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Two hours of fitful dozing brought Ariel into the utter darkness that heralds the break of a new day. He yawned, checked the time, and peered out the rental car’s window.
He didn’t hear any rain - good.
Ariel switched his car lights on. The windshield was wet, but he didn’t see splashes of large droplets. The head beams faded into a milky-white haze, and Ariel decided he was being treated to some genuine English fog.
Regardless of the hour and of the weather, he wasn’t willing to endure the car seat any longer. He grabbed his water bottle and a packet of paper handkerchiefs, a box of shortbread for later, and headed out.
He had the paths memorized from his navigation app.
Down the path, then up the dirt road that shot to the top of the hill.
He peered through the hazy darkness. The trimmed hedge to his left side snagged his arm every so often, which kept him going straight.
He wondered whether he’d recognize the place where he was supposed to turn right. It was up the hill, after all. It shouldn’t be hard to miss, not even on this foggy night.
Something cold and hard bumped his chest.
Ariel stumbled, then reached out carefully. Whatever this was, it was inanimate - and it had not been apparent from the map. Not even on the satellite view.
Rounded metal tubing made a half-circle around him, and as Ariel felt his way in the dark, he felt the smooth wet metal give way to wood and wire to the right.
Same thing to the left.
A fence, then. And this was some kind of a gate, one which was impossible to push or pull open, and one where he didn’t feel an obvious latch.
Some kind of a local version of a cattle gate? Maybe. But if this was a cattle gate, logic dictated that there was cattle on the other side. Ariel was a creature of the civilized cities, and as much as he yearned for adventure, being gored by a bull wasn’t on his bucket list.
Hesitantly, Ariel turned around and made his way back to the road and to where he had parked. He was, after all, in the middle of the stone circles. Surely he could avoid cattle in the middle of a neolithic artifact? The place was a protected site and tourist-friendly to boot. He had no misgivings in settling down in the middle of the Avebury stone circle and do his morning yoga and meditation. He stopped by the car, then set out on a slightly different adventure.
After all, he was here all alone.
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THE VISITOR’S PARKING lot was empty, something that pleased Wade as its gravel crunched under his tires. He displayed the National Trust member’s permit on the dash, grabbed his equipment bag, and gently closed the car door.
No need to make a racket on such a peaceful night.
The fog tended to distort sound, either carry it or muffle it, and he resolved to be as silent as possible. Being here alone might mean seeing a wild animal. The best photo ops revealed themselves only to those photographers who knew how to keep silent and still.
He walked on the damp grass just to keep the crunch of fine gravel of the path from breaking the peace. The earth never quite closed at this latitude, and Wade inhaled with greed, searching for any sign of life. Soon there would be new grass growth, green punctuated with bright spring bulbs and veiled with the white clouds of blossoms from the trees.
Even now, Avebury had its own sense of beauty. Bare of leaves, a row of trees stood dormant and stark, like sentinels on a path that used to be the Great Road of the ancestors.
Leading through the henge and around it.
As always, Wade wondered whether the annual showing of the bones of the Dead Ancestors had been a protective measure, or whether wielding them had been intended as a threat that would keep the residents on their best behavior some four thousand years ago. Nobody but the nutty sorts believed in such things these days, and the nutty sorts were safely tucked in their beds.
Wade was alone, and as he pulled out his camera and checked its settings, he relished his privacy.
The stones disappeared into the fog in a classic gradation of grays, showing the kind of typical atmospheric regressions photographers live for and painters try to capture in vain.
He shot a few frames, then moved onto the old oak tree. Then crossed the street to a place where the large henge’s stones stood arranged in gently curving arcs, and where he knew the fog would obscure the buildings that still tended to show through the branches beyond.
He didn’t want the period buildings with their thatched roofs – not
now. Today his heart hearkened to an earlier time, a time when just grass and trees and improbable, cottage-sized monoliths stood witness to the presence of humans.
Few more frames, few more angles.
He turned - and he stilled. A scream froze on his lips as a wraith drifted through the mists within the smaller circle of stones.
It had the shape of a man, a bare-headed man draped in a long cloak who floated along the ground without taking any steps. Lolling fog tongues covered his legs from the ground to mid-thigh.
Wade came to his senses, aimed his camera, and started shooting even though he wasn’t sure whether the otherworldly being would ever show in something as mundane as a photograph.
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THE WALK FROM THE CAR had warmed Ariel up as much as the old woolen blanket he had borrowed from his corporate apartment, which he now wore draped over his shoulders.
And he was alone. In a henge. In a place many revered as one of ancient power. The tranquil vibe of the place drew him into a smooth gait of his yoga moving meditation. He rolled off his heel and onto the toes of the foot with knees bent, still slowly moving his body forward as his other foot caught up and did the same thing.
Over, and over, and over, step after a carefully controlled step. Had his yoga teacher seen him now, he would’ve approved.
Smooth. This place had coaxed him to relax enough so that each step flowed into another, languid and even, almost as though he were floating on a cloud of energy.
Ariel moved with his breath, letting air whoosh in and out in a way that left him energized and made up for his lack of sleep.
Dawn broke, but just barely. The light of day hesitated, hiding behind all this fog while the stones loomed solid in the dark, swallowing light rather than reflecting it.
The road that bisected Avebury was as silent as death, and Ariel had not seen a single man-made light anywhere. Had it not been for the clouds overhead, he was sure he’d have seen magnificent stars.
Heaven above, Earth below.
If he was alone and unobserved, surely it wouldn’t hurt him to continue with his morning yoga routine? He chose a monolith with a distinct, top-heavy shape. Its base would be a repository of the things he couldn’t afford to lose. Then he scanned the horizon around him and located the brightest shade of gray in the sky. That was, most likely, the east.
He grinned. He was going to do something even better than taking a dip in the forbidden pool of the Roman bath house in Bath.
He zipped his keys and wallet into his jacket pocket and shed it at the base of the stone. The sweater went next, then the button-down shirt. Misty, cold air caressed his skin with a soft breeze, but he didn’t shiver.
He felt refreshed, rejuvenated.
Nothing like a bit of naked yoga to reboot this disaster of a road trip.