It’s a cold, gray morning above Stonehenge, with a gentle breeze blowing through the landscape. In the fields beyond, ancient burial mounds mark the final resting places of those who built this monument almost 5,000 years ago.
Train your eyes on the standing stones and you can almost imagine yourself back there, on that bleak and windswept plain, gazing up in wonder at those rocks as they were newly hewn and transported from the western edge of Wales, such 200 miles away. . The smell of the mud and grass is the same, the glint of winter sun through the clouds is the same, the dull roar of trucks rumbling along the A303 is… well, wait a minute.
Standing at Stonehenge, it’s impossible to see the modern world as anything other than a distraction from an ancient wonder.
In Giza, modernity is kept at a respectful distance from the pyramids; the Parthenon of Athens sits above the city on its rocky acropolis as if on a pedestal. Modern Rome around the ancient Colosseum simply serves to chart the course of civilization.
But when it comes to Britain’s most famous ancient wonder? We managed the worst of both worlds. Here, past and present offer each other nothing but discomfort.
For motorists on the A303, Stonehenge means traffic jams from dawn to dusk, as spectators slow down to view the site on the single-carriageway road just as bottlenecks occur. At peak times the 13 kilometer journey takes an hour.
For visitors wanting to experience a Neolithic wonder, the road is a loud, immersion-breaking eyesore that bisects Stonehenge, Avebury and their associated UNESCO World Heritage sites, cutting off access to the Normanton Down barrows and other ancient features belonging to are crucial to understanding the mysteries of the site. Traffic accidents – and even deaths – have occurred when tourists have tried to visit the rest of the ancient monument.
This has led to National Highways drawing up a plan to sink the A303 underground. Members of campaign group The Stonehenge Alliance have gone to court to object to the plan, arguing it could lead to the destruction of up to seven hectares of land, and even see the area lose its UNESCO status . The group was responsible for overturning previous government approval for the plan in 2021.
However, English Heritage – which manages the site on behalf of the Crown Estate – has given its support to the plan. “I think it will improve Stonehenge enormously,” says archaeologist Heather Sebire, the charity’s senior property curator, who met me at Stonehenge’s visitors center on its tenth anniversary. “We cannot encourage people to explore the entire site if they are risking their lives along the way. The sound is terrible. There is so much misinformation out there that people are getting worked up about. I’ve had people worry about the road going directly under the henge, which is nonsense.”
The palaver encapsulates everything we get wrong about Stonehenge. We have the opportunity to improve an old site and choose not to, for fear of things going wrong. Let’s face it: no other country’s greatest archaeological attraction is as poorly executed as Stonehenge.
Before we begin, we must acknowledge that we also got a lot of things right about Stonehenge. The new visitor center is 2.6 miles away and there are regular shuttle buses to the henge itself. This means Hengeheads can fill their boots with Neolithic goodness, without hearing the clink of teacups from the cafe or a big boxy building spoiling the view.
Stonehenge is also accessible on a budget. A public bridleway runs directly past the site, so if you can’t afford to pay the (frankly exorbitant) entrance fee of £23 per adult to access the official walkway that surrounds the site, you can still visit the main attraction for free view. from just a few meters away.
Yet we seem determined to squander these positives.
First: access. The nearest train station to Stonehenge is Salisbury, 9.5 miles away – but if you want to travel from one to the other? Nothing. I have been reliably informed that the 10 minute journey costs just £25 by taxi. You can save some money by getting on a private bus – that’ll be £18.50 per adult, please. This runs once an hour and you must book in advance.
Even the pricey Warner Bros Studio Tour is generous enough to arrange a free shuttle from nearby Watford train station for ticket holders. That could partly explain why Harry Potter gets twice as many visitors per year as one of the oldest archaeological attractions in existence.
Once you arrive at the visitor center, there is plenty to do. If you’re English, that is. Despite the fact that around 70 percent of visitors to Stonehenge come from abroad, you won’t find a multilingual information board anywhere. Even the Parthenon Museum in Athens, which exists almost exclusively to annoy the English into returning the Elgin Marbles, has information presented perfectly in their native language, complete with jokes.
If you can read English, the exhibition in the visitor center is reasonable. There are a handful of artifacts on display and a history of the monoliths to delve into. But after a quick read you would think that Stonehenge was the first and only stone circle of its kind in the world. In fact, there are many in Scotland that are older and just as well preserved. The Ring of Brodgar on Orkney and the Callanish Stones on the Isle of Lewis, to name two.
Outside are a quintet of empty Neolithic huts where visitors can get a sense of how the British lived in ancient times, if they were truly committed to minimalist aesthetics.
Once you get on the shuttle bus to view the stones? Well… you can see them. There’s no argument they’re not in a field, right in front of your eyes.
“I’m not as disappointed as I could have been,” one visitor joked as she passed me.
If they are unlucky enough to miss that day’s Stone Circle Experience visit, which takes place in the early morning, visitors must settle for being kept at a distance of at least 10 meters (33 ft) at all times , sometimes more. You should look for a spot close to the monoliths where you can take a selfie. Thank goodness I brought my binoculars.
I’m not suggesting a return to the last century, where visitors could walk up and climb on top of the stones and engrave their initials on them (a fence was installed in 1977 for this reason). In that way lies madness, as the Colosseum discovered to its detriment earlier this year. But there is a balance to be struck: with better security and surveillance, we might be allowed within a meter or two of the great monoliths.
After you’ve completed a loop over the official walkway – a muddy path around the henge itself (and it’s very muddy, remember your boots) – there’s more to do. You could walk to Woodhenge or the Durrington Walls, where the builders of Stonehenge lived. If you can find the way, that is: I have not been able to discover a signpost.
So back to the visitor center to check out the shop. I could be snotty about the tat for sale, but honestly, what heritage attraction doesn’t have tat? I was pleasantly surprised by some tasteful selections, including a fun building game based on the henge itself.
Then home, via the A303 for a last look. It only added an extra 50 minutes to my trip.
Despite all my complaints, Stonehenge is amazing. It is a fascinating remnant of a truly ancient civilization, steeped in myth and magic, full of mystery. We should be proud to have it, but it’s time we learned that to properly celebrate the ancient world, we can’t just leave it there and look impressive. Work on the new visitors center started ten years ago. Now it’s time for us to capitalize on that.