# Happy Winter Solstice



## Capt Lightning (Dec 21, 2022)

It's the Winter Solstice and start of the Yuletide  celebrations.


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## Trish (Dec 21, 2022)

Happy Solstice @Capt Lightning 

How do you celebrate?  Have you ever joined the celebrations at Stonehenge?  It's not something I follow but I find these things interesting and I have visited Stonehenge, I imagine it to be quite magical to watch the sunrise there.


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## JustDave (Dec 21, 2022)

Ahhhh.... The solstice.  The return of the sun, but only the beginning of winter.  You have to wonder about the ancients.  What were they thinking?


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## JustDave (Dec 21, 2022)

Trish said:


> Happy Solstice @Capt Lightning
> 
> How do you celebrate?  Have you ever joined the celebrations at Stonehenge?  It's not something I follow but I find these things interesting and I have visited Stonehenge, I imagine it to be quite magical to watch the sunrise there.


I think it has to be on the exact day, but then magic only happens when you make it.  If I went to Europe, Stonehenge would be on the top of my list.  I only know two people who have been to Stonehenge.  It was shocking to hear them describe it as their biggest disappointment, but they are fundamentalist Christians, and I think what they were really saying is they find nothing spiritual in Pagan worship.

Unfortunately, we can only guess at who built it and why.  Some guesses are better than others, no doubt, but whoever did it seemed to know what they were doing and had a better understanding of "the heavens" than the average person.  Imagine!  Ancients having that much data about the cosmos seems profound.  I would just like the opportunity to sit there and wonder about those people, if only for an hour or two.


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## Alligatorob (Dec 21, 2022)

Capt Lightning said:


> It's the Winter Solstice


Thanks!  I am sure looking forward to the longer days, but they always seem to be slow in coming...


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## JustDave (Dec 21, 2022)

Every year, although at the equinox, my sister sends me pictures of a Chicago event called "ChicagoHenge."  It seems that the original surveyors that laid out the streets were quite pedantic about getting everything exactly east to west and north to south, which results in:



You can google "Chicago Henge" for images if you're interested.


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## Trish (Dec 21, 2022)

JustDave said:


> I think it has to be on the exact day, but then magic only happens when you make it.  If I went to Europe, Stonehenge would be on the top of my list.  I only know two people who have been to Stonehenge.  It was shocking to hear them describe it as their biggest disappointment, but they are fundamentalist Christians, and I think what they were really saying is they find nothing spiritual in Pagan worship.
> 
> Unfortunately, we can only guess at who built it and why.  Some guesses are better than others, no doubt, but whoever did it seemed to know what they were doing and had a better understanding of "the heavens" than the average person.  Imagine!  Ancients having that much data about the cosmos seems profound.  I would just like the opportunity to sit there and wonder about those people, if only for an hour or two.


Definitely.  I guess it depends on what you are expecting but, I agree with you, I found it quite an experience.


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## Capt Lightning (Dec 21, 2022)

I've seen Stonehenge, and as JustDave said, we can only guess as to why it was built, but there was obviously a good understanding of astronomy.  There are many other stone circles and perhaps more significant than Stonehenge is the Callanish stone circle on the Isle of Lewis.  This is one I have also visited and unlike Stonehenge, it is in a  wild and desolate setting.

The Calanais Standing Stones are an extraordinary cross-shaped setting of stones erected 5,000 years ago. They predate England’s famous Stonehenge monument, and were an important place for ritual activity for at least 2,000 years.

We don’t know why the standing stones at Calanais were erected, but our best guess is that it was a kind of astronomical observatory.

An aerialview of the stones.



The Aurora over the Callanish  stones.


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## Trish (Dec 21, 2022)

@Capt Lightning Wow!  thank you for posting that and the photos.  I tend to think of Stonehenge but the Callanish stones look amazing.  Seeing the arial view is interesting too.


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## JustDave (Dec 21, 2022)

That is beautiful.  I had heard of other similar man made monuments besides Stonehenge, but never looked them up or have seen pictures.  But Stonehenge gets all the attention.  The one on the Isle of Lewis would be even more interesting to me.


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## Trish (Dec 21, 2022)

JustDave said:


> That is beautiful.  I had heard of other similar man made monuments besides Stonehenge, but never looked them up or have seen pictures.  But Stonehenge gets all the attention.  The one on the Isle of Lewis would be even more interesting to me.


Me too.  It looks amazing


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## hearlady (Dec 21, 2022)

Beautiful!


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## Jean-Paul (Dec 21, 2022)

Bon Fête de Noël 

J


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## Capt Lightning (Dec 21, 2022)

Another view of the stones .  I used to have a ring (bought in Stornoway) with a design based to the layout of the stones.


There is another often overlooked  stone circle nearby.    Entry to the new visitors' centre and the stones themselves is free.


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## Paco Dennis (Dec 21, 2022)




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## Pink Biz (Dec 21, 2022)




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## Remy (Dec 21, 2022)

I like the shortest day of the year. I was considering a walk to watch the sun go down but I don't think I will. It's partly cloudy anyway.


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## MarkinPhx (Dec 21, 2022)

I am probably one of the few people who don't look forward to more daylight .. I enjoy the earlier sunsets and later sunrises. Living in Phoenix probably has a lot to do with it though.


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## Geezerette (Dec 21, 2022)

What I like about this day is that going forward,  day by day, minute by minute the Light is coming back!
A close friend and I visited Stonehenge many years ago. In early morning hours, we were alone there .It wasn’t a day with any events, but the mood & the energy present there is unforgettable.
Tingling!


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## Ruthanne (Dec 21, 2022)




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## JustDave (Dec 22, 2022)

Geezerette said:


> A close friend and I visited Stonehenge many years ago. In early morning hours, we were alone there .It wasn’t a day with any events, but the mood & the energy present there is unforgettable.
> Tingling!


Maybe like you, any spiritual-like associations could never happen to me in a group of people.  What many people think are spiritual experiences are something I only experience in solitude.  I would not want to visit Stonehenge while people were gathering in ritual celebration.  I know this is not the way most people worship.  It's just something I could never do, even in church as a young person, I could never make that connection.  Put me in the middle of thousands of acres of wilderness in Montana by myself, and good things begin to happen to me.


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