This is how we live the (surreal) night of the summer solstice at Stonehenge
“We celebrate the union between the Earth and the Sun, we celebrate the union between the Earth and the Sun” . This phrase and others asking for peace or evoking the ancestors are repeated over and over again, in chorus, among the crowded crowd. It's the afternoon of June 20, the longest day of the year , and thousands of people have traveled to **Stonehenge (Wiltshire, England)** from different countries to say goodbye to spring and welcome summer by celebrating the solstice.
tradition commands . Although it is unknown who put the stones there forming concentric circles and with what intention, that their origin dates back to the Neolithic and their relationship with the astronomical are evident. both in the winter solstice as well as summer solstice, when the sun reaches its highest point in the sky , accurately crosses the axis of the construction, slipping between its stones. And that is the scene that the thousands of people have come to witness one more year. Or is it time to openly acknowledge that the majority is here to capture it with the mobile?
Stonehenge fans
a temple to the sun built by the druids is the version of its history that wins more followers. So when I finally pass through the entrance to the monument after nearly three hours of travel - I come from Bristol and to get there I took a train , shared a taxi with five people and walked almost half an hour across fields- I am looking forward to running into one of those who attend the celebration every year. It happens.
I see a druid with a red cape and a basket of flowers getting off a bus that they have set up exclusively for people with reduced mobility. Together with the group of friends I have made at the station, I follow him until I can see the stones.
It is the only day of the year that they can be played. Those who have come to visit say that on the usual tour you hardly see them up close. people who hug them , who sits to meditate on them or who touches them trying to decipher them and become infected with energy is a scene that will be repeated continuously from seven in the evening, the time at which the monument was opened, until the afternoon of the next day , when it closes to return to normal.
The Shaman of Stonehenge
The rituals begin . Women who have set up an altar with natural elements and plastic candles (due to space security restrictions). Different groups of druids who gain ground among the stones or families and groups of friends who take out instruments and food. Suddenly ruckus . Within the circle and by the altar stone, the druids have begun to sing. As a family or in groups, with capes, branches and flowers on their heads and without letting go of their wooden sticks , they do their pagan ceremony. Everyone is invited to repeat their songs and follow their drums.
When the priest who is in charge of the rite (the same one we follow when we arrive) is about to “close his circle of peace”, an interruption. A woman dressed entirely in red, who in turn leads a whole group of women also dressed in this color, means something: “The ancestors, we are going to sing a song to the ancestors. It is important that they are present.".
The druids look at each other and the feeling is clear: the idea is not welcome. But the women in red move on, the Druid master is left in the middle, and those of us who have witnessed the scene give little credit. All except for the couple who has been by my side all this time doing a Facebook direct and greeting their friends there, who have become trapped in the reality of their screens.
The women in red during the solstice
The sunset comes with the drums and since then they will not stop playing, they are everywhere. Among the noisiest, those of a band of almost ten men with the look of Vikings. The thing begins to divide . On the one hand, those who will remain inside the circle dancing until a thousand, on the other those of us who choose to throw ourselves on the blankets. People smoking, chatting, playing or sleeping wrapped in warm clothes because the temperature has suddenly dropped ten degrees. Almost everyone has just met and the company is welcome. Tetris and spoons among strangers to warm up and a couple of poorly spent hours of sleep to wait for the solstice, which will arrive at dawn.
It's a little after three when the noise of cymbals and some singing wake me up. Me and many others. Are the hare krishna touring the entire area to warn that it is starting. Little by little, we are all looking for a location to see it well. Now it is the outer part of the circle where more people congregate, to see well how the sunlight enters between the stones it is better to take a little distance. “My phone says that it dawns at 4:51 a.m.”, I hear out there. I know because I've seen it too. Nothing of complex mathematical calculations as before, the pilgrims of 2018 do not have so much merit.
The sun goes down... and the clicks begin
“Seven minutes to go, three, one!” listening. It's not time to eat the grapes, although it looks like it. It's time to shoot to get the best photo, the one that manages to avoid sneaking into the lit screens of others and that captures the glimmer of the Sun rising between the stones. But the dawn is not instantaneous, it takes time to arrive and the time frame for the shot is about five minutes . There are a lot of 'clicks' and suddenly the thing has dissipated quite a bit. - Where have the people gone? -.
The first buses back have already left but in the circle there are still various scenes to greet Helium. People together in concentric circles holding hands with their ears covered by helmets, women climbing on the stones to dance with perspective, more drums (because no, they have never stopped playing).
An unstoppable man dressed in sequins shakes the glitter from his face, young people with unhinged jaws walk around howling, the most mystical have begun to meditate or practice yoga in the middle of the revelry and there are mothers who breastfeed. The magic of Stonehenge is that, within its scarce 30 meters in diameter, there is room for everything.
welcome helio