england #21 – the glastonbury tor

Could it actually be another chapter in The England Chronicles at last??? I do believe it is! And sadly there aren’t too many more to go. We’re down to Glastonbury and Stonehenge, and then the last day which we spent in Nottingham. So, it’s drawing to a close, slowly but surely. This was our last day in the Wiltshire area, our last day of mystical mysterious monuments. And stuff. We kept thinking we’d get down to Salisbury and see the cathedral too – it’s only something like a twenty-minute drive from Stonehenge to Salisbury- but alas, it was not to be. Darned English Time Warps! We started out again in Clevedon, having spent another night at our wonderful cliffside hotel, getting the exact same room again and walking down to the little waterside town again and having another dinner – and beers!-  in the Moon and Sixpence. Then, on to Glastonbury to see the Glastonbury Tor.

Baker B, knower of all that is mysterious and mystical and probably UFO related, (and our Wiltshire Area Tour Director From Afar)  kept telling us we had to go see the Glastonbury Tor. We didn’t think we were going to have time without leaving out Stonehenge, but spending that third night made it possible.  I didn’t know much about Glastonbury, other than there’s a huge music festival there every summer (and I will admit I actually thought the Glastonbury Festival was in Scotland, for some reason. NO idea where I got that.) I am SO glad we managed to work it in. The Tor is absolutely amazing.

 

 

It’s a huge hill out in the middle of this very flat farmland, with a tower on the top.

The town itself was very very pretty too — sadly all we really saw of it, beyond what we saw driving through, was the part we walked through to get to the path up the Tor. There’s all sorts of other stuff to see that we missed, including the ruins of a medieval abbey which is possibly where King Arthur was buried. There is speculation that Glastonbury is actually Avalon, and the site of the Holy Grail.  All sorts of stuff to investigate next time!

 

Hahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!

 

 

The tower on top of the Tor is kind of …. weird. It is right on top of the hill, but in places  – like this — it looks like it’s way off on one side.

 

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a black rabbit. Neither has Kim. He wasn’t at all afraid of us. Alien?!? Well, maybe the pet of an alien.

 

You walk through a field before starting up the hill. Very very pretty, of course.

Where did it go?????

 

 

The walk up was (of course) gorgeous. And oddly, not difficult. When I first saw the tower, waaaaaaaaaaaay up the hill, I figured we were in for a strenuous hike. But it was not bad at all. Again, very deceptive. It’s terraced, and as I was reading up on the website about the Tor, (unfortunately I didn’t read up on it before going) I see there’s some belief that the terraces are actually the remains of an ancient labyrinth with the top of the Tor as the center, probably dating back to long before the tower, in the Neolithic era.

The views also made the hike very painless.

 

The path really did twist around very strangely in retrospect, although I didn’t notice that at the time. Probably from being so distracted by taking 798,065 pictures. And trying to not fall over in the howling wind. You can’t tell from these peaceful photos, but it was very very VERY windy.

 

 

The tower is all that’s there now, but it looks like a castle all by itself.

 

According to the website (which again, I wish I’d read before going since it would have made it even more fascinating – but oh, well, now I’ll have all this information for the next trip!) the top of the Tor was leveled in the 900s or 1000s to build a large stone church. In 1275 the church was knocked down by an earthquake. It was rebuilt in 1323, and the tower is all that’s left. And there’s much more speculation about all the stuff that was up there prior to the medieval days. At one time Glastonbury was surrounded by water, but they started draining it way back in the 1600s. What a strange place!

 

This guy was taking pictures with a tripod and could barely keep his camera from flying away in the wind.

 

 

Interesting map kind of thing – it showed directions and distances to towns and other features, not that you can actually see it here.

And finally… back down.

 

And onwards to Stonehenge, an entry for another day.