When my family was in town before christmas, I was afraid they would be bored with just staying in London since they were going to be around for more than a week. So, I decided to book a trip for the 4 of us to Stonehenge and Bath.
We went with Premium Tours and it was a full day trip beginning with the Stonehenge - going with tour groups has its good and bad, but considering my family has very different views/expectations when traveling, and its really hard to accommodate everyone, it just seemed like the best option.
Stonehenge isn't the only henge in England, there are NUMEROUS - some even nearby the Stonehenge, but Stonehenge is probably the most renown.
On that Saturday, we left London early in the morning and took a coach down to the Stonehenge. Fortunately, Premium Tours leaves London and arrives in Stonehenge slightly earlier than other tour groups, so when we got there, it was nice and quiet with very few tourist around. We had to take a shuttle bus from the new visitor centre up to the henge, arriving early meant that we did not have to wait for the bus. As we arrived at approximately 10am, the sun had already risen and thankfully it was a day with clear skies and no rain.
We were offered of option of having an audio guide, and my sister and I both took it. However, it became too troublesome to grapple with the audio guide as well as my camera. In the end, I only heard half of what was on it, and read the rest of the information on the signboards along the way.
We spent about half an hour up at Stonehenge, with was sufficient for us to walk a whole round around it, read / listen to various information about the stones and their origins (from way back in 3000BC!!! How they survived till today, I have no idea.) and take multiple pictures/selfies.
Many have told me that their experience visiting the Stonehenge was unimpressive and disappointing, so I went without much expectations - apart from wanting to see the stones for myself. I must say, I wasn't disappointed, neither did I find it unimpressive.
The walk around gave me different views of the stones, and you could see the different stones depending on where you were on the pathway. Also, because of the angle of the sun, we had fun observing the sunlight and shadows being cast by the stones. We were also attempting to obtain images with light leaks on our cameras.
I think its important to find your own form of enjoyment when you're traveling, and not be too quick to form mental impressions of a place base on other people's opinions before visiting them.
Even though they're "just stones", as some might say, and some people might think that every image in this post looks similar, I had a fairly good time around the Stonehenge. Plus, the scenery is amazing! I love the trees and the vast grass fields.
I think it was largely because the weather was good, that made the experience really pleasant.
Here's a photo of my sister and I doing what we always do when we take photos together.
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| Stoning with Stonehenge |
If you do want to visit the Stonehenge, remember to go on a day when the weather is forecasted to be great! If you're an early riser, you can always attempt to catch the sunrise at the Stonehenge. I believe it would be a picture perfect.
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