The Wansdyke & District Forums

For those who never go, a word on what it is actually like. We gathered at the stones before dawn for the summer solstice, a few hundred of us, drummers, a handful in robes, families with children, old hippies, tourists, the lot. The light came up grey and then gold over the bank, somebody started a slow drumbeat, and for a moment the whole ring seemed to breathe. I will not pretend it is what it was five thousand years ago. But people standing quiet in a circle of old stones to watch the sun come back is not nothing, and it is older than any of us. I came home soaked in dew and very happy.

It was lovely this year, Bran, I stood near you I think. Whatever folk make of the robes, there is a plain truth in marking the turn of the year in the very place built to mark it. We have done it on that ground for five thousand years. We are only the latest to stand there.