Summer Solstice

Happy Solstice

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For those of us in the northern hemisphere this will be our longest day, though as some bright spark is bound to point out, days are always 24 hours long. In my garden we should have over sixteen hours of daylight and rewilding will be at its peak. To celebrate the solstice our guest blogger Florascribe allowed me to share a few snippets from her new podcast.

‘When I look out of my window I feel I am living in the middle of a field, though my neighbours may not feel so joyful.

While they are busy jet washing their brick paving and vacuuming their artificial lawn, I put pots and tubs everywhere to hide the weeds, or rather the plants that identify themselves as wild flowers.

What is that irritating buzzing while I’m trying to enjoy my breakfast in the garden? Oh yes, it’s the bees I’ve been attracting to the garden. My wildflower meadow now has a solitary cornflower.

I managed to photograph this special rose which only lasts one day before its petals fall off.

Rewilding your gates is an excellent idea if they won’t close properly.

Dandelions thrive if you don’t mow your lawn, in fact judging by my neighbours’ front gardens, they thrive even if you do mow your lawn. Dandelions have lots of medicinal qualities and there is only one downside…

When the sun goes in their radiant beauty disappears…

All sorts of flowers might appear in your wild garden, but Do Not proudly share your pictures on your local Facebook pages, just in case you have grown a prohibited invader that is about to rampage through the neighbourhood.’

My thanks to Florascribe and our thoughts go out to her family who have just reported her missing, believed to be lost in long grass.

Silly Saturday – Guide to What’s Not On

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When I wrote on Silly Saturday exactly a year ago How To Cheat At The Chelsea Flower Show, I never imagined that the BBC would be cheating this year.

https://tidalscribe.wordpress.com/2019/05/25/silly-saturday-how-to-cheat-at-the-chelsea-flower-show/
The presenters have been standing in their own gardens at home this week and showing clips of previous shows, because The Chelsea Flower Show is one of the many events that is Not On this year. We all know why, but I’m not going to mention Covid 19. Does it really matter? Thanks to television and television archives, unless you were planning to go and mingle with the heaving hordes, one flower show is much the same as the next on television. Lots of colour, same presenters, some more irritating than others and all that is missing is the scent of the blooms.

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If you want to know what’s on this year, the answer is probably nothing. Those theatre tickets you got for Christmas and the whole season of your favourite orchestra you purchased months ago are all wasted. Nothing beats a live performance, whether you are squashed between two hefty modern patrons in a narrow row at a very old West End theatre or wading through mud at a pop festival, watching on television will not be the same. There are advantages to your humble or perhaps gigantic wide screen television such as comfort, no queues for the toilets, eating your dinner on your lap or enjoying a takeaway.

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Optimistically the BBC has apparently delayed announcing the 2020 Proms till the end of May. Will it really go ahead with all those people filling the Royal Albert Hall, or will they have a spaced out audience of a few dozen and only soloists or string quartets dotted on the stage. They could dress orchestras in full protective clothing, but any safe option would rather detract from the festival atmosphere. Most concerts are not broadcast on television, the BBC could get away with showing a few old concerts, though music lovers might notice the difference if they broadcast a black and white 1940s concert with Sir Malcom Sargent conducting.

https://www.bbc.com/historyofthebbc/research/the-proms-and-the-bbc

Whatever happens, the Sun will surely rise on June 21st BUT
‘This year’s summer solstice celebrations at Stonehenge have been cancelled because of the ban on mass gatherings prompted by the coronavirus.
Senior druid King Arthur Pendragon said it was disappointing but unsurprising. The sunrise will instead be live-streamed on English Heritage’s social media.’ 

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It won’t be quite the same.

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Bournemouth Air Festival has been cancelled so don’t come round to my beach hut in August this year. Air shows are best seen live. We may watch the Red Arrows doing a fly past over Buckingham Palace on television, but I’m sure it’s more exciting watching from the balcony of the palace.

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What events will you not be going to this year?

Silly Saturday – Summer Solstice Sunday

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Don’t worry if you think you missed the Summer Solstice, it has been moved to Sunday. Every year there is confusion as to the date it will occur, 20th, 21st or 22nd of June; so from now on the Summer Solstice will take place on the Sunday nearest those dates, which this year is the 23rd. This will also make it easier for people who wish to greet the dawn at special places and don’t want to bother having to go to work afterwards.

The solstice also marks the first day of astronomical summer, so if the meteorological summer has been a  disappointment so far there is a new summer to look forward to.

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And there is still time to order your ‘Make your own Stonehenge kit.’ Parents of young children are advised it may contain small parts that are a choking hazard.

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Stonehenge – September Staycation Part Three

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 When you are on Staycation you will visit places after breakfast that others have crossed the world to see. We had not been to Stonehenge since the new visitors’ centre was built, out of sight of the World Heritage Site. The A344 which previously enabled motorists to ‘come across’ Stonehenge, but also intruded on the peace of the past, is now used solely by the fleet of buses with destination The Stones on the front.

If you belong to English Heritage or the National Trust entry is free. You can hop on the bus or walk; divert off the road through chalky fields to enjoy the peaceful scenery of Salisbury Plain. There is nothing at the stones now so make sure you avail yourself of the visitor centre toilets and take a bottle of water.

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On a Monday morning, with school holidays over and the website stating timed tickets were not needed, we thought it would be quiet. The lady at the booth issuing our free tickets said it was very busy as several cruise ships had come in; this presented a strange vision.

It was almost a pilgrimage, Pilgrimage Lite perhaps. We set off at a brisk pace, overtaking lots of people and hearing various languages, we’re British, we can walk fast…

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We started to anticipate the moment when Stonehenge would be revealed; round the next copse or over the next brow? Alas, the first view was partially blocked by the ubiquitous buses and queues of people. Queues waiting to have their tickets checked and file between the ropes to the stones, even longer queues waiting to get back on the shuttle bus.

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Only a low rope separated us from the stones, creating enough space inside the circle to imagine how they were when they stood alone. A young Canadian tourist asks to have his photo taken, with the toy penguin that is to accompany him on his trip round Britain.

We ask a tour guide where she’s from.

Portland

USA?

No, Dorset…

She had come to meet passengers who had left their ship at Dover and been coached to Wiltshire.

But the tourists that morning were not rushing and ticking off another place visited, they were in genuine awe that they were really there looking at an ancient construction no one can explain for sure.

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This year marks one hundred years since Stonehenge was given to the nation.

 On 26 October 1918, Stonehenge was offered by Cecil and Mary Chubb as a gift for the nation. Cecil Chubb had bought Stonehenge for £6600 at a local auction three years previously. Prior to 1918, the monument was propped up with wooden poles and some of the stones were in danger of collapse. Increasing numbers of visitors through the late 19th century had led to damage, with people regularly chipping the stones for souvenirs and scratching their names on the monument.

http://blog.english-heritage.org.uk/30-things-you-might-not-know-about-stonehenge

The first guidebook in 1823 claimed Stonehenge survived Noah’s flood. We do know the stones came from South Wales, that is part of the mystery, how they got there. Stonehenge was built between about 3,000 BC and 1,600 BC and its purpose remains under study. What is certain, if you stand in just the right place inside the monument at the summer solstice, facing northeast through the entrance towards a rough-hewn stone outside the circle, known as the Heel Stone, you will see the sun rise above the Heel Stone.

http://earthsky.org/earth/gallery-the-summer-solstice-as-seen-from-stonehenge

A few days later visitors came round and asked how the staycation was going and where we’d been.

‘Oh, that heap of old stones’ was their reply.

 

 

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See more pictures at my Beachwriter’s Blog

https://www.ccsidewriter.co.uk/chapter-five-beach-writer-s-blog

Look out for Friday Flash Fiction as the Stones theme continues…