolate for my hosts in faro. 2 quid for chocolate? - worth every penny! it was when i sauntered nonchalantly into the departure lounge that one guy looks at me and gestures to his own daypack that i realized that he had noticed that i had somehow misplaced mine. oh shit i forgot to pick it up at the security check. running back, i exclaim to all the security personnel that "i forgot to pick up my daypack" upon which one of them mentions to another that it was the drum and said daypack was retrieved. how the hell did i forget to pick up the most important material possession i own? "it's either a lack of sleep or i must be going senile", i joked to the dude who saved my bacon when i got back to the departure lounge. grant was his name and i got talking with him as we waited to board the plane. he had become a photographer after many years as a project manager, now carving out a niche for himself photographing musicians.
the flight to faro was without incident, and passport control also proved trouble-free. unlike other times, but those are other stories too. but now i was just glad to have arrived in the algarve and sat patiently outside the terminal for the bus to take me into faro itself.
No comments:
Post a Comment