The Hedge Druid

Posts Tagged ‘chamber’

As I mentioned in my post about an update to the Sacred Sites page recently here is a more detailed account of my recent visit to the rather small but beautifully formed site that is The Bridestones. By some accounts what remains is but a small part of an originally much larger collection of stones and chambers. Here is a quote from the Unknown Phenomena Investigation Association’s web site:

“The site is very different to its original structure; many tons of stone were taken from the cairn by the builders of the nearby turnpike road in 1764. Other stones were used to build the adjacent house and farm, and more were recycled into an ornamental garden in Tunstall Park.
However, before this large scale ransacking occurred, it appears that the Bridestones was an incredible monument, perhaps unique in England. Evidence from a variety of sources indicates that it was a chambered tomb of massive proportions with a paved crescent forecourt and a port-holed stone dividing the main chamber. The complex was supposedly 110 metres in length with the horned cairn being 11 metres wide. A report from the 18th Century notes that in addition to the main chamber which still stands today, a further two subsidiary ones were located at a distance of 55 yards. No traces of these have ever been found, but there is much debate as to whether they are located east of the surviving chamber, or west. The latter seems more likely as they were probably covered by the same cairn as the main chamber.” (source: UPIA web site)

My task on this visit was not to investigate the former scale of the site, but to map the remaining energies in detail. I set about the task with some vigour as there was a cool wind and the sky was thickly clouded – not a day to be hanging around sun-bathing!

Luckily for my work the site was empty and there was little passing traffic from Dial Lane – the road passing the site across the adjacent field. The field contained a small group of young bullocks, though, and brought to mind several dowsing visits where cows had curtailed such dowsing endeavours. This spurred me into action all the quicker!

Yet I couldn’t start dowsing just yet. I had to have a good look around and get “into attunement” with the site, which is simply a question of being there, without thought, tuning into one’s senses and taking in everything at once without analysis. Moments later I felt myself blend into the site much better, and then I was ready to start dowsing its energies.

I started at the entrance and worked inwards to the chamber. Once I found a connection to the chamber I stayed in there for a while finding its power centres, denoted by terminating spirals. The alignmentAlignment relates to the concept that humans have their own energy fields that are oriented or formed in a specific way such that the person is either suited better to one energy source of another. Some people have their energy fields empowered by the direct subtle energy force of The Sun, whilst others are empowered by the indirect subtle energy of The Moon. Due to the historical associations and symbolisation of The Sun with masculinity and The Moon with femininity we designate these alignments as either being ‘male’ or ‘female’ alignments accordingly. We interchangeable refer to people as being ‘sun-aligned’ or ‘male-aligned’ and similarly with the female alignment. of the power centres seemed beautifully balanced – a male here, then a female, then a male and female centre combined. It felt lovely to be dowsing here – some sites feel ‘difficult’ or complex, but this site was beautiful in its simplicity and balance.

Inside the chamber

I stepped into the chamber by the right-hand edge’s gap and felt a compulsion to light a stick of incense in there. These days I go with such feelings, so I lit one and it scented the air nicely as I dowsed the rest of the chamber. Were the remains of the dividing wall between the two parts of the chamber the place where there was a hole that could fit a man, allowing access between the two when there had been a roof? It was hard to tell. The dowsing rods indicated that possibility, but were not conclusive about it.

Re-emerging from the chamber an intriguing lone pointed (male) stone caught my attention and I found that it had a connection to an energy that formed a ritual path into the nearby chamber. I was finding this feature almost every time I dowse a site now, and am beginning to think that Stone Dowser may have been on to something with his ‘ritual paths’. It does indeed seem like there was a specific way to enter some sites, irrespective of simply finding entrances.

The bullocks begin to take an interest and come over to see what’s happening. We have a short one-way conversation where I quiz them about why they might be interested in my dowsing. When questioned they move away as though they had never been interested after all.

I followed the spirals I had found to their termination points. Where did they go? Were they self-contained or did they link to other sites, I wondered? The female-to-female spirals I knew were self-contained, as was the male energy around the outlying male stone. It was the male/female power centreA place where a person of a particular alignment (see ‘Alignment’) feels particularly comfortable and empowered. The place is an energetic centre where a particularly beneficial combination and formation of energies is formed into a pattern that is harmonic with the person for whom it can be called a power centre. that needed to be explained. I followed the female energy to a large spiral a few feet outside the entrance to the chamber. The male energy flowed through a gap at the back of the chamber to sinew its way out of the back of the site but I couldn’t follow it far through the thick rhododendrons, brambles and assorted other obstacles that sealed off the rear of the site.

Some sort of rambler’s club began to make their presence known by gabbling loudly as they walked up the lane to the site. I decided this would be a good time to retire to consider what I wanted to do next, and leave the site to them for a few minutes. In my experience visitors to ancient sites are usually frequent, but fleeting. And so it proved. Minutes later your anti-social Hedge Druid had devised a set of questions to ask at the site and was back on the job without distractions – even the curious bulls had retreated faced with the retirement party.

I made a more respectful entrance, introducing myself to the guardian of the site, stating my name and purpose, and asking for permission to enter. A curious ritual, but one which I have learned from reading about and trying to understand the mind of The Druids. It was at this stage that things began to take a mystical turn!

I’ve posted recently on the strange phenomenon of the sun making an appearance when Kal and I meditate at sacred sites. Standing on the power centre in front of the tall stones outside the chamber I felt a gradual warmth penetrate my eyelids. I opened my eyes to see the whole site, and only the site, bathed in the spotlight of sunbeams the were radiating through a gap in the thick cloud cover that had been the constant feature of the day’s weather. This was highly improbable, but certainly very welcome!

Power centre lit up by sun

I smiled. I felt integrated with the site’s energies, and in response the sun was smiling down on me. Of course, it’s pure coincidence, but when it happens like this you feel something special is happening. I felt this was a good time to get the rest of my questions answered.

Here are the questions I asked the dowsing rods to help me answer about this site:-

1. Is this site still capable of performing its original function? YES.
2. Is the site still energetically active? NOT RIGHT NOW. (3:50pm on 3rd October 2009)
3. Can the site be activated? YES. AT SAMHAIN.
4. Can the site be used for education, revelation, healing, transformation, communication or something else? EDUCATION by nature spirits, REVELATION, HEALING, and TRANSFORMATION.
5. Does the site need restoring, healing or balancing? NO to all.
6. Is there a genius lociGenius Loci means 'spirit of the place' and refers to the geological/gaian spirit of place. It is transfixed to a place – being an embodiment of the collective intelligence of the place. present at this site? YES. FEMALE.
7. Does this site respond to human interaction, the position of the sun, moon or stars? YES to all. Specifically the FULL moon, and the sun at NOON. Stars, less so.
8. Is the site an observatory, a calendar, an initiation chamber or a burial place? OBSERVATORY, CALENDAR, INITIATION CHAMBER.
9. Is there underground water at this site? YES.

With that information in mind I went back to do some quick dowsing for where water might be present at the site to see if it had any obvious significance in terms of where it might flow. As you can see from my sketch below there were two main flows of underground water crossing the site, and indeed they did tally with significant places for energy – namely the female spiral links just behind the entrance to the chamber, and the other, wider stream being marked by an outlying stone.

As I drove away from the site back towards Congleton I saw the group of bullocks react. They saw me driving away and began to gallop as a tight group stalking the car from across the field. I watched in a kind of amused shock. What were they doing? Then they turned like a flock of starlings straight towards me as they approached the end wall of the field. Now they were galloping towards me with a speed I could never have supposed a bovine to be capable of! I waved to them and wished them a cheery good day as my car dipped down the hill and beyond the confines of the field. Very strange behaviour!

From the information gleaned from this site I can see that there might be more to be learned, but that the next interaction would need to be a much more spiritual affair, guided by the information that I have obtained from dowsing. I think this clearly demonstrates the way in which dowsing can be used as a powerful investigative tool that can lead one quickly to understand qualities of a site, and the times when these qualities can best be utilised for the purposes that the site was designed for. We shall see!

Gwas.

A quick visit to The Bridestones of Congleton yesterday furnished me with enough information to provide an energetic map of the place for you. Check it out in the Sacred Sites section for more details. I’ll do a post of the visit, and add some pictures to the Gallery soon to fill in some extra information too.

Sunday 10th May – Créhen, Brittany

What I thought was the last of my dowsing trips on this holiday was to a small structure situated in the middle of some agricultural land just outside the village of Créhen near the northern coast of Brittany. Luckily the site is signed by one of the small blue signs that show the interested observer (because they’re easy to miss) that a megalithic site is close by. A small area large enough to park two cars allowed us to pull off the D768 road in order to visit it.

The way to the site was along a lovely tree-lined path kept clear for visitors by some helpful agency. We travelled along three sides of a square field until we saw a group of tree-infested large stones that were the remains of the Créhen covered alley. The trees were poking out of every available crack between the capstones, of which there were five, two of them very large indeed – some ten feet square.

I inspected one end and found what looked like a collapsed entrance. Two rounded smoothed pillar stones seemed to mark an entrance and I peered under the leaning capstone to see that the alley extended the full length of the stones, although this was difficult to see with the varying angles of the leaning capstones.

I checked for a nemeton field around the site. Nothing. None existed. I asked the rods if the site was still energetically active and got a positive response. ok. Well, let’s see what that meant. I checked the alignmentAlignment relates to the concept that humans have their own energy fields that are oriented or formed in a specific way such that the person is either suited better to one energy source of another. Some people have their energy fields empowered by the direct subtle energy force of The Sun, whilst others are empowered by the indirect subtle energy of The Moon. Due to the historical associations and symbolisation of The Sun with masculinity and The Moon with femininity we designate these alignments as either being ‘male’ or ‘female’ alignments accordingly. We interchangeable refer to people as being ‘sun-aligned’ or ‘male-aligned’ and similarly with the female alignment. of the passageway and found it was aligned East-West with the entrance facing eastwards.

Crehen - The FEMALE portal

I examined the two ends of the structure. Both had a small area large enough for a person to stand in. Interesting. I dowsed for a power centreA place where a person of a particular alignment (see ‘Alignment’) feels particularly comfortable and empowered. The place is an energetic centre where a particularly beneficial combination and formation of energies is formed into a pattern that is harmonic with the person for whom it can be called a power centre. and found a male centre at the western end in the space where a person could stand. I followed the line as it wandered along the top of the capstones to end in a spiral on the eastern end capstone. Then I asked of there was a female power centre. Indeed there was. It was centred in the small open space at the eastern end of the passage. I followed the path of this energy as it gently meandered along the capstones to terminate in a small spiral on the westernmost capstone. The two energy lines and power centres were mirror images of each other, travelling in opposing directions!

Crehen - the MALE portal

This struck me as full of potential, On the spur of the moment I asked M to stand in the female power centre, whilst I stood in the male power centre. We were about fifteen feet apart. I shouted to her, “Close your eyes – relax – and think of a colour.” I did the same on my male power centre. As I closed my eyes I saw a blue circle appear with a pink centre that then instantly flipped into a dark orange colour. It stayed that colour, as though I had looked too long at a circle of light and was seeing the after-image of it. I looked at M and shouted to her, “Orange!” She opened her eyes in astonishment. “Yes! Burnt orange was the colour I was thinking of !”

She asked if we could repeat the experiment, as she was quite excited at what had just happened. I explained that, like when I pass the cars at particular dark energy spots on the road to work every day, if you think that you can make something happen, i.e. you consciously intend to do something or to make use of this ‘ability’ then it never works out. We should just leave it at that – an extraordinary event of ridiculous coincidence.

We walked back to the car and headed off to the beaches of northern Brittany where we spent a lovely day admiring the coastline, the beaches and the wonderful “galette” crepe pancakes that are a speciality of this area. Strange things can happen when you visit ancient sites. We were now accumulating quite a wealth of such experiences, and I for one was becoming increasingly convinced that magickal things can be brought about by tuning into them.

Gwas Myrddyn.

In search of the strange

Anglesey, Wales – August 25th, 2008

This is the third and final part of a three part story about the sites in Anglesey that we dowsed in late August 2008. In this part of the story you find the protagonists winging their merry way towards the north-eastern part of Anglesey, close to the coastal town of Moelfre

As the afternoon was ending and early evening was coming upon us the sun was beginning to move quickly towards the horizon. We still had several hours of light yet, but wanted to spend time at the Lligwy complex where there was an ancient settlement (not another!) and a stone chamber that sounded like more fun. As we approached on the narrow roads, dodging oncoming traffic, we saw a sign which we had seen a couple of times that day: an AA sign for “Songs from Stones“. We took an educated guess at what that was, and I considered whether we might host our own “gig” at some sites soon – Kal and I playing drums and whatever to get some vibrations going! Turned out to be an idea which we implemented sooner than expected. However, ‘Songs from Stones’ turned out to be an animation which was playing at Beaumaris Castle, and was themed on some ancient sites of Anglesey.

Kal has already posted about what happened at the site for him. I’ll just post my additional bits. We stopped, of course, to have a good laugh at the council’s attempts to describe the purpose of the site – the usual: ancient burial rites, etc. Yeah, yeah. I’d test that with a quick dowse in the chamber later to come up with another negative reading for that theory. We had our own theories we wanted to test out.

An entrance passage

For some reason I left my staff at the gated entrance, leaning on the railings outside the main site. So, I prepared my rods and began at the entrance while Kal settled himself on the stone next to the opening. I got a pattern of symmetrical teardrop shapes coming out of the holes around the big capstone. Each corner of the site was inhabited by a male line which came out of a hole, went around into the corner (N, S, E and W) then came back into the same hole it had emanated from. Cool! But how did these lines all interact inside, I wondered? I went inside to dowse and found that the western and southern teardrop lines ended in a spiral inside the chamber. The northern and eastern lines were in fact one line which curved around to meet near the northern side.

My next bit of dowsing was to trace the energies from the two outlying stones outside the gated perimeter. The smaller stone came into the gated railings and turned right, to swirl and terminate just inside the railings. The larger stone came in through the gate too (how odd, but a bit too convenient?) where it swung left, went around the big capstone, and formed a male spiral in front of the entrance hole.

A stone on the northern edge caught my eye. What about the energy from this? So far, every line had been a male energy. This stone emanated female energies, which went from each cardinal point to end in a small female spiral. On my drawing it looked like a set of curly handles! There was a link with the male energies, though. The female spirals closest to the chamber, one of them went into it, the other joined the male spiral in front of the entrance. Oh! I didn’t recall ever seeing a male and female spiral come together that closely before. So, an outlying stone gave out male energy which linked with a closer stone giving out female energy.

Kal pacing sunwise past the female stone

I now wanted to try some of the meditation in the chamber. I crawled in and sat near one side. Kal had taken it upon himself to pace around the site, at what seemed like an increasing tempo. Kal was now humming. It was loud and made the stones vibrate as it bounced around so that I couldn’t determine which direction it was coming from. I sat and thought about nothing (my wife tells me I’m good at that). Maybe so, for in a minute or two I started to recede from noticing what was going on around me as my mind moved into a trance and a picture began to form.

In my vision I saw a young man in a foetal position inside a semi-transparent membrane, like the albumen of an egg. The young man was pushing at the lining until it tore and he was able to emerge, standing triumphantly. However, the moment he emerged two or three black long-nosed faces screeched out of the air, diving at him with their long mouths trying to eat the young man. With his new-felt strength and courage the young man welled up to three times his size, filled with angry emotion until he was larger than the black screaming faces with the dark black eye holes. Now HE consumed the black faces – and when they were swallowed the vision dissolved, and I was back in the chamber – dazed and vibrating with the powerful force of the allegorical tale. I composed myself in the chamber.

I crawled out of the entrance way to recount my story. Kal then had a go and got his vision. Kal told me his vision, and suggested that he thought the shelf was for ritual offerings, not for resting on. With that idea I asked Kal if he would bring my staff in, as I couldn’t (I didn’t know why not – just that it was wrong to bring it in myself). I went back in and he handed me the staff which I placed on the resting stone. I meditated again, but this time I got no visions. Instead I felt a cleansing effect, as though all the energy that had been built up by Kal pacing around had been dissipated and neutralised, and I felt ‘clean’, fresh and alert. I suddenly got an overwhelming urge to look out of one of the hole, which was shaped like a ‘V’. I looked again – and it drew me out of my sitting position. I found that I hurled myself out of the hole up onto the grass outside the chamber! Literally threw myself out! Very strange. I lay on the grass giggling in the remaining evening light.

The V-shaped birthing hole

Last thing I did was to hop up onto the top of the huge capstone to see what was up there. It was going to be yet another bizarre coincidence in a day of such things. Rainwater had carved unusual patterns in the top of the rock – two faces sharpened into focus. One was a small face with black holes for eyes (flashback!) and the other was a face with a long nose or beak (double flashback!). I nearly fell off the stone in amazement. These were the faces I had seen in the vision! Seriously! My legs wobbled as I photographed them I can tell you. I dropped back down, mouth still open with gaping disbelief.

Black-eyed face

Still in shock I asked Kal if he would come and collect my staff for me, but he told me he couldn’t! Somewhat miffed I gingerly felt inside the entrance hole to grasp the staff and pull it out. For some reason there was no way I was going back inside. I had had my information and it was time for me to leave. I had no idea what the information was that I was supposed to have learned, but nevertheless I had to go now. When I got to Kal he apologised, but explained that he felt he couldn’t go back inside the site now. At that moment I understood exactly what he meant! I too felt like that and I also didn’t have a good reason for it either.

Long-nosed/beaked face

As we walked back to the road, and along it towards the car, a murder of crows leapt from the trees in the field to our right, soaring and swooping, making a racket in the late still air. They swept in front of us, and danced in the air before careening off to distant tree tops. We looked at each other, and muttered about symbols and meanings. This was going to take more than a single cup of coffee to make sense of all of today’s events.

Gwas.

Follow your true path.

UPDATE 30th December 2008:

I have been reading David Cowan’s excellent books “Ancient Energies of the Earth” and have come across this paragraph, which I felt was pertinent. He had just been discussing how some burial sites have cup-marked stones placed next to or on the graves of reknowned people. Then he says:

“If the energy from cup-marked stones can, indeed, allow access to the system for the spirits of the dead, then it must also do the same for the living, so building an underground chamber or souterrain with a powerful cup-marked capstone in the roof and below it, in the passage, another upright inside the entrance so that initiates, wizards or shamans could meditate or perhaps retrieve knowledge would be an important part of the ceremonies of the ancients. The Native Americans had a similar procedure, building subterranean kiva (magnetic chambers), where they could achieve lucid dreaming and imagery, helped by hallucinogenic plants.”

“Ancient Energies of the Earth” – Ch.14 ‘Rebuilding the Ancient Magic’ pp.170-171.

Anglesey, Wales – August 25th, 2008

This is Part 1 of a three-part write-up of a visit by Kal and I to Anglesey. We visited several interesting ancient sites, dowsed them all, and as ever we both learned more and were more puzzled by some of the results. In Part 2 and 3 you can read about the visions we experienced in a chambered site, and about the amazing energy pattern we were able to produce at three standing stones. In this part I will describe taking Kal to Bryn Celli Ddu – the fantastic chambered mound – as well as various sites nearby the village of Brynsiencyn that we both visited for the first time.

BRYN CELLI DDU

A chamber remembered and the Hippy Oz Brother.

When we visit a site these days we hardly notice other people wandering around unless they take an interest in our activities. This arises from an increasing confidence on our part, rather than a desire to be distant. Most families out for a day trip to ‘do the sights’ because the weather looks crap, these generally consist of parents herding their children away from the crazy dudes with the metal sticks, and exiting once the children have bounced around for five minutes. Others, though, seem hell bent on satisfying their curiosity by enquiring as to whether we have found water yet. Another type altogether engages us in meaningful conversation, and that was our experience this day.

Bryncelli Ddu is a short way down the A4080 as you take the first turn off the Menai Bridge onto Anglesey island. Left again at the next turning signposted for ‘Newborough’. From there it’s got a brown sign indicating a right turn near to Plas Coch. What, cock? Don’t be tempted to translate – you’ll only be disappointed!

We arrived at the site just thankful it wasn’t raining and that we could spend some leisurely time looking around. The site, as always, was either letting people out or letting them in – it’s amazing how many people are visiting these sites! Before we began dowsing I was swept by an urge to stand on the top in the immense winds that were sweeping the site from the West. As I got to the top I watched Kal walking around the outside of the mound, looking for a ‘entrance’, I supposed. Indeed he was. I had found the entrance by ‘feeling’ for it on my last visit, now Kal walked up to the mound via the same entrance way, and I laughed into the wind. How extraordinary! I wondered if other people did that without consciously noticing? A group of middle-aged gentlemen, well attired, wandered into the site. Within moments one of their number went through the same entrance way. Another non-obvious occurrence!

Kal began to dowse the place, and I’ll leave him to describe the exact findings as he did most of the work.

The energy findings at Bryn Celli Ddu

Kal takes up the story….

“What a fantastic site this was. I got some really fabulous readings as well as a new discovery which makes me want to go back to Arbor Low!. And so it begins…

I started dowsing as soon as I stepped into the mound area from the main gate and found that there was a Male energy bound (band?) surrounding the mound. The band began about two feet outside of the ditch and included the ditch area (diagram to come). I followed this around the mound ‘expecting’ to find the Male energy surrounding the whole of the mound, when much to my perplexity I found that the energy shifted to Female energy about a third of the way round. It then remained Female until just before the entrance of the mound where it turned into male energy. Then about 3/4 of the away around the mound it turned to Female energy, finally ending up at Male at the starting point.

Having my expectations broken in such a spectacular way, I actually walked off into a corner of the field (to get away from other visitors at the site) and pondered this mystery. And how to proceed? I wanted to see if the energy was just around the outside of the mound or over it too! But before doing that I decided to check a my findings a few more times so as to confirm the results. This I did, always walking counter-clockwise, which seems to be a habit with me. The results were confirmed thrice! The site was gaining more visitors now and at what point I was forced to work my way around the mound in a clockwise manner and this really and truly confused me – for what I found was that walking clockwise my results were completed opposite to walking ‘widdershins’! For where it was Male in one direction it would be Female in the other!!!

Again, the doubting Debbie that I am, I checked my results again and again and found it to be so every time. These two results have totally made me rethink the Tao of things -

1. That the bands of energy surrounding an area do not have to be of one type
2. That walking in the opposite direction gives opposite results

I am still puzzling over this finding and in much need of coffee and cake to discuss these and other matters with Gwas.”

A chance meeting of minds

Whilst Kal was dowsing I was still atop the mound enjoying the feel of the powerful westerly wind that was roaring in from the Irish Sea that day. As I watched him from my perch atop the mound I saw the group of gentlemen entering the innards of the mound by the main entrance at the rear of the site. Moments later a pleasing whiff of sweet-smelling herbs wafted up to me, and I ‘dis-mounted’ to investigate, as the smell was new to me.

A wise tanned face appeared out of the entrance tunnel and smiled at me. “Nice smell!” I ventured. “Just smudging.” came the response. I didn’t flinch at the phrase. I was familiar with the term from reading druidry books. I watched him put his herbal bag back into his pouch, then smiled back, and began to dowse around the mound. I had some catching up to do, and I was eager to see whether I got anything similar to my last visit’s results. Also, the entrance way itself had a curious configuration that I hadn’t seen anywhere else, and I needed to get Kal’s results and then enlist his help in sorting out the energy patterns that had baffled me last time. Perhaps he had another view? He seemed able to dowse ‘areas’ where I would dowse lines, and this may be helpful in this case.

I think it would be better at this stage just to deliver some main points of the dowsing:-

1) There are points around the mound where standing stones once stood in the original site – confirmation from my last visit

2) The mound is surrounded by a quadrant of male and female energies

3) The five stones (not four, as I may have written previously) with their two ‘guardian’ stones either side (one is missing) form an eye shaped area of male/sun energies, possibly fed by the strong sun line that passes through the mound’s interior and out the entrance portal. Each of the five small stones has its own male energy forming in concentric circles.

The theme of the site, though, was the finding that dowsing in particular directions (either with or against ‘the flow’ of the lines) caused an opposite reaction of polarities. What I mean is, male lines gave female readings when traced backward, and vice versa. This was Kal’s baffling finding.

Oak leaf and snake spiral

Then we got interrupted by the group of gentlemen: two brothers and their friend. One of the brothers was a schoolteacher and the other was visiting him from Australia – this was the wise-looking smiling man who had been smudging the interior. We chatted generally about our findings, which I reviewed for them, and then, for some inexplicable reason, I was talking with the wise man, and Kal was chatting to the other two. Minutes later, I saw the schoolteacher walking around with Kal’s rods! And they crossed! He was simply walking backwards and forwards around the site of the old standing stone spots shouting “I don’t believe it! They’re crossing! Look at this!” every time he walked over a ‘hot spot’ of energy.

The wise man, called Russell (hope I remembered that correctly), was a very engaging man. We chatted intently for a good while about shamanic practises, dowsing theory, crop circles (I’ll need to look at those again), and druidic history and practises. Never once did I let on that I was a practising druid, even though I felt I could discuss anything with him, we had so much in common. Or rather, I felt I could learn so much from him; I wouldn’t flatter myself that I have anything worth passing on yet! It was the kind of conversation that I wished could have taken place for hours.

He noticed his brother dowsing and smiled broadly: “You have no idea how wonderful it is to see that.” he said. “I’ve been the crazy hippy in the family, and slowly I’ve been moving him towards some of my ideas, and now look!“. We observed the bemused grin on his brother’s face, then launched into a talk about Terence McKenna. Russell said he’d met him once, and performed the most startlingly realistic mimicry of TMcK’s voice that I nearly wet myself, and had to stop him.

The gentlemen took their leave of us. We moved into the chambered area itself to get the ambience of the place. I showed Kal the markings on the standing stone in the chamber, then noticed some other marks on the opposite wall, which I hadn’t seen before. They made me think of a ruler, or a time marker set at the kind of level that might measure the low point of where the beam of sunlight would enter the chamber through a gap in the back. Interesting. Something to think about, and maybe check that theory at sunset on singificant pagan dates? When were the marks made though, and would precession affect any readings taken in today’s orbits?

Sunlight markers in the chamber

We soon departed ourselves. On to the next site on our maps – Caer Leb. It was listed as an ‘ancient settlement’. Ok – let’s see what one of those looks like!

CAER LEB

We traveled further along the A4080 through the village of Brynsiencyn. Just outside the village we took a small B-road off to the right, and were soon in the right area for both Caer Leb and the Ty Mawr stone(s). As we parked in a small lay-by next to the site it held promise – an expansive 6 foot high earthwork spanned our vision to the west, and one of those “historical summary” signs beckoned us to the pathway into the site.

The ground was marshy. This was late summer, and there had been rain on and off for the last fortnight. We ‘gowned up’ and walked the short distance to the official entrance, oddly barred by a sliding wooden fence plank. As we approached we got out our dowsing L-rods and began searching for the ‘proper’ energetic entrance point. We still don’t know the full significance of this, but it feels right to ask for it, and usually leads us along a strong energy lineThe direction energy takes when moving. It may be straight or curved, in several dimensions and be composed of one or more different types of energies, i.e. negative, positive or neutral. Energy lines can be found at standing stones and ancient sites but are a general feature in all energy fields. into a site. The first corner reached twitched a response from the copper rods and in we walked – into a boggy marshy mass of grass and standing water! Abandon ship! Kal veered off to survey the inner raised earthwork, whilst I trekked stupidly across the floor of the site, getting my feet wet in the process.

Nothing to see here - move along!

At the far end we quickly decided there wasn’t much here, and the energy was weak, and wet! A small pile of three stones had ended my dowsing trail, so Kal asked if the stones had been used to mark something special. “Yes.” Was it a site of ritual practises, he enquired. “Yes.” That as enough. We were wet, and there was nothing else to it. Kal finished by asking if the site was simply a settlement, or something more. Just a settlement, came the rods’ answer. Then we’ll move on. That kind of thing is for the historians.

A TY MAWR STONE

Across and just down the road from Caer Leb we started looking for a standing stone marked on our printed-off OS map. Somewhere over to the right hand side of the road? At a grand stone pillar entrance to a field I indicated we should enter. I had no idea why, so I started to dowse to see whether I was just making it up, or if I had reacted appropriately. Apparently a stone was close, and the rods led us past some increasingly inquisitive cows, down a trackway beside a long hedge. Nothing in sight! “Are you sure it’s down here?” Kal asked. He had every right to be questioning my direction-finding abilities recently, so I double-checked by asking the rods to point straight at the stone. They moved to the right, pointing into the hawthorn hedge. Oh…..what’s going on?

I glanced through a gap in the hedge to be confronted by the sight of a large standing stone about twenty feet away. This was one of the Ty Mawr stones. Today, I was back on form, which made me more comfortable. We clambered into the field and spent a good half hour dowsing around. The theme of the day seemed to be “reversing the readings”. Kal could identify the opposite types of energies to me (as usual), but then could get the same readings from the stone if he dowsed in the opposite direction! Still puzzling, so I wondered if the male and female lines going through and around the stone were very close to each other (male through, female around – another common finding). We dowsed very closely, slowly, watching the reaction of the rods with every small step to gauge the changeover points. Indeed they did run side-by-side, only parting at the stone. We noticed that dowsing to one side of the stone would naturally lead you to think the energy line was feminine, whilst an inch to the other side of stone would give a male response. Aha! We were on to something to reconcile our frequently differing findings concerning the qualities of the energy lines. Perhaps this ‘coincidence’ of lines happened more often than we thought?

We agreed that whenever we got such crossed readings at other sites we would dowse the type of line very closely to see if there were actually two energy lines, not one. With that, we left to go further around Anglesey to pick up some of the sites nearer the north coast, which you can read about in Part 2.

Gwas,

Follow your true path.

I had taken my motorbike in for an MOT in the morning, and had the rest of the day booked off work. As it was a day that looked promising for good weather I decided to use the remaining sunshine to visit Anglesey again. I had biked over there a month ago to see what was there, and see how long it took to get there. One hour exactly by bike. Relatively easy reach then.

M and I headed off in my banger of a car and sat in the holiday traffic in the burning heat. Well, it was almost inevitable. We detoured around the worst of it by going through Rhuddlan, past the castle that Kal and I had visited recently, and had found lots of faerie rings in the castle and around its battlements. As we passed I said to M : “There’s Rhuddlan Castle on your left!” – she looked right and we zoomed past. Oh well!

The site of many faierie rings

In the back of my mind I had an escape plan – if we hit traffic on the A55 again we’d turn around and I would take her to Dyserth Waterfall, which is a beautiful location to relax at on a sunny day.

As it turned out we bypassed the queue of traffic and were soon hurrying towards Bangor, racing the dull clouds that were forming to the south-east of us, at the edge of the Snowdonia range. We took the first turning off Britannia Bridge and followed the brown signs past Plas Newydd. As we approached the turning for Bryn Celli Ddu we were directed through a car crash scene by a policeman. Looked like a nasty shunt for a little blue Peugeot. We were also in a little blue Peugeot and that made my spine crawl in my seat.

We parked and walked along the well-constructed path that zig-zagged towards the site. I like the way you don’t get to see your destination until the last moment – it really adds to the surprise of seeing it rise up in front of you as you round the last turn.

As we got to the entrance gate we saw a cow calf which was stretched on othe other side of the hawthorn hedge. In the field on the right side of the entrance was a cow looking very concerned for the little calf – it was agitated, worried by our presence, and kept staring at the calf “with cow eyes”, as they say. M immediately began to fuss over it tenderly. She knew it wasn’t well, and for the rest of the visit she would be only concerned with the calf, leaving me to dowse around the site.

It had once had 12 standing stones around it, but when I was last here I had only found 11 places where I got my dowsing rods to cross. However, this time I wanted to know more about the energies going into and out of the mound. I started at the back edge and dowsed for a ‘sun/yang’ energy lineThe direction energy takes when moving. It may be straight or curved, in several dimensions and be composed of one or more different types of energies, i.e. negative, positive or neutral. Energy lines can be found at standing stones and ancient sites but are a general feature in all energy fields.. Quickly I latched onto a powerful straight line heading straight for the back of the mound.

The back was almost more elaborate than the front. It had a stone placed on the left side of a small enclosure, and above the enclosure there was a long gap between two tall stones placed inside the mound to allow the sun to enter, at a particular angle corresponding to specific times of the year, I would suggest. The energy line went straight into the gap on this day.

There was a spiral energy circling this stone, and it could be traced in a wavy line around the right side to the front of the mound, where it went out to link to one our four faerie rings which were in a semi-circular formation just above the entrance. Below these faerie rings were four small stones placed in a line about four feet from the entrance passage.

Four stones lined up with four faerie rings

As I hovered over these stones I got very strong energy readings, but didn’t have time to trace their intricacies. I needed to get a clear picture of the main energy paths. I went into the entrance way a crouched through the tunnel. Inside it was a homely space, suitable for one person to meditate with good space, or up to five or six people to squeeze in.

On the right as you enter the inner sanctum is a tall stone darkened with age possibly, which is aligned with the other stone at the back of the mound (which is pictured above). How coincidental! I also noticed a small circular depression just as you enter the space. I ran my rods over it and they spiralled furiously! I didn’t need to do anything else to realise this was a “hot spot”.

My staff against the central stone

I placed my staff against the stone pillar, and the stone I had been “given” in Delamere Forest a few months ago (another story!) to ‘charge’ them with the energies of the place. Then I carried on dowsing the lines inside the mound.

Entrance to chamber

From my quick survey I found two strong female energy lines eminating from the circular depression inside the mound. They moved along the edges of the corridor to emerge at the entrance, and then take a sharp turn up the mound on either side, to spiral into themselves on either side of the entrance. A male line pushed in between the two female lines, coming from the gap in the rear, flowing down the corridor, and emerging straight out of the entrance, and proceeding over the field towards the nearby farmhouse.
I could see that M was getting fidgety, so I quickly drew myself a map of the lines, and we started to pack up and leave. On our way out we wished the calf well, and headed off back to the car.

And this is the bit that begins to get weird. M needed to relieve herself, and we knew we were miles away from anywhere convenient, and that no-one was around. So, having had the same experience when I was last there I was able to direct her to an appropriately concealed corner of a field for her to use whilst I kept guard.
I stood on the little wooden bridge and looked at the weather closing in – any second now it was going to rain. Dark ominous clouds were rolling over from Snowdonia, and the wind was picking up to bring them in all the quicker. I thought to myself, “I hope it doesn’t rain on M while she’s busy! I wonder if I coud keep the rain at bay?”. What a crazy notion! As if!
But I’m nothing if not hopeful, so I ‘zoned out’, as I had learned to do with the sun/trees/dappled light episodes of recent posts. I stared lazily at the flowing river beneath me, and held my staff in front of me with two hands. “Keep the rain away. Hold back the rain.” I thought to myself, as I tried to form a connection with the elemental forces at play around us.
At that moment, just as I was trying not to let the thought of how ridiculous this all was overcome my concentration, the sun shone through the gloom and highlighted the area I was standing in!
Trying not to break my concentration, I felt a surge of excitement mixed with incredulity. Surely this couldn’t be happening? I shelved that feeling whilst I maintained my ‘connection’.
M re-appeared, and I snapped back to reality. I smiled at her. “What?” she said. “Nothing.” I beamed, and we headed off up the path.
Fifty yards later we nodded our “hellos” to a family heading to the site, and then the rain speckled our cheeks as the remaining sunlight was squashed by the dark clouds.
I need to think about this – I wouldn’t believe such a tale myself if I hadn’t been the one experiencing it!

Gwas
Follow your true path