It is a truly magnificent thing and the best vantage point is from the air, so Geoffy chartered a hang-glider and flung himself off a precipice to take this superlative pic. Either that or he pinched it off the internet. Mind you, the horse is still pretty impressive without the aerial view, as our own pics that follow will attest. It's over 112 metres long and can be seen from miles around.
A good view of the horse's eye and ear in this pic - this was taken close to the top of White Horse Hill. Note the old hillfort in the centre-left of the pic. Not to mention the breath-taking backdrop!
This pic >>>>> was taken from a lower slope, near where we parked. You can also see a bit of Uffington Castle (a major Iron Age hillfort) on the right of the pic.
If the White Horse is in fact Bronze Age, then it pre-dates the hillfort by a thousand or more years.
Yesterday Geoffy mentioned the Ridgeway, considered the oldest road in Britain and a section of which runs near our digs. The Uffington White Horse and another monument that we visited today (coming up!) are also on or near the Ridgeway, as is fabulous Avebury, visited yesterday.
The Ridgeway is the reddish line running diagonally across the map. If you click on this pic to enlarge it you might be able to see some detail. But then again, why would you bother? I wouldn't.
Our other ancient site for today took forever to get to - as the crow flies it's not that far from the White Horse and Uffington Castle hillfort but it was quite a hike, as these timeless and beautiful things often are. Our destination was Wayland's Smithy.
Like West Kennett yesterday, Wayland's Smithy is a chambered long barrow, believed to be at least 5000 years old. Its unusual name is because the Saxons incorporated it into their own folklore - claiming that if a traveller left his horse overnight at the barrow, with a coin on the capstone, a ghostly blacksmith would shoe the horse and take the coin, so travel could resume in the morning. Wayland was the Saxon god of metalworking.
Will hand over to Geoffy now, who is anxious to tell blog readers about our exciting trip to the Marlborough recycling centre with all our empties this arvo. Nah - just joshin! He's got a story to tell about Wayland's Smithy and it ain't pretty!
The White Horse is truly magnificent. The fact that you can only see it properly from the air somehow makes it even more special. I'm sure we were not the only first time visitors who looked in vain for the perfect vantage point. In fact, we thought our best vantage point was from immediately above, as shown in the photo taken from the top of the hill. Even if you are then looking at it upside down. You just need a good imagination, that's all. Here's a super close up of the horse's eye.
And here's a vista of the Oxfordshire Cotswolds from the top of the hill.
With Wayland's Smithy, there's the good news and the bad news. The good is, of course, that it's a monument to several thousand years of history, situated in a beautiful wooded copse, or maybe it's thicket. Anyway, it's a glorious spot.
I would also include in the good news the fact that you need to walk for over 2 km through verdant fields to get there. Oh, and some canola fields too. As Anne has said, we're becoming quite familiar with parts of the Ridgeway, having spent well over an hour on it this morning. In fact, once you get to Wayland's Smithy, you'd be hard pressed to find a more idyllic spot, and would want to settle down and spend quite a bit of time there, to reward yourself for your exertions in getting there.
At any time other than today, unfortunately for us (bad news now imminent). The area immediately surrounding the monument does take some maintenance, to ensure it doesn't get completely overgrown. So it's understandable that from time to time the local rangers would feel the need to get out there in the Toyota HiLux 4 wheel drive, fire up the Victa 2 stroke, the whipper snipper and the leaf blower and let rip. Tragically for us, today was such a day.
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| Whippin' and snippin' and mowin' and leaf-blowin' on top of Wayland's Smithy. |
There they are in full cry. We suspected trouble when we heard what sounded like typical activity in a Canberra suburb on a Sunday morning from about half a mile away. Instantaneous ruination of the tranquillity.
Regardless, today was another successful sojourn to some more of the wonderful ancient historical sites that abound in this part of England. And only about half an hour across the county line into Oxfordshire. And we didn't get lost once. Alright, maybe a little bit just once, but we recovered quickly. We think we've travelled through about 10 counties in our travels so far, with a couple of more to come as we head back to London.
Such a glorious part of the country, isn't it? Pity about the lawn mowing!
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