June 21
The longest day of the year
By Maneeza Iqbal and Kelsey Proud, Reporters, MSN UK News
We were going to catch the 21:20 train to Salisbury, but missed it by five minutes. With time to kill until the next train, and all the usual conspicuous baggage of journalists heading out on assignment, we sat in the Waterloo train station, fueled up with coffee, and tried to make small talk. Though we didn’t know it, those would be the last calm minutes of the next 18 hours. We were going to Stonehenge for the summer solstice.
As the 22:20 train filled up, we claimed a table for the hour and a half journey, and tried to grab some shuteye on the ride for the night ahead, but that plan didn’t work so well. We were joined on the train with fellow revelers, and most were headed to the celebrations at Stonehenge. Raucous laughter in many languages filled the train car, and we headed out of the station into the foggy English countryside.
We arrived at Salisbury to drizzling rain. It wasn’t enough to prompt us to dig out our umbrellas from our backpacks, but enough of a strong mist to have new friends chivalrously offer us shelter under their “brellies.”
Several buses numbered 333 to Stonehenge lined up on the road for us to climb aboard. The price was “six pounds one way, nine pounds return,” but most of us in line wondered who would stay behind and buy a one-way ticket to the stones.
We were dropped off 2 km from Stonehenge. They say there’s “wisdom in a crowd,” and thus we followed a long line of revelers, trekking across a motorway and through pockmarked and grassy farmland in the complete dark. The only directional aides were the glow of the lights around Stonehenge on the horizon and each set of feet in front of our own.
Ready to start the work we had come to do, we reached the celebration grounds around 1 a.m., found the media tent, and were greeted by food stands advertising vegan and vegetarian menus. We think this was the first time we had ever seen vegetarian food options outnumbering meat options.
Past the food stands, we could see the stones themselves in the distance, glowing blue from the spotlights placed around for safety. The silhouettes of thousands of people were dancing to the beat of their own drums and were all that stood between the iconic circle and us.
As we got closer to the stones, the pounding of drums got louder and set a chaotic rhythm for the early morning hours. Some drum ensembles had crowds surrounding them and dancing, while others simply made music for themselves. The beats had an international flair and echoed patterns reminiscent of the Caribbean or Spain.
All of this, and we hadn’t even made it to the main event, the centre of Stonehenge.
The centre was almost impenetrable, with some people dancing on the altar stone and others camped out on the ground. We got through it because it was still before sunrise and the tone of the celebration was still relatively calm. There was enough room at this point to stream through the crevices between the boulders by trading places with people to move forward.
The musk of sweat, marijuana, alcohol and rain was everywhere. We had to be extra careful not to step on a passed out partier as we made it from one side to the other.
Police said that considering the number in attendance, the crowd was well behaved, despite the regular issues. There were a number of arrests due to minor offenses like theft and drunkenness.
For the rest of the morning, we traversed around Stonehenge, speaking to people and hearing their stories as we waited for the sunrise.(see video link below)
Sunrise was at 4:50 a.m. People moved in from the outside toward the stones. The centre of Stonehenge became denser as people crowded to see the sun emerge above the heel stone.
According to the police, 28,000 people were present for the sunrise.
The fog hung above our heads as we saw the sky become gray-blue and clouds stopped the sun from peeking through. Even with a dull climax, people cheered, banged drums, and danced to welcome midsummer’s day, the longest day of the year.
See some of the solstice first-hand through our "What does the solstice mean to you?" video.
Tell us your summer solstice story or post your comments here or on our message boards.
For more on the summer solstice at Stonehenge, see our special report.
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