✔ Watch the Sun Rise at Stonehenge

Here’s one that I’ve done! Stonehenge is a very strange place… when I first visited, I was with my cousin and we were listening to the audio guide…

“<cue grand music> 4000 years ago, Early Britons erected… Stonehenge. This marvel of engineering… ” the guide said. I turned to my cousin, looked a little shocked and said “ok, let me get this right… 600 years AFTER the pyramids, someone came by, put a few stones together and this rivals the other marvels of the world?”

What I didn’t realise at the time was that stonehenge is spectacular not because of its (quite frankly, small) size; it’s spectacular because of the effect it leaves on you. Oddly eerie before dawn, and spectacularly calm (albeit being so close to the motorway) it really leaves a mark.

I’ll upload pictures once I find them…

Oh, and if anyone is planning to see the sunrise at Stonehenge, be careful… it’s closed before 9:00 or so. To see it, drive past it, and take the first left (when coming from the motorway). There is a small road on the fields which is quite a nice place to camp out. Then, to actually see the sunrise at stonehenge you will need to jump the sheep, don’t wake up the barbed wire and avoid the guards that patrol the site… (or some combination of those words). If you lie in the grass and watch the sun rise as it slowly makes the mist dissipate… well it’s just magical!

For those of you planning to visit Stonehenge’s sunrise/sunset, here’s a copy of the sun’s schedule… he’ll appear on time every day, but may be covered by clouds 363 days a year in the UK…

Sunrise Sunset
Sunrise
Sunset
Jan 1st
8:06
4:02
Feb 1st
7:39
4:49
March 1st
6:45
5:41
April 1st
6:35
7.35
May 1st
5.33
8.24
June 1st
4.48
9.08
July 1st 4.49
9.21
Aug 1st
5.25
8.48
Sept 1st
6.14
7.46
Oct 1st
7.01
6.37
Nov 1st
6.55
4.33
Dec 1st
7.44
3.54

 

One last note, there is a geocache around stonehenge… I left a USB stick in there, so if you do find it, drop me a line!

Leave a Reply

Rss Feed Tweeter button Facebook button Technorati button Reddit button Myspace button Linkedin button Webonews button Delicious button Digg button Flickr button Stumbleupon button Newsvine button Youtube button