Friday 12 October 2007

Stonehenge and Salisbury. Yay!


A photo of the Tower Bridge I took while wandering. This photo does not relate to the entry whatsoever, I just felt like adding it!


Last weekend, Tane and I joined Stephen and Erica for a day trip to Stonehenge and Salisbury.
Stonehenge has got to be the most famous pile of rocks in the world. There is something really cool about the idea of a pile of huge rocks perfectly placed so that the sun hits at various angles at different times of the year, so we all boarded a giant red double decker bus and paid fees to enter the site that felt a tad like extortion to see what the fuss was about.
Tane does his Spinal Tap impersonation - 'Stonehenge, where the demons dwell/and the banshees live and they do live well'

Stonehenge was very cool and did not disappoint. The tacky attempt at Druid music and drums on the free audio guide was an added bonus. The thing with Stonehenge, though, is that while it is very cool, once you have looked at it from all angles and managed to manoeuvre yourself in order to take photos without the hordes of tourists in the background, there is not much else to see. Awe struck "ooohs" and "aaaaahs" start sounding a little silly after a while. It was about at this time that Stephen discovered the hardened sheep poop on the ground and began to amuse himself by throwing large chunks at me. Apparently it was quite funny seeing me try to remove it from my hair and jacket hood. I also learnt at Stonehenge something new about myself - my poop throwing skills are crap. I think I need to train for next time. Look at that evil glint in his eye
It was a great day, and an excellent first glimpse at what life outside London is like. Salisbury is a cute little town with a great church, not to mention poky old buildings that were built about the time the moa still roamed around New Zealand. Despite only being a couple of hours away, Salisbury has a very different feel to London. The foot traffic didn't have me fearing a stampede, and we did not feel compelled to use escalators while always standing on the right (to do otherwise is to risk nasty death stares from commuters moving so quickly through the subways that their training for the London Marathon can be the only explanation). Salisbury was also filled with white old people, rather than cosmopolitan young people. In short, it really felt like small(er) town England that what I'd seen so far. And while it's nice enough, I am still glad to be living in London. I can lift up a house! Ra!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

There's a nice restaurant in Salisbury in a building like that, which seemed reasonably priced until I converted it to NZ dollars - then it was outrageous.

Old Sarum is cool too.

Charlie House said...

Lauren you He Man! [please do not get the haircut to match]

MM said...

Lucky I got your post Miriama as I was JUST heading out to get a mullet and your post stopped me ...

Ug ... He Man hair ...