No one told me I'd have to bring an extra pair of underwear...

After the Chalice Well we waved goodbye to the caring ghosts at the George and Pilgrim and were back on the road, this time to Salisbury. It wasn’t that far, so we would get there in plenty of time to pretty much do all that we wanted to do in the town; which was Stonehenge and the Salisbury Cathedral, boasting the tallest spire in England. Both of these we would do before bothering to book into the hostel.

I have to say it’s more than a bizarre feeling to be driving down the highway then all of a sudden spot Stonehenge up ahead. Seriously it’s mind blowing! After a few moments of staring mouth agape you have to shake off that stunned look and say holy shit, that’s fucking Stonehenge!

After parking we headed to the infamous stone structure and slowly walked around it, eyes taking it all in. I had a hard time assimilating the fact that I was standing before Stonehenge and as most people say it’s actually smaller than you would imagine it to be. I was glad I managed to catch a National Geographic article about it in the dentists office cuz it really made me understand it better…what it was supposed to have looked like and explained the small “trenches” that go in circles around it and all that. But all in all it was truly inspiring to imagine that something that grand was built so long ago and with stones not even native to the area.

After that we went to the cathedral where we had a tour of the tower booked. In hindsight I would wonder exactly wtf was going through my mind when I decided to do this because I am afraid of heights…lol…and if I had known exactly what the conditions of the climb would be, I might have not even attempted it. Yeah, fear of heights + climbing bell towers in the tallest spire in England = not a good thing. I wouldn’t make a great Quasimodo for certain.

So there were several stages to this climb, taking us to various levels of the tower. The first one had us go up in one of those medieval stair cases, stone, enclosed and very small. I am okay with that cuz you can’t see how high you are going but this is what Trish doesn’t like, she’s claustrophobic…so basically we took turns shitting our pants on this tour. There were about two of those staircases I think and that first one took us up to a place where we could look out over the cathedral interior. Not too bad so far but it was to get much, much much much worse.

There were two sets of these other staircases, spirally ones with not really much around them, they were very open and they went up really fricken high. I bravely started up, the floor of where we had been getting further and further below me, the emptiness of air all around me. I got partially up before that feeling kicks in, you know the one where your brain starts to scream, “HOLY FUCKING SHIT I’M UP REALLY FUCKING HIGH AND I’M GOING TO DIE.” And at the same time that is happening your body freezes up, refusing to go anywhere whether it be up or down. Your foot tries to take another step, but it’s all in vain and just sort of hangs there frozen in mid step. I start to feel lightheaded and I can hear my heart hammering away in my chest and soon a cold sweat will surely break out upon my deathly white brow. But screw that, that teeny tiny part of my brain says, the part that’s rebelling against such silliness. If I don’t do this the whole way I am going to regret it. I survived driving across the English countryside with signs that read “oncoming traffic in middle of road” and I can survive this! So forcing one foot in front of the other and breathing like I am about to give birth, I make it all the way up! Yay! Well not so fast! We get to where we were going and it’s just some old scaffolding somehow attached along the circular wall, maybe a few feet wide and probably built in 1041. Ugh….my back hugs the wall for this part. Then I find out we have another set of those staircases to do and I go through the exact same thing, worried now that I won’t be able to make it back down and will be forced to live in the bell tower forever, my only companion a hunchback and a whole lotta pigeons.

At the top we go out onto a small, very small (not even 2 feet wide) balcony that runs along the outside of the tower. I kindly allow everyone else to go first (see the first people have to move along that balcony to let the others on…not me! Ha ha!) I stayed last and kinda kept one foot in the door and tried my best to surreptitiously peer over the town. Holy shit we were up high!

Going down wasn’t much fun either but at least we got to the bells in time to hear them bong 6pm…that was loud! The whole time I can’t help but think of that joke, “I dunno but his face rings a bell!”…lol…But in the end I did it! I did the whole damn thing and I even got a pin that says so…a treasured possession I wear with pride that’s for sure. Our guide was totally awesome and I highly recommend doing this tour if you are ever in the area.

So then we went to find our hotel, a bit of a pain as the road was blocked off 2 blocks from our hostel preventing us from getting there directly. We then had to take this huge detour that got us lost…ugh. Anyways we got there checked in and were off to find food at the only pub that serves food after 6pm. Course that night their kitchen just happened to be closed for some reason…lol…but we made it to a pizza/pasta place, had a great meal and were off to bed….the next day was our trip into London!