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Thought the days of touching the stones were over? Anyone can - all you have to do is book early and pay £14, says Ginny McGrath.
There was no red carpet, no tour guide, not even a leaflet. Just 12 of us and a chatty security guard on a blustery Monday morning in Wiltshire.
We wove between the stones, ran our fingers over the coarse lichen-covered blocks and stared skywards at the megaliths that have occupied this field for 4,000 years.
Wandering among the stones might be something my Dad’s generation took for granted, but 30 years ago English Heritage put Stonehenge behind ropes, albeit very low ones, to stop visitors from damaging the site.
The trampling and caressing by some 850,000 visitors a year took its toll, albeit less drastically than the 19th century practice of handing out chisels to visitors who wanted to take a piece of the monument home with them.
Souvenir-hunters are still banned, but few people realise that touching the stones isn’t. If you pay an extra £7.30 on top of the normal ticket price for Stone Circle Access, you’ll join no more than 25 others in the inner circle when the site is closed to the public. Yoga and meditation groups are frequent visitors at this time, but even ruthless pragmatists will find themselves captivated.
The most spectacular stones up close, as from a distance, are the outer ring of 40-tonne sarsens from Wiltshire, topped with bluestone lintels from Wales.
How these five-tonne Welsh rocks travelled the 150 miles from the Preseli Hills is just one of the riddles surrounding Stonehenge. An ill-fated re-enactment failed to shed light on the mystery – the bluestone they’d hoped to float to England plunged to the bottom of the seabed a few miles off Tenby, requiring some decidedly 20th century technology to get it back to the surface.
That the outer circle is not complete - the neighbouring stones having long vanished to lie in gardens and fields around the country - is part of the charm of Stonehenge. Too symmetrical and this monument would be far less intriguing.
Up close there’s something intriguing – the stones are scored with countless etchings and graffiti. An ancient dagger symbol, a Mr Hale wishing to leave his mark and an L, I, V and E, on consecutive stones, suspected to be the interrupted scribblings of a Liverpool Football Club fan, are just some of the carvings that span 200 centuries, all but invisible to the visitor behind the rope.
There’s something else too that doesn’t reach the ropes – the magic. Druids and ley lines aside, these rocks have charisma – their size, alluring history and longevity are astonishing. Even on a windy day in a wet Wiltshire field, you can’t fail to feel like a VIP in their presence.
Need to know
Stone Circle Access costs £13.70 for adults and £6.90 for children aged 5-15 and is free for children under 5. It includes standard site access during normal opening hours.
There are discounts for English Heritage and National Trust members.
Access is for one hour before or after the site opens and is available every day except Tuesday and Wednesday mornings.
The opening and closing times vary by month – there are full details on http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/stonehenge
An English Heritage guidebook can be ordered in advance for £4.99 and includes theories of the site’s construction and history.
If you want an extended break based around Stonehenge, which includes a tour inside the circle with an expert, Andante Travels offers the Bare Bones Wessex break from £325 per person, staying two nights in Sarum College with one lunch and dinner and an introductory lecture.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/travel/best_of_britain/article5987747.ece
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