The Staunton Longstone and some Leylines

This is the third in my series of occasional posts inspired by Ray Wright's book Secret Forest. For the others click here and here.

The Staunton Longstone stands beside the busy A4136, ½ mile east of Staunton. It's about 7ft tall and dates back to the Bronze Age. What makes this one a bit special is that, according to local folklore, if you prick it with a pin exactly at midnight, it will bleed. Cynical old woman that I am, I'm not tempted to forsake my warm bed to test the theory.

Ray Wright places great importance on this stone as being at the intersection of two leylines. He writes, "These two lines make contact with the Rivers Severn, Wye and Monnow at points where the energies of the rivers are dissipated. Elsewhere he explains, "Leylines  are not only physical, material lines, but are also ionized lines along which very subtle forces or earth currents can flow."

Well, you're free to make of that what you will. I'll admit that the fact that The Kymin (overlooking Monmouth), The Buckstone (near Staunton), Staunton Longstone, a couple of crossroads and Barrow Hill on the other side of the Severn are in almost perfect alignment is very interesting. I checked them on an OS map and they really do align. I don't put it past the ancients to site their landmarks thus for their own reasons; cynical me, though, is not ready to subscribe to talk of ionising lines and subtle forces.

My visit to the Staunton Longstone was part of a longer walk that began and ended near the Forest Holidays holiday park at Christchurch.

Here are a few photos of the walk...

Despite horrendous amounts of rain in recent weeks, we're enjoying a glorious autumn in the Forest of Dean. The colours are amazing, and even more so when the sun condescends to shine. This is the footpath that skirts the Forest Holidays site. 

It was good to get out onto this broad forest track through Marian's Inclosure, as the rains have reduced many of the smaller paths into slippy-slidey mud tracks. 

A couple more shots of Staunton Longstone, the first showing its close proximity of the A4136.

From the Longstone we zig-zagged along forest paths, descended to the mighty River Wye and made our way upstream to the Symonds Yat rapids.  The rapids are a favourite spot for kyakers. I've canoed down them a couple of times and it was great fun. Usually they look like this...

... but after all the recent rain, they looked like this!  Not a kyaker in sight.

When it's not heaving with summer visitors the Saracen's Head Inn at Symonds Yat is a great place to refresh ones energies before the steep ascent to Yat Rock, with its breathtaking views of the meandering River Wye. I needed that refreshment and can recommend their Brie and Cranberry baguettes. 

Yat Rock

Autumn Reflections

Fall, leaves, fall; die, flowers, away;
lengthen night and shorten day;
every leaf speaks bliss to me
fluttering from the autumn tree.

Emily Brontë

Skipper and me

having fun

in autumn sun 

at Soudley.

Listen...

With faint dry sound,

like steps of passing ghosts,

the leaves, frost-crisp'd, break from the trees

and fall.

Adelaide Crapsey

Oh oh oh oh, when I'm dead and gone

Scarcely a week goes by without some financial institution trying to sell me a Funeral Plan. I'm sure it's my advancing years that prompts them; surely financing my funeral must weigh heavily on my mind. Moreover, my hard-won pensions are there for the picking.

The latest offer from Sun Life made sober reading...

The average cost of a basic funeral in the South West of England is £4,685

Notice that that's just the basic cost and doesn't include such 'essentials' as press notices, black cars for the mourners, flowers to bedeck my coffin, a church service with organist and appropriately cassocked vicar, a bun-feast in the pub and a lovingly inscribed headstone to mark my final resting place.


Over the decades the funeral industry has taught us what a 'proper' funeral should look like. A shining black hearse, black limos, a funeral director in pin-striped trousers, top hat and tails, a professionally-conducted memorial service... the list goes on.  Little wonder, then, that the cost of the average funeral has risen by about 120% since 2005 and is projected to rise by another 77% over the next 10 years.  With this increase has come a dramatic rise in the popularity of funeral plans, as families seek to shield their loved ones from this crippling cost. About 1.3 million people in the UK have a plan and 200,000 new ones are sold every year. I wonder who profits the most from that?  I strongly suspect that these plans are actually driving up the cost of funerals, since they literally bury the true cost from grieving families.

I realise that I must choose my words carefully. If you've recently been bereaved, and bidden farewell to your loved one with all the pomp and ceremony that you and your chosen funeral director could muster, then God bless you. Funeral services are, after all, primarily for the living, and if the last one you had to plan brought help and comfort, that's great. But such extravagances are not for me.

They'll still spend more than they should.
It's just another Funeral Plan advertisement 

Here are a couple of  things to ponder:

• Why does the coffin need to be present at a funeral service? Unless you're moved to open it, it's just a rather ornate heavy box that we take on trust to contain a body.

• And why, if you have a church service, does the vicar have to commend the dearly departed to God? I speak here as a Christian who really does believe in a life hereafter, but do we really think that a body that's been dead for a fortnight or so needs the 'ok' from a minister to release it from limbo?

I'm writing in my will that I would prefer a Direct Funeral, sometimes called an Unattended Funeral. My body will be taken to a crematorium (I really don't mind which one – one of the cheaper firms uses a crem in Lancashire), then my ashes will either be scattered or (for an extra £70) returned to my family. Costs start at around £1000, rising to about £1700 if one employs a local firm. Other costs that they may wish to consider include:

• A Service of Remembrance which, with vicar and organist, would cost about £300.
• Notice in the newspaper, at about £75... or why not tell everyone via Facebook?!
• Finally, how about a bring-&-share meal in a hall? Another £250 perhaps?

So bidding farewell to the late Angie Kay will cost at best £1000 and at worst about £2400 – a little over half the cost of that average funeral.



NB. I would like to assure my loyal readers that this post has not been inspired by the knowledge of my impending demise.  To the best of my knowledge I'm in splendid health.