Well I left Blogger procrastinating over a little bit of an upload

And got bored and went away to visit other blogs. Forgot these might have arrived by now!
Today I got up early enough to give Barney a bit of a shock and set off to Avebury to take pictures of the stone circle. I was hoping for mist but the early(ish) morning sun was almost as good. And the absence of tourists was extremely good (As I found out later when they all arrived)
In times past the village was entwined with the stone circle (until some victorian preservationists decided to move the people out and demolish their homes to make room for the stones) and to some extent the village and the circle still seem to have a curious intimacy.
So Frangelita, you're quite right probably abut the anger but it's the villagers who got a bit pissed off with all things ancient and heritaginous! The stones just sit there impassively. All over the place.

And hawthorne grows around the circle along with Ancient Beech and oak trees and small purple, pink, yellow and blue flowers.



So this one has had the path added (for tourists) and I was desperate to get the hawthorne berries showing against the stone...involving a lot of leaning amongst brambles... and failed totally. (but I spent so long over the pics, you get to see them anyway)
Anyway, here are more stones.

And bits of village (In this case it looks a bit as though the pub roof is trying to elbow the stone out of the way)

Still lurking rather crossly around the stones
or drinking across the road from them

And the stones occasionally being used as scratching posts by itchy sheep
Wherever you go in the village, you're likely to meet a stone round any corner and whenever you gaze soulfully at a stone, you inevitably become aware of a cottage or a garden just behind it or beside it.

All I can say about Avebury is it may not have the 'in your face' mystic romanticism of Stonehenge but it most certainly has a powerful presence.
Of which these two jackdaws are clearly oblivious.
I love it.
After wearing my feet out trudging round the circle, I went to Avebury Manor which has the most serene and beautiful garden and then called on my brother on the way home and saw his new house which is looking much newer than it did last time I saw it. It was really nice to see him (it seems to have been a long time since I last did). Then I had coffee cake in hungerford and went home feeling extremely satisfied with my day out.

When I've sorted through my pics of the manor garden I shall post some.
And in case you didn't know, last week there was a partial eclipse of the moon. I spent some time trying to work out what was shadowing what to produce this topless effect. But I gave up because whichever way I looked at it, it didn't seem to make sense. But that is probably just because of my ignorance of eclipses.