Machrie Moor

For the first fifteen years of my life I spent part of my Easter and summer holidays in Arran - staying with my Mum's Aunt May (my maternal grandfather's elder sister). In all those holidays I got to know (and love) much of the north part of Arran; Lochranza, Catacol, Pirnmill, Sannox, Corrie and as far down the east coast as Brodick, Lamlash and Whiting Bay. After Aunt May died (in 1985) we never went back to Arran. I have always meant to go back, but never quite made it. Until last week.

We had three days in Arran last week, in glorious sunshine. Nearly 22 years since the last time I had been there I did a whistle-stop tour of many of the places I remember from my childhood. Few of them have changed.

But I also had the chance to go to a few places that I had never been to before. I don't know why, but I had never been to Machrie Moor before, despite being quite interested in stone circles and the like. So I went and was very impressed.

I did a tour of all the stone circles on Mull a few years ago, and they were interesting, but nothing like as good as Machrie. The sheer quantity of prehistoric stone circles at Machrie is astounding. And some of the larger stones are still standing after 5000+ years.

All this by means of introduction... here are three of my photos:
This photo doesn't convey the size of the stone. If I was standing next to it, I wouldn't be half the height of it.

There are five stone 'circles' in this field. And archaeologists have uncovered evidence of others and several timber circles which predate them.

Once again, this photo doesn't convey the size of these. Suffice it to say that they're big and impressive.