Here we go again....

I had organised to go on the tour with Cath who lives at the hostel.
We purchased the "Magical Tour" but due to rainy weather we ended up doing the "Stone and Bones Tour".
We really didn't care as long as we went to Stonehenge!

The bus was almost an hour late picking us up so we got a bit worried but apparently there was bad traffic so that was why.
The bus is only a little 16 seater and there was six girls on the tour including me and Cath.
It was a good group - three Aussies, a Canadian and two Brazillians.

Our first stop was Old Sarum which is the ruins of a castle and cathedral at the top of a hill.
The place was adandoned in the 13th Century.
There was two huge man made trenches surrounding the place to stop attackers I guess - you can see them really well from the postcards that I brought.

On the way there the driver was talking to us about how the whole landscape has a chalk covering - a bit like topsoil.
It goes all the way to the white Cliffs of Dover - so I guess that means they are made of chalk!

Anyway...after that we went into Salisbury to the Cathedral there.
It was really amazing.
I could spend all day in these kinds of old churches.
The Salisbury Cathedreal has the tallest spire in England and it is pretty damn big.
Another thing that they had at Salisbury Cathedral is the original Magna Carta.
I had a good look at that and brought a translation.
I remember a print of it used to be hanging at Reaston Lawyers when I worked there.
So I thought that was pretty cool.

Then Cath and I found a nice little handmade chocolate shop and had some truffles!
Yum.

Then we got back in the bus and went to Amesbury where we had lunch at "The George".
It is a pub.
Apparently the Beatles once stayed there.
Which I guess is pretty cool and I must says that the roast turkey I had was pretty bloody tasty.

After lunch it was time to go to Stonehenge.
I absolutely loved it.

It was quite bizzare though in that you just come up over the hill and it is sitting beside the main highway.
I guess I thought you would have to drive down a little dirt track or something like you do to most places at home!
Shows how much I know.

You can't get right up to them but we got close enough.

It was really amazing and I could have spent much longer there.

Then our next drive was to Avebury which is a town built in the middle of an ancient stone circle - the postcard I got shows it really well.
You can actually get right up to these stones and while we were there we did some divining for lay lines.
A lay line is an imaginary line that runs in a straight line and along each line are 13 churches dedicated to a particular saint - I can't remember their names.
Between two stones called the Gateway Stones we had pieces of wire in our hands.
We had to walk slowly between them and at the point of each lay line the wires crossed in front of us!
It was a bit spooky but fun too.

That was the end of our trip but driving along we saw two of the Chalk Horses.
When farmers wanted to show their wealth they paid someone to carve the horses into the ground - which at the top is chalk so they show up white.
It was done on the side of a hill and they look like huge white paintings on a green background.
One of them was 2000 years old but the ones that we saw were 1780 and 1812 - still pretty bloody old!

Anyway - that tour was one of the best that I have been on.
It was different from when we went to Bath because we just caught a coach up there and did our own thing.
On this tour the guide spoke to us all the time about things that we were passing by and a bit of the history of places.

I am going to do at least one more of their tours.
They were quite expensive at £57 but we didn't have to pay for a thing - even lunch and the bit of extra money is worth it by having the guide.