Stonehenge

Camilla's cousin Esther was visiting for a couple of days, so we took her to see Stonehenge (which I hadn't seen myself since I was ten).

We started with a look at the Uffington White Horse, one of the chalk figures carved into the WiltshireBerkshire Downs. Unfortunately we didn't have time to look at the full complex, which includes the Iron Age fort Uffington Castle and the Neolithic barrow known as Wayland's Smithy. This would be a great place to spend a full day.

Uffington White Horse

Dragon Hill

After lunch in Hungerford we headed to Stonehenge, only to have the slowest part of the whole trip on the only section of full dual carriageway just at the end.

You can't touch the stones, but do a counter-clockwise circuit around them, along with the other several hundred people on the site. It's set up so that you can see the stones without any people in many places, however - I even managed a person-free three image panorama!

Stonehenge

From Stonehenge we headed for Avebury, where we looked at the Silbury Mound and walked around the circle/village and then had dinner in the Wagon and Horses. On the way home we got a bit lost in Swindon in the dark, in a maze of roundabouts.

Like the Uffington White Horse, Stonehenge and Avebury deserve more time too, with a variety of other sites and fascinating landscapes in the area around the "name" monuments.