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Either I don't have the time, nor the funds for it, but if I were given the chance
to travel, there will be a select few destinations I could prefer and one of them is a visit to mysterious Stonehenge
in England.
Indeed, the opportunity came in November of 2007 when I got the invitation
to attend the Wortld Travel Market in London. So off I flew from New York to London, and the dream of being there right
before these massive structures of monolithic stones of mysterious origins was a dream come true!
No, Stonehenge is not in London and how I got there was quite an
experience, with the same lesson to be learned, that is: when going on a tour, always try to be on time.
I had booked myself a room at the Meininger Hostel
(located at Baden Powell House in South Kensington) which is just right across the grandiose British Museum of Natural
History and a few minutes walk- about 3 blocks away, to the nearest 'tube', prior to my arrival. Don't smile, the
tube is the English version of the underground railway system- pretty efficient and (practically) always on time. The Hostel
itself plays host to visitors from all over the globe and my stay was one pleasant experience. From there, you can
then practically go anywhere in the UK. But let's go and visit Stonehenge first.
Stonehenge- considered to be one of the "World Heritage Sites"
by UNESCO and found in the UK, is geographically located in the English county of Wiltshire, about 3.2 kilometres (2.0 mi) west of Amesbury and 13 kilometres (8.1 mi) north of Salisbury. According to Wikipedia:
". . .Stonehenge is a prehistoric monument and one of the most famous prehistoric
sites in the world. Stonehenge is composed of earthworks surrounding a circular setting of large standing stones. Archaeologists had believed that the iconic stone monument was erected around 2500 BC, as described
in the chronology below. However one recent theory has suggested that the first stones were not erected until 2400-2200 BC,[1] whilst another suggests that bluestones may have been erected at the site as early as 3000 BC (see phase 1 below).
The surrounding circular earth bank and ditch, which constitute the earliest phase of the monument, have been dated to about
3100 BC. The site and its surroundings were added to the UNESCO's list of World Heritage Sites in 1986 in a co-listing with Avebury henge monument, and it is also a legally protected Scheduled Ancient Monument. Stonehenge itself is owned by the Crown and managed by English Heritage while the surrounding land is owned by the National Trust.[2][3]
New archaeological evidence found by the Stonehenge Riverside Project indicates that Stonehenge served as a burial ground from its earliest beginnings.[4] The dating of cremated remains found that burials took place as early as 3000 B.C, when the first ditches were being
built around the monument. Burials continued at Stonehenge for at least another 500 years when the giant stones which mark
the landmark were put up". . .
It was on the 17th of November when I had booked the trip
to Stonehenge with an outfit called "Anderson Tours", but on that very day, like an idiot, I missed the tour bus and
that meant I had to be on my own, if I had to push thru with the trip. I didn't have much choice; I was already
there- and since this visit to Stonehenge was one of the two major reasons why I traveled to England in the first place, so
I proceeded instead to the train terminal in Waterloo (London) to catch the schedule that would take me to a town called
Andover where a bus service took over (from the train, as part of the railway seemed to have been up for maintenance, or something
like that) which took us to Salisbury, then by another, separate, bus to the plains where the massive monoliths
could be seen standing from the distance as we approached.
For the next houir and a half or so, I walked around- stopped and gazed, and
pondered deeply as to what these massive rocks could have been. Such deep thinking seemed to bring about a higher level
of consciousness to your mind as my thoughts carried me back to the dawn of time when the people- or whoever they
were, have labored and toiled on the construction of this awesome edifice. How could they have achieved the required
engineering and accomplished such a marvelous- if not almost humanly impossible, task. And for what possible purpose?
Could this place have been an ancient observatory for astronomical undertakings
by people in that distant past, as speculated by most? Most likely, perhaps. Or it could have been a kind of temple;
a center for religious worship;. . . or, it could have been just about anything after all.
This is the kind of enigma and mystery surrounding the unknown origin
of Stonehenge that have lured those who are curious enough to come and try to find out. The very same reason
that also made me come to personally experience Stonehenge as it is- a monument to the mysteries of life.
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