Visiting Avebury and Stonehenge

Every heard of Avebury before?

Yeah, I hadn't either. But I saw it with about 50 other American students on Saturday. It was pretty cool.

The site predates Stonehenge by 1,500 years, but it's doesn't receive near the media attention. It's more difficult to photograph and our guide actually carried around a diagram of where the stones were.



First off, it's a mile in circumference. The stones are smaller than Stonehenge's and they weren't shaped like those either. They're spread apart about 10-15 feet and the tallest one was probably 15-18 feet or so above the ground. Originally, there were 98 stones, according to the Web site http://www.avebury-web.co.uk/.

Two smaller circles sit inside the larger one, referred to as the northern and southern circles consisting of 27 and 29 stones respectively, at least originally.



The stones were made of sandstone, which is the fourth hardest stone after diamonds, according to our guide. So a lot of them were taken down to be used for building other structures, especially at the encouragement of religious leaders who thought the circles were pagan.

What makes Avebury so different, is that a town of 90 people sits in the middle of the circle, so visitors have to navigate roads, houses, a church and a pub to see the entire circle. Not to mention the sheep that live there to keep the grass down. Conventional ways of mowing would damage the site. So half the time instead of looking at the stones, I was looking down at the ground to avoid the massive piles of pelleted poop.



But other than that it was pretty cool.

Stonehenge was Stonehenge. I put up a picture, you can find the rest online. It was very commercialized and people can't walk up to the site because it's being preserved. It may be more impressive on first impression, and many of the people I came with enjoyed it more than Avebury. But I liked being able to touch the rocks, walk around the town without feeling like I was going to be yelled at for stepping in the wrong pile of crap.

I don't think I'll ever feel the need to go back. But I'm glad I did go at least once.



Pictured above: Our tour guide with diagram at Avebury; a view of the circle from the south side; Leah after chasing sheep, resting one of the biggest rocks; me listening to my audio at Stonehenge.