Stonehenge and the Cheddar Gorge

We left Portsmouth and headed for Stonhenge to see the circle of stones. I knew the stones themselves were roped off so people couldn't get close enough to touch them, but we didn't really have a desire to touch them anyway.  What we didn't expect was that the road from the visitor center was closed to traffic and was a 2 mile walk to reach the stones if you didn't want to take the shuttle bus. Well, they wanted £36 for entrance and then there was a long line for the shuttle and I knew you were supposed to be able to see it from a road somewhere. So with a little help from Google maps, we were able to find a little dirt road that took us right to the same spot where the shuttle lets people out.

Now the only problem was that we couldn't get into the roped-off area without a ticket. As we were standing there pondering what to do next, one of the shuttle drivers actually told us there was a gate into the neighboring sheep pasture that you could use. Thank you mister shuttle driver! We walked about 100 feet down the fence line and found the gate.  Luckily, farmers in the UK don't care if you cross their field as long as you close the gates behind you. We went through the gate and made sure it closed behind us, then walked past the sheep (and all the sheep poo) to a place where we could get a look at the stones. We were about 20 feet further back than the people who had paid the £18 each, but it was definitely good enough for us. A few photos and then back to the car. I have to note that were a lot of camper-type vans here and I think people stay out there and then sneak in after hours to do who-knows-what out there after dark. 😳
Next stop: Cheddar Gorge. This was something I had seen in a guidebook that looked like it might be fun but turned out to be a big nothing in my opinion. The gorge itself is not deep at all compared to many (most) others and was not very long either.  Definitely not worth the time.

Oh well, live and learn!