So last week, I was not required to attend uni due to a Berlin trip taking place that many of the students and staff of the Design school attended, so we had a bit of an unofficial reading week, and we were encouraged to go on some trips to aid our research. (This also meant I wasn't able to do a Spontaneous Sunday this week as I was too busy, but it will return next week!).
As my new 3D environment project focuses on stone circles, I decided to take this as an opportunity to go and see one with my own eyes, and I set to work researching stone circles that I could visit. I soon discovered that a stone circle called the Twelve Apostles exists on Ilkley Moor in West Yorkshire. This is not far from my girlfriend, Chloe's, hometown, which was handy because it meant we could go and visit her family during the free week and also go and see the stone circle. It all worked out very well!
I printed out a route and some maps that we could follow to reach the Twelve Apostles stone circle ,and Chloe and I got the train to Yorkshire on Wednesday. We went on our trip to Ilkley on Saturday.
Here's some info about the Twelve Apostles stone circle:
"The Twelve Apostles is a stone circle near Ilkley and Burley in Wharfedale in West Yorkshire, England. The Twelve Apostles consists of the remains of a stone circle with a diameter of about 15 metres. The circle originally had between 16 and 20 stones, but it is now reduced to 12 stones. The stones are made from the local millstone grit. All of the stones were fallen by the mid-20th-century and were lying loose upon the ground. At the centre of the circle was a small mound, which may have been the disturbed remains of a burial cairn.
In 1971 a group of amateurs made an unauthorised attempt to re-erect the fallen stones, but the stones soon fell again. The stones have since been re-erected.It is not clear who re-erected them, nor when. The site suffers severe visitor erosion, as it was formerly hidden beneath heather, but is now in an area of bare trampled soil. It is regarded as one of the most damaged prehistoric sites in West Yorkshire."
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| Before getting the train to Ilkley. |
We approached the Moor from the North, from the centre of Ilkley where the train station is located. Our walk would take us up the northern approach, past the White Wells cafe located on the ascent, and up some stone steps before reaching the top of the ascent and the Moor proper. We would then walk south across the Moor to the stone circle. We saw lots of interest stuff along the way including Victorian graffiti carved into rocks, cairns, streams, and some nice views of the Yorkshire countryside and towns such as Ilkley and Bradford.
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| White Wells cafe on the ascent to the Moor. |
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| Victorian Graffiti |
After about two hours of walking, we arrived at the stone circle itself. It lies about 380 metres above sea level, and its location offered amazing views. We had been able to see very far for pretty much all of the walk, but the views from the circle itself seemed to be the most impressive of them all. The location also felt like the spot that was most exposed to the elements. It was very windy and it began to hail soon after we arrived at the stones.
Twelve Apostles is not the most impressive stone circle that one can visit, and it has been heavily affected by human activity and interference, but it was still very cool to see a real example of what I had been researching for the past two weeks. I took a moment to take in the sights and try and place myself in the viewpoint of the ancient people who will had placed the stones there. This experience will hopefully help me to pinpoint the feeling that I want to evoke from the atmosphere of my 3D environment.
Making our way back down to Ilkley...
Our trip to Ilkley Moor to see the Twelve Apostles stone circles was a really fun and insightful experience. I think that seeing a stone circle in person, and the pictures that I took, will help me with my environment art project.
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