Living rocks soaring majestically 18" above the mystic land?
Tapioca, Merlin wasn’t there the day I visited and Doug Henning was unavoidably detained having achieved room temperature a decade ago. That’s a good idea, though.
Teacake, I’m just kidding.
No, I can see what you mean about not being able to get near them. Stonehenge is surprisingly small and fenced off. Though the phenomenon of people vandalising stuff is nothing new; back in the eighteenth century, they used to have stalls where you could rent a hammer and chisel so you could chip a bit off and take it home as a souvenir. I’ve never been near enough to Stonehenge to feel whether it has any particularly spiritual atmosphere or anything like that. That’s why I recommended Avebury, where you can stay at the pub which is about 50 yards from the centre of the circle, get up early and just have the stones all to yourself - we walked around for about an hour and a half, touching the stones, sitting on the damp grass watching the colours change as the sun got higher… it’s an amazing place. That is definitely spiritual. One of the most intense experiences I ever had was when I was about seventeen or eighteen and went there with my brother. We were standing on the bank that cuts between the circle and the avenue, with the sun going down in front of us, the full moon rising behind us, and the most beautiful pagan ceremony going on in the middle. It makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up just to think about it.
I think the thing with Stonehenge is that it’s there and it always has been, and it’s so impressive when you look at it and think about how the hell they did it, and so mysterious when you wonder why they did. Avebury, though the stones are in their original positions, has many more stones missing and the ones that are there were replaced upright after being buried by superstitious Christians. Stonehenge is just there, just like it has been for 5000 years.
I suppose it all depends on whether the OP is actually interested in all this mystic crap, or just wants to see the one everyone’s heard of even if it is “just rocks”!
Here’s the thing, though: you go up to the fences, and think, “Hey, big rocks! I wonder how they did that then?” and maybe briefly chuckle about the Eddie Izzard bit about the Druids duping Welshmen into dragging the rocks there.
Then you look at all the other people standing there, all thinking, “Whoah, big rocks!” and quietly chuckling to themselves over the Eddie Izzard bit.
Then you see a patch of moss that would be perfect for scratching “Steve 4 Vanessa” or whatever, if you could go past the fences.
Then you realize you’re in the middle of a sodding great field full of giant rocks and tourists and that there is nothing else to do there except perhaps mug somebody.
I grew up in Somerset, and even a day trip down the A303 to Stonehenge was a pain - it’s a long, boring drive, for perhaps 15 minutes of “oooh, big rocks”, followed by another long, boring drive home.
On the other hand, you can visit the Fleet Air Arm Museum at the Yeovilton Naval Air Station on the way home, and that place is awesome.
Being a Welshman, I suppose I should ask you to consider some of the attractions in South Wales.
Some links for you to look at.
http://www.museumwales.ac.uk/en/stfagans/
A working living museum, which you can smell and touch!
Guided tours:
http://www.southwalestours.com/Scheduled_Day_Tours_Tour_Information.htm
Heh, you pretty much nailed it, Really Not All That Bright. When it comes down to it, I’m not sorry I visited Stonehenge. It was interesting, I got a couple of cool pictures. Then I went to the store, browsed at the shirts that said “Stonehenge ROCKS!” and was ready to get back on the bus.
We really only stopped there for an hour on the way to Bath, which was far cooler in my opinion. The Roman Baths were amazing.
And there’s the sheep of course, you can touch and smell them if that’s your scene
Portsmouth naval base is full of interesting things. You can take a tour of HMS Victory and see where Nelson was shot and where he died. You can tour HMS Warrior and see a hybrid steam/sail warship. You can look at the remains of the Mary Rose and go through its museum. There are others museums and gift shops as well. If you want to see more military stuff, you can head out to the Royal Armoury at Fort Nelson NW of Portsmouth.
This stuff is pretty good even if you’re not a military freak like me.
I’m tentatively planning a trip to England this August, so I’m very interested in this thread. I’ll probably spend most of the time in London and surrounding areas but I am interested in taking a day or two to go to Paris (somewhere in Spain is also an option). I know I won’t have time to see much but it’s better than nothing. I went to the Eurostar website and I can get a roundtrip ticket from London to Paris for $103.00 for a same day trip. Sounds good to me but what do I know? Is it worth it to book a ticket well in advance or can you just show up at the train station and buy one with no problems? I’d appreciate any recommendations or advice.
The Dinorwig power station is one of the coolest places on Earth*. Unfortunately, it’s in Gwynedd, which is cold, bleak, and boring, unless you like slate mines.
In the chest?
*Although it’s actually a pretty crummy idea in terms of power generation. It generates electricity when water from its reservoir runs down through the turbines - and then uses more electricity pumping it all back up again during off-peak hours, when energy is cheaper. It doesn’t actually generate anything except money, really.
Yup - Stonehenge is worth going to on the way to Bath, if the OP decides to go to Bath, but they’re not worth an entire day out of a ten day trip.
Paris is easily doable as a day trip, though I’d definitely advise staying over for a night if you can afford to. Spain, not so much, even if you fly - the flights are short, but getting to the airport and clearing customs can take a while at either end. You can just rock up to Waterloo station and buy Eurostar tickets, but it’ll cost you more than buying tickets in advance, so it’s worth getting them now.
It’ll cost you the cab fare to St. Pancras more, at least (it changed in 2007) 
My wife and I got some great pictures of Stonehenge, which are all the more impressive for the fact that we were going past at 70 mph at the time. That’s the best way to do it, IMHO.
Wow, I wasn’t expecting this much input. The more you post, the more facinated I get. Stonehenge falls under the heading of “tourist” and sounds like it’s not worth the time. Avebury looks like an alternate (and better destination). The military and industrial stuff interests me, but I have to balance my interest in these with items for my GF.
London and the other major cities aren’t on schedule on this trip, since I really want to see the countryside. My picture of England is more LOTR and Dickens, but I know that’s a gross oversimplification. Got to see Watership Down though.
How far can I travel in 7-8 days, assuming multiple stops for sightseeing, food, etc? Can I expect to go through Kent, down to Portsmouth, over to Bath, and back through Oxford/Cambridge? Or is this too much to schedule? I realize that I’ll never see everything, so I want to see the what “the locals” recommend, not what the tourist books require.
With a car, you should be able to do it, although I strongly recommend you get one with a GPS unit. Navigating English country lanes, as you’ll have to do a bit around Bath and Cambridge, can be pretty difficult if you’re used to wide American roads where you can tell what direction you’re going in relatively easily.
You’d have a more comfortable time of it if you skip Bath (though the baths are glorious) and get your Roman fix somewhere closer to your other destinations, like Cirencester.
Yes. It’s a perfect loop, though only you can decide whether you want to drive that far when you’re meant to be on holiday. Land at Heathrow (is it?), drive southwest towards Portsmouth. Spend a day driving about seeing Stonehenge, Avebury, some Iron Age hill forts, maybe a white horse (as in chalk cutting, not a fine steed), couple of long barrows, that kind of crap. From Portsmouth go to Salisbury, then Warminster, which I think has a military museum, to Bath, then back round to Oxford. From Oxford you have a choice: go southeast and see Watership Down, then round the bottom of London to see Kent, or go across the top and drive across the Thames on the QE2 Bridge (providing a pleasing contrast to the tiny little river you saw in Oxford - it’s only after it’s been through London that the Thames is liquid history!), into Kent and see what you want to see there before going back to the airport via the Downs, with perhaps a pause at one of the vineyards in Kent or Surrey on the way. Godstone’s my favourite.
I was born and raised in London and for 4 years on my way to college, I rode my motorcycle over this particular zebra crossing in St. Johns Wood - a London suburb. Later on in life I became more of a Beatles fan than I ever had been previously.
Therefore, when I returned last year, Abbey Rd was a must: Facebook
It’s a three minute walk from St. Johns Wood tube.
Here’s the webcam. http://www.abbeyroad.co.uk/visit/
Just make sure you
A) get the right one - you’d be amazed at the numbers of muppety tourists who wander across the wrong crossing
and
B) don’t bloody do it when there’s traffic. It’s really fucking annoying to people trying to go about their ordinary business when tourists insist on standing in the middle of the road at rush hour while all of north London screeches to a halt!
Oh yeah. It’s sleepy wishful thinking on my part - Waterloo’s easier to get to for me. Not that I’ve actually travelled by Eurostar anyway, as is probably obvious.
I don’t think I’d get a cab from Waterloo to St Pancras, though - the tube’d be quicker and about, ooh, forty quid cheaper.
That’s going to be hard during summer hols. When we got there, there were probably a hundred Japanese teens who spent the next hour wandering back and forth across the road. We read the wall posts and chilled until we got our chance. Check the web cam - link above - it’s a very popular tourist spot.
And there is always traffic. The camera operator really takes their life in their hands since they have to stand in the middle of the street if they want their photos to be somewhat accurate 