....and relax

No more work for 13 days....whooooooopeeeeee.

Stayed in bed until 7:45 this morning...luxury, still feel absolutely knackered though, just the lack of work stress, I should have more energy come tomoroow; ready to get teh house ready for the festivities.

So today is the shortest day of the year, the Winter Solstice is celebrated at Dawn and Dusk at Stonehenge today by the druids, it is now officialy Yuletide :o) No pressies until Sunday though. The days start getting longer from here on in, so I may get to travel to and from work in daylight again in a month or two

The winter Solstice is the most significant time of year at another of my favourite places to visit...Newgrange in The Republic of Ireland:o)

The passage and chamber of Newgrange, a splendid neolithihic tomb in Ireland, are illuminated by the winter solstice sunrise. A shaft of sunlight shines through the roof box over the entrance and penetrates the passage to light up the chamber. The dramatic event lasts for 17 minutes at dawn from the 19th to the 23rd of December. One of the passage tombs of the Brú na Bóinne complex in County Meath, is the most famous of all Irish prehistoric sites. Originally built c. 3200 BCE according to the most reliable Carbon 14 dates available, this makes it more than 600 years older than the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt, and 1,000 years more ancient than the Stonehenge trilithons, (the earliest stages of Stonehenge are roughly contemporary with Newgrange). Although it was built thousands of years ago, it lay lost for centuries until the late 17th century, when men looking for building stone uncovered it, and described it as a cave. It was much restored between 1962 and 1975. It consists of a vast man-made stone and turf mound retained within a circle of huge kerbstones topped by a high inward-leaning wall of white quartz. A long passage, only going in one third of the length of the mound, leads to a cruciform (cross-shaped) chamber. Every year, at the time of the winter solstice approx 9.17am December 21, the sun shines directly along this passage into the chamber for about 15 minutes as it rises.

Myself and Mrs.A last visited it in 2000, and took the opportunty to take the guided tour into teh mound itself, we have had the pleasure of standing in teh central chamber, the sense of age is overwhelming, the neolithic spiral artwork amazing, it is well deserving of it's World Heritage Site Status, and i can't wait to go back an show it to the Agnothlings.

According to Irish mythology Newgrange was one of the sidhe or fairy-mounds where the Tuatha Dé Danann lived. It was built by the Dagda, but his son Aengus later tricked him out of it. According to some versions of the story, the hero Cúchulainn was born there.

And so my Pocture today has to be Newgrange....Click on the photo to enlarge (recommended)

Spiral Art on the Entrance Stone to Newgrange



Lots more Images of Newgrange Here