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