The Longest Day of the Year

The drive to the Salisbury Plain wasn’t promising. I pulled the wash in early because the darkening clouds loomed ominous, ready to open. Raindrops splashed the windscreen as we passed thatched roofs in Bath and wound through narrow lanes, being overtaken by Range Rovers. It’s the longest day of the year in the middle of a pandemic and my partner, Craig, and I are driving to arguably the world’s most famous neolithic structure: Stonehenge.

It seemed improbable on this rainy Summer Solstice that we’d even be able to get close enough to see it, as all gatherings at Stonehenge were cancelled due to coronavirus. With a bit of madness that comes with three months of feeling stir-crazy, and since I’d never seen the henge in person, we went anyway. 

We’re always off-season tourists: visiting Ireland during a winter snowstorm, camping in Croatia after the summer holiday-makers have packed up, and now traipsing through National Trust land during a pandemic to an ancient stone monument under the guises of government regulation allowing us to “travel to outdoor open space irrespective of distance, as long as you can return the same night”. 

We parked at Woodhenge, just a few miles away. Each of the reconstructed concrete stumps used to be huge wooden trees. I try to imagine giant totem poles shooting up from the earth making six concentric circles that align with the summer solstice’s sunrise and winter solstice’s sunset, but it’s tough not to picture instead a wonky parking lot.

The midwest, where I’m from, has its own earthworks in the Great Serpent Mound made by the Adena people in southern Ohio. Created a mere thousand years ago in the crater of a meteorite, like seemingly everything in America, it’s newer than its European counterparts. On the solstice the sunset aligns perfectly with the head of the snake, which is poised to eat a giant egg. 

I visited the mound last winter with my sister, mere weeks before moving to England. It feels like a lifetime ago. There are no fences or barriers there. There’s nothing to stop visitors from scrambling up the curves of the snake but self control and reverence for the dead. The mound isn’t as famous as Stonehenge, and because it’s made of dirt and lacks monolithic boulders, perhaps it’s not as impressive. The midwest is the breadbasket of America and the Adena were some of the first farmers. I guess farmers have never looked fondly on rocks in the middle of fertile fields.  

I sit on the “Cuckoo Stone” and ask Craig to take my picture. It used to be upright and was a site of ritual and burial ceremonies for the surrounding barrow mounds. I wonder after the fact if I should be more revenant and not worry about documenting the experience for social media. We head through pastures of cows and sheep as pigeon’s blare out their pulsing techno-esque coos. They reminded Craig of solstice raves of yesteryears, when he was younger and thousands of people descended on the site to take in the vibes, open their minds, and watch the sun rise. We noticed a few people had set up tents or brought camper vans and trailers near where we parked. They were gathering in small groups, sitting or hiking. A few came on bikes, some brought dogs, one was flying an acid smiley face Union Jack. We ran into a trio on horseback who lamented what a shame it was that the party had been cancelled, but encouraged us to have a good time anyway. 

From a distance I thought the equestrians were mounted police and I got a pit in my stomach, afraid we’d be reprimanded, fined and told to go home. I am a rule-follower and a truth-teller and an authority-abider. I know that nothing we’re doing is technically illegal. I’m not a Druid; Stonehenge isn’t my most sacred temple. I don’t think God can be found in these rocks, yet here I am on the most sacred of days, traipsing through wheat fields on a pilgrimage to a site that humans have been gathering at for millennia.  

Summer in England is cool and windy and I’m glad to have my puffy coat and hat. The wildflowers are in full bloom speckling the pasture with yellows and pinks. The British army is nearby at Bulford Camp and makes its presence known with tank crossing signs, though I don’t see any heavy machinery. It’s not the first military installation in Wiltshire. For 500 years from the Middle Ages it was widely believed that Merlin transported Stonehenge’s megaliths from Ireland to the Salisbury Plain to commemorate slain Britons. At that time the stones were called Giants’ Dance. It was rumored that Aurelius Ambrosius, a 5th century Romano-British leader who beat back the Saxons, asked the wizard to erect the monument.  

In reality, the henge itself is the circular earthwork on top of which sits the stone circle. It was created around 3000 BC with the stones coming along some 500 years later. It wasn’t the Vikings or the Romans or the aliens, the Druids or the glaciers or magic that brought the megaliths to the plain, though each have enjoyed their moment in the limelight as leading hypotheses. Archeologists don’t know a lot about the culture that decided to drag giant rocks to make a celestial-aligned stone monument; they didn’t leave written records. The 42 smaller “bluestones,” which each weigh between 7 and 8 tonnes, were quarried in Preseli Hills in southwest Wales then brought nearly 200 miles to the Salisbury Plain. I try to imagine Stonehenge’s creators meeting the Pharaohs and swapping maps and measurements of the night sky; Stonehenge was created at the same time as the pyramids of Giza, but the ancient Egyptians were better at documenting their history. 

We crest a bluff and I can finally see it in the distance. I’m excited, it’s a momentous occasion. Even the small stones are massive, but the whole structure looks diminished against the wide open sky and rolling plains full of cows and sheep. While there are stone circles all over the UK, none have the international prestige or rich mythology of Stonehenge. Craig maintains it’s an overrated and inferior henge to Avebury, which is the largest megalithic stone circle in the world, but I’m keen to judge for myself. Like the Mona Lisa or the Colosseum, there are some feats of human ingenuity you just have to see with your own eyes.  

Even once the henge is in full view it feels like ages before we’re upon it. If I don’t keep my eye on the stones, they disappear into the horizon like so many squared-off trees. We passed a couple making tea on a camp stove, and a family walking the other direction. It’s hard to know how much to say to strangers during social distancing. I manage to eek out “Happy Solstice” to everyone we pass. Some people smile, say it back or nod. None of us know for sure if we’re supposed to be here, but we’ve all come anyway, drawn by the mystique of the ancient and the seemingly endless rays on the longest days of the year. 

The people who built Stonehenge were from all over the UK. Archeologists have found the remnants of animal bones from species native to all corners of the British Isles dating back to the time of its construction. I think about the nearly million tourists who flock here every year, on group tours of Southwest England and on bucket-list trips from every corner of the world. I have to pinch myself remembering that I live here now and this site is only an hour-and-a-half drive from my new home. 

We come up on the fence surrounding the inner stone circle. Guards in neon high visibility vests patrol the area and camera crews assemble their equipment for tonight’s live streaming of the sunset and tomorrow’s sunrise. Usually anyone is allowed into the stone circle on solstice. I close my eyes and picture the drum circle, speakers, and thousands of revelers but it’s hard to hold onto the image in such a peaceful, quiet place. Craig and I sit in the grass and share a pack of Haribo watching the crows jump from stone to stone. 

Craig asks, “Are you glad you came?”

“Yeah,” I say, and I mean it. I’m glad I came to Stonehenge. And I’m glad I came to England. “It’s perfect.”