Today I noticed on the Yahoo homepage that Stonehenge was ”trending.” I immediately thought the surge in searches had to do with the winter solstice considering tomorrow is December 21st. It turns out that researchers have confirmed the exact origin of the bluestone Stonehenge rocks.
On a past trip to England, my son and I ventured out to the World Heritage site. It truly was amazing! We did an audio tour around the perimeter and started to ponder the many questions that so many people before us have asked. ”Why was Stonehenge built?” ”How much do the stones weigh?” ”How were they moved?” Of course, the beauty of an audio tour is you learn facts and answers to many of the questions that were running through our heads. I was surprised to find out that the bluestone had come from Wales which was 150 miles away. That was hard to fathom, because of the weight of the stones and lack of a realistic way to move them.
Well, according to the recent discovery by the geologist that has been studying mineral content and texture relations, it has now been determined that the large rocks indeed came from Pembrokeshire, which is a country in the southwest of Wales. Amazing! Of course, there have been many theories of how they were moved, like humans moving them by planks or possibly being moved by ice transport. Hopefully, now that the particular source of the stones is known an archeologist will be able to come up with answers to the stone moving debate.
Until then, I will reflect on my memories of the day trip to Stonehenge from London. Tomorrow I will celebrate that the days will stop growing shorter and will soon become longer, so I can walk my dog in the daylight on the preserve trails when I get home from work. Maybe on the while meandering on the path, I’ll decide what my next world heritage site visit will be….maybe we’ll go to Easter Island (in my dreams) or maybe we will stay in the US and head to the Mammoth Caves. With 936 sites to visit where you would go? Check out the list here and let me know!
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