American Stonehenge

"Let's do something really, really American."

"Okay, okay…Like what?"

"Well, Montana is really American. You can't find Montana anywhere else in the world."

"This is true…But we're not going to Montana."

"…Did you know there is a Stonehenge Memorial in Washington?"

"Get in the car."

That was, more or less, the conversation that Emma and I shared before heading off on our adventure yesterday. We hopped in the car and drove for four hours, stopping once at a view point to view all of the points and eventually, after getting briefly lost, ended up in Klickitat County, Goldendale, WA. Along the way, there were a lot of rocks and even more signs informing us of them, we drove so far the temperature increased over 20 degrees and we left civilisation for a rather extended period of time. Seriously, Central Eastern Washington is pretty barren of life, from what I gathered, and those who do live there have acres and acres of farmland, whose cows we spotted. (Mostly Emma spotted them, I was much better at 'horse!')

So yes, at the end of the journey…there was Stonehenge. A brief history of this monument is that it was built by a road builder named Sam Hill, who was inspired by the original Stonehenge and the fact that it have been used as a sacrificial site. He constructed the American one as a reminder that "humanity is still being sacrificed to the god of war."

Unlike the original Stonehenge, which is aligned to the midsummer sunrise, this one was fixed to the astronomical horizon purely for the purpose of being a good vantage point for an eclipse that occurred on June 8th, 1918. Which just essentially means that it is pretty much impossible to use at an astronomical calendar, but that it was a PERFECT spot to sit for that one astronomic event. Good going, boys.

We could not have picked a more perfect day to go, to be honest. We arrived around 6pm, the sun hit the monument perfectly. Right on the other side of the monument was the Columbia River and, on the other side of the river, Oregon. With giant turbines above on the hills, spinning in the sunshine, very few cars driving along the dirt roads on the bluff…so picturesque.

However, due to the fact that before we left, we didn't really know where we were going, I didn't even think to bring my actual camera and only had my camcorder. Hence the less-than-great photos in this post. Ah well. There will be a video, at some point. After some of the most serene moments of my life, we hopped in the car, drove an hour in before stopping at a Denny's to order a heart attack - I mean fried cheese sandwich composed of bread, cheese, MOZZARELLA STICKS, cheese, bread - and made the final three hour journey back to Seattle.

Some of the hi-lights of the drives there and back were almost deciding to go to Montana instead once we saw there was another car driving there (or we assumed so because he was driving east and had a Montana license plate.) Signs every few miles claiming 'ROCKS' whenever there was a cliff-side with, you guessed it, rocks. A warning that the highway would be closed for 'rock blasting,' because this was a very rock-heavy roadtrip. Goldendale's Main Street, which consisted of...next to nothing. The Nomad Mountain Outlaws. Some chicken roadkill. Mamma Mia sing-alongs. Fruit stands every thirty seconds while going through Yakima. And all the while, chastising Liam on both Skype and Twitter for watching My Little Pony.

Just another Thursday. I'll see you guys tomorrow. x

Days till London: 23.