England/Decemberfests?

[Frostheart Grueburn]

Might be coming to England around yuletime (between 20.-28.12.) for a couple of days, and likely touring around the Wiltshire-London-Suffolk axis (Sutton Hoo and Avebury on the top of my list). Anyone want to meet even briefly? PM or email me within two weeks or so if interested.

[aliantha]

I wish. Avebury is cool.

[Frostheart Grueburn]

Hallo? May have to get my flights sooner than later, as the cheap ones are vanishing into the maw of oblivion. England timing narrowed now to 20.-24.12. I know some Brits lurk out there and I'm not a Sandgorgon.

I wish. Avebury is cool.

Hope you get to see it at some point! I was dubious about Grand Canyon and suddenly that happened. We could do a neolithic pagan site tour if we end up together on the British Isles.

[aliantha]

I wish. Avebury is cool.

Hope you get to see it at some point! I was dubious about Grand Canyon and suddenly that happened. We could do a neolithic pagan site tour if we end up together on the British Isles.

I would love that!

I've been to Avebury, as it happens. Here's Batty and MagickMarker giving me the stinkeye for taking their pictures yet again: "Seriously, Mom?"



I'd love to go back, though -- we didn't have much time, as you can tell by the length of the shadows in that shot. There's a looooong story about that day, involving kerbs, a harrowing trip through a roundabout, and the White Horse of Uffington....

[TheFallen]

Hallo? May have to get my flights sooner than later, as the cheap ones are vanishing into the maw of oblivion.

Frosy, you may soon realise that there is no such thing as a "cheap flight".

As evidence of this — and also in an hommage to KW's favourite sentient potato — I strongly recommend you view the below linked video. Featuring a trio of the Emerald Isle's most famous and beautiful songsmiths with accompanying traditional dancing and drumming, it's a pure celebration of indigenous Oirish culture that'll no doubt bring tears both of emotion and of national pride to ussusimiel's eye — and helpfully for those of you who don't really understand the Oirish accent, it's fully subtitled for your enjoyment.

It'll also help demonstrate the usage of Oirish idiom in context — watch it and you too will soon be using words like "gobshite", "feck" and "eejit" with unfettered abandon.

U, this one's for you.

[Iolanthe]

Sorry Frosty. Christmas, family and all that. Christmas is at my house this year and I can't take any time off from the cooking/cleaning/decorating etc. I've actually never been to Avebury! Been to Stonehenge of course, when you could walk among the stones. Have a black & white photo of my mum, dad and sister standing right next to one of the uprights.

[Ananda]

Why are you honouring the cowardly dead of the worshippers of the argrific hvítakristr at jul when there are warriors at home?

[Frostheart Grueburn]

Why are you honouring the cowardly dead of the worshippers of the argrific hvítakristr at jul when there are warriors at home?

Because the kekri-month prevails now. I have already visited one hiisi and more shall follow, such as cupstones on Þórr’s day. Besides, I have squandered the church-gold gathered around Veðrafjǫrðr to a new longship and a sword even longer; hence the islands of the cross-folk call for me to plunder a few monasteries anew. ‘Tis furthermore the perfect timing, when they have borne out all that ecclesiastical pomp aglitter with gemstones and flung the doors to the houses of hvítakristr wide open.
They also possess a commodity hight daylight on the tropical zone.

Frosy, you may soon realise that there is no such thing as a "cheap flight".

U, this one's for you.

:lol::lol:
Let us say “affordable”, when the next company “offers” the exact same three-hour experience in an airborne sardine jar for 150 additional euros on the price tag. I haven’t had any troubles or disappointments with Norwegian; don’t need priority boardings, extra legroom, flight movies, duck roasted inside a coconut for lunch, or a personalized en-suite jacuzzi cabin draped in black velvet with a throne of skulls in the middle. I’d almost sit that length of time in someone’s lap, preferably a cute guy between 30 and 50 and who can maintain some interesting conversation.

As the festfolk saw, I'm pretty low-key, preferring room-sharing and hostels and ready to board the much-despised Greyhound without further ado. I'll be camping on the sofa of some girl I've never met before in RL during my next Oslo weekend.

Sorry Frosty. Christmas, family and all that. Christmas is at my house this year and I can't take any time off from the cooking/cleaning/decorating etc. I've actually never been to Avebury! Been to Stonehenge of course, when you could walk among the stones. Have a black & white photo of my mum, dad and sister standing right next to one of the uprights.

Let’s keep late April in mind, then. Appears I may have other adventures roughly in the same direction at that time, so could combine Lincoln with those! Have a good yule with C. and your family!
It’s a drag to have half-a-stamp-sized family of whom none follow any traditions. I’m meeting some people in London on the 20th; would have been nice to combine e-festing with the trip but some other time, then.

I'd love to go back, though -- we didn't have much time, as you can tell by the length of the shadows in that shot. There's a looooong story about that day, involving kerbs, a harrowing trip through a roundabout, and the White Horse of Uffington....

Ooooh White Horse of Uffington...have to put that on my list! So what happened? The girls appear to wear very heavy clothing...how cold was it? I cannot see any hoarfrost on the ground.

[TheFallen]

Ooooh White Horse of Uffington...have to put that on my list! So what happened? The girls appear to wear very heavy clothing...how cold was it? I cannot see any hoarfrost on the ground.

Fair enough... Io's recommendation is well-made, since the Uffington White Horse is visit-worthy.



Having said that, I'd have thought, what with your rampant macromania, that the Cerne Abbas Giant might have been more to your taste...



Alternatively, albeit it's of course far later than Neolithic, I'm a big fan of Tintagel castle down in Cornwall.

[michaelm]

Well I'm a Brit, but no longer live there so no can do - it's almost a 4,000 mile flight for me to get there now, and it's very expensive.

I'll be there in August next year for a niece's wedding, but don't really get back much at all now.

[I'm Murrin]

Wrong end of the country for me, I think

[Frostheart Grueburn]

Uuuuuf what a huge club the giant has!
The horse's familiar to me from some Terry Pratchett books. Cornwall I hope to enjoy at greater length some other time; it harbors a fair amount of stone circles and other curiosities, and the castle looks intriguing. I'm not picky, my interests begin with the Neanderthals (or even Homo heidelbergensis) and meander all the way to...errr...spaceships? Of course the list will diminish in size should they discover space-traveling Neanderthals, but that's another story. Sutton Hoo is Vendel-age.

Buh, now to select three or four must-see items from among myriads. Water molecules in a lake...

[ussusimiel]

It'll also help demonstrate the usage of Oirish idiom in context — watch it and you too will soon be using words like "gobshite", "feck" and "eejit" with unfettered abandon.

U, this one's for you.

Fascinating Aida! That's funny alright. We teach to all kindergarten kids ever since Ryanair went large

u.

[michaelm]

Uuuuuf what a huge club the giant has!

Probably all to do with food and survival in ancient times, so hunting was important - the bigger your club, the more likely your woman was to get some meat...or something like that...

[Frostheart Grueburn]

Wrong end of the country for me, I think

What's your end?

Uuuuuf what a huge club the giant has!

Probably all to do with food and survival in ancient times, so hunting was important - the bigger your club, the more likely your woman was to get some meat...or something like that...

Aye, meat is important! You cannot survive by gathering and chewing on nuts alone.

[aliantha]

Uuuuuf what a huge club the giant has!

Probably all to do with food and survival in ancient times, so hunting was important - the bigger your club, the more likely your woman was to get some meat...or something like that...

Aye, meat is important! You cannot survive by gathering and chewing on nuts alone.

Love the video, TF. I'll be practicin' my Oirish vernacular now...

After all that, my White Horse story will be a bit of an.... Well, let's just say it won't be as....

Forget it. Here it is.

We went to London in about the same time frame as your proposed trip, Frosty -- we arrived on a Christmas Day flight and poked around in London for a few days before the pilgrimage to the countryside. I'd rented a car for the day via Travelocity, which neglected to inform me that the company I'd rented from didn't actually have an office at Heathrow. But another firm rented us a car, and we started out. Which is all to say that we got a late start on one of the shortest days of the year.

We had lunch in a pub (which is where Batty learned that "grilled cheese" in American is "cheese toasty" in Brit -- a bit of knowledge which came in handy later, when she went to Ireland with her college choir, but I digress) and found the White Horse. What hadn't occurred to me was that the chalk drawing is best seen from a distance. See that brown line above the horse's head in the photo TF posted? That's the trail we were on, and of course we couldn't see anything from there. The kids were less than impressed.

From there, we headed for Avebury and Stonehenge, but I got flustered in a busy roundabout near Reading and took the wrong exit. In backing the car around to try again, I managed to bend a tire rim on the curb that I didn't expect to be there (American highway engineers don't put curbs on country lanes, you see). By then, we were running out of daylight. We did find Avebury, but we only got about a quarter of the way around the circle before it was time to head back. We never did make it to Stonehenge.

[michaelm]

I got flustered in a busy roundabout near Reading and took the wrong exit.

I think it must be really difficult to drive on multi lane roundabouts when you don't have experience of them. You have to get used to them in the UK when you learn to drive, but I don't think I've ever seen a multi lane roundabout in the US that doesn't have those kerb-like things between the lanes.

My wife hated them when we were there and was OK with the highway driving, but hated driving through towns. There's also the fact that the US has maybe 20 or so highway signs, and in the UK there are about a gazillion, usually with about 20 or 30 of them on the same post.

I actually find it much harder to drive when I go back there as I have got used to driving on the right, having lots of room in lanes, and not having to constantly read road signs.

[I'm Murrin]

I'm all the way up in the north east of England, Frosty.

[MsMary]

Sorry Frosty. Christmas, family and all that. Christmas is at my house this year and I can't take any time off from the cooking/cleaning/decorating etc. I've actually never been to Avebury! Been to Stonehenge of course, when you could walk among the stones. Have a black & white photo of my mum, dad and sister standing right next to one of the uprights.

You can still walk among the stones if you book a special tour to go either before or after the regular visiting hours. We booked a neolithic tour that left from outside Kings Cross station in London that took us to Avebury, Long Barrow, and a couple other sites. We arrived at Stonehenge in late afternoon and were able to walk inside the circle after the site closed to the general public.

It was a long day, since we were staying with my son in Cambridge, when he was a student there.

I hear they built a whole new visitor center at Stonehenge since I've been there, though. I'd love to go back.

[aliantha]

I'd love to actually *get* to Stonehenge next time.

I got flustered in a busy roundabout near Reading and took the wrong exit.

I think it must be really difficult to drive on multi lane roundabouts when you don't have experience of them. You have to get used to them in the UK when you learn to drive, but I don't think I've ever seen a multi lane roundabout in the US that doesn't have those kerb-like things between the lanes.

My wife hated them when we were there and was OK with the highway driving, but hated driving through towns. There's also the fact that the US has maybe 20 or so highway signs, and in the UK there are about a gazillion, usually with about 20 or 30 of them on the same post.

I actually find it much harder to drive when I go back there as I have got used to driving on the right, having lots of room in lanes, and not having to constantly read road signs.

That stupid roundabout was the worst. I did fine on the highway, but as soon as I got off, I was hopeless. It seemed to take me a long time to get used to cars whizzing by on the other side. I wasn't going fast enough to suit the locals, who would honk at me as they zoomed past. And there was a fair bit more honking as I tried to negotiate that damned roundabout. You're right -- we don't have those multi-lane monstrosities here.

It also didn't help that while I drive a stick-shift at home, I'd never before seen a car where you had to lift up a ring on the shift lever in order to go in reverse. That's another reason why I bent the tire rim -- I was trying to figure out how to back up the freaking car....