Hello folks!
Last year I lived in England for 2 months. At the time me and my husband decided to make the most out of it, visiting as many cities as we could. It's no secret that I love ancient history, so for me Stonehenge and Old Sarum close to Salisbury were a must.
It was a bright cold day in October, and the birds were flying high in the sky. Stonehenge was waiting for us. We decided to go by train from Southampton to Salisbury and it took us around 30 minutes. In the front of the station in Salisbury we bought tickets for the coach company called The Stonehenge Tour for £29.00 each including the entrance fee for both sites, you can buy it online as well. It was a very comfortable ride, we enjoyed the view over the fields of Wiltshire whilst we could hear historical information through the headphones provided by the company. An extra advantage of this special bus is that we had a fast track access to the Stonehenge historical site, beating the queues. This is definitely the best way to go to Stonehenge and Old Sarum by public transportation. Thanks, Christian's colleagues for this piece of advice ;)
The magical stone circle slowly emerged on the horizon during our 5 minutes free shuttle bus ride from the entrance. It was stunningly beautiful and I felt so happy and glad for having the opportunity to see and explore this Neolithic monument, built around 5 thousand years ago. The cherry on the cake was the crows soaring above Stonehenge, they seemed like the ancient guardians of the holy grounds. In the complex, you can not only see the famous monoliths but also many, many burial mounds from the bronze age, which was really interesting for me, as I did not know how many ancient remains there are and so close to the circle! If you are going with kids you will love it, behind the entrance they had a small tend with actors dressed as Neolithic peasants, explaining how the life was at that time. The Stonehenge visitor centre also hosts a museum and a cafeteria. To be honest, the museum wasn't impressive, but we liked to stay there to warm up, as it was really cold and windy.
After visiting Stonehenge we headed to Old Sarum, which unearths over 2,000 years of history. It was a hillfort during the iron age, a settlement for Romans and home to a medieval castle, prison and cathedral. The ruins of the cathedral and the castle of William the Conqueror are there and we can literally walk through it, as you can see on my video. Particularly the nice atmosphere and the amazing view of Salisbury was one of my favourite things about Old Sarum, it was relaxing and somehow very romantic, as we could see many other couples walking there, it was so dreamy! The one thing I also loved as much is their little shop, where they sell delicious jams and other local specialities. On our way back to Salisbury we, unfortunately, missed our coach. Actually, the company told us we could take any local coach to go back, however, we had to take just the green ones, that were never coming, so we decided to pay for a regular one. This was not a nice situation when the bus driver explained it to us, but apparently, it happens with many other tourists, so keep that in mind to don't make the same mistake as we did.
Arriving in Salisbury, we decided to explore the town and even though it was already 6 pm and dark we had a great time. We went to the cloister of the cathedral and explored the lovely lanes. We were very surprised by the beauty of the city and are sorry for not dedicating a full day to visit Salisbury, so maybe next time in England we will do it. It was one of the best days of my life and I will never forget about this mystical and special places.