.Glastonbury: Avalon of the Heart. pt1

It was 1970 I think, but I'm not sure and I can't be bothered to check it right now, that I first went to Glastonbury. It was the year of the first ever Glastonbury festival. So that should be easy to check if you can be bothered. To be honest though, I think it was probably 1971, but like I said I can't be bothered to check.

I had been travelling around the South of England generally dodging about the place taking lots of drugs and hitch hiking, something you could do in those days, hitch hiking I mean. It was the times that made me do it you're honour, I was a victim of the times and circumstances prevailing. I was a 'dosser' but liked to think of myself as a hippy type.

I arrived in Glastonbury on a rather gloomy mid-week afternoon. I had heard of this strange place before in the form of rumours and whispers. It was supposedly a place of magic and strangeness, right up my street then.
I was with a guy named Brian and we had arrived there from the lesser mysterious climes of Bournemouth, don't ask how. It seems looking back now to have been a very free time in general. We were entering the more paranoid times of seventies, but we were still a bit pre that yet, so things were not too bad.

On arrival at the foot of the 'Tor' we were met by some 'proper hippies' or so I thought. There was three of them and they all had afghan coats on and had proper long hair nearly reaching all the way to their arses. I only had not quite shoulder length hair so in no way could I be called a proper hippy. They were friendly and offered us a smoke on a rather miserable looking 'joint'. We shared with them some bread and jam we had shoplifted earlier on in the day from a local shop.

I was desperate to go up on the tor and experience this strange place for myself. So fortified with 'bread and jam and cannabis resin Brian and I left our fellow hippies and started to walk up to the top of this very strange hill. The guy's had told us tales of 'dimensional portals' and 'an inter dimensional maze' that was buried under the tor. I had read enough sci-fi, a la Phillip. K. Dick as a kid to be deeply intrigued by this kind of info.

On arriving at the top, I was slightly overwhelmed and disappointed at the same time, if you can get you're head around that idea. Once more we were met with hippy types and more 'joints' to smoke. I was desperate to find out more about the inter dimensional maze, so I asked our new smoking partners. My question was met with a rather stony silence, ah well, I thought maybe they don't know about it. I took a deep breath and came to the conclusion that we were here, me an old Brian, on top of this hill in the middle of nowhere, or Somerset actually, and it all felt pretty weird.

A 'Tor' is a hill basically, and this particular hill has an old ruined tower on it, the remnants of a monastry that existed way back in the 13th century, and even further pre- dating these existing ruins, going way back. All sorts of legends and myths are associated with this place. Not least of which is the legend that Jesus of Nazerath himself once walked on these lands. From the William blake hymn 'Jerusalem, 'and did those feet in ancient times, walk upon England's pastures green'. However I digress, here we were, me an old Brian up the hill and out of our heads, fantastic!

As the sky grew darker we were told of a place that we could go to called Cinnamon Lane. It turned out to be about a three mile walk to Cinnamon Lane and this was where the main hippy hang out was, we had arrived.
It was a fantastic time looking back, and there were all types there too. Even within the hippy world there were different groups. The 'Angry brigade' were there, these guys caused some uproar letting off some bombs in London around the early seventies. I don't know if these were the actual people but they had badges on which boldly stated, 'Angry Brigade'.

Then there were the peaceful people and these were the types I gravitated towards, they liked having sex and smoking lots of dope, I smoked lots of dope but sex was a bit thin on the ground in those days, at least for me it was, I just generally got 'paranoid', a word that was becoming increasingly more popular in my vocabulary. Oh what a time we all had.

It was early to mid September and the Autumn equinox was occurring. This is when Summer officially turns to Autumn. It all sounded rather magical to my urban ears, and Brian and me saw it as another excuse to celebrate, as did most of the others in Cinnamon Lane.

Evening came and there we were, back up on the tor. It was a beautiful late summer evening in Somerset, I can feel my heart melt now at the thought of it, as we looked out across the flat lands of Somerset into the setting sun, amazing! People were arriving from all over, more hippies, all very proper too, very long hair and beards. Brian and I had got split up and I found myself sitting in a pretty big circle with about 30 other people. The joints were flying around as 'Gandalf', yes Gandalf himself, began to distribute free dope to us all, throwing out silver foil parcels of 'grass'. In that moment I didn't think it could have got any better, when Gandalf, I swear that's what he said his name was, got out the 'acid'.

The 'acid' was then passed solemnly around the circle until we all had a tab each. I had taken 'acid' before in Shepherds Bush and Ealing but not in a place like this. I had no reference points whatsoever, but nevertheless here I was, sitting in this large circle of my peers and the onus of responsibility was on me to 'drop the tab'. To say I was tense was an understatement, the dope was strong and the paranoia was kicking in, fuck it, down the hatch went the tab, and my head went, 'Oh Fuckin No!'

Then the wait starts, I've got one eye on me and one eye on the world, I wait for the acid to kick in. In those days of too much dope and paranoia I would usually become pre-verbal and when anyone spoke to me I would pretend generally that I knew what they were talking about and try to nod or shake my head at the right time, basically I never spoke to a soul, all that was going on was going in my own mad head, and it was getting spooky.

The acid kicked in, and at this point I had managed to move into the ruined tower. This tower was/is, it actually still exists, about 40-50 ft tall and about 12 feet square, but don't quote me on that. We, that is me and about 20 others, were huddled in this space, passing more joints and drumming on oil drums and old boxes, making strange ommming noises in the dark, all very intense in one way or another.

The old LSD was well and truly kicking in by now and as I looked up I saw what I thought was a purple spiral forming at the top of the tower. I forgot to say that his tower had no roof so you could literally look up and see the stars. As an aside, another legend was that when the constellation of aquarius is directly positioned over the top of the roof of the tower, we would officially be in the 'age of aquarius. I have no idea if this is true by the way, but then it all seemed believable enough. Anyway back to the story. The spiral was getting thicker and was starting to move down the tower walls towards the heads of the unsuspecting crowd below. Was I the only one to see this vision, probably, but then it all seemed so real.

The rumours and the reality and the LSD were all merging to totally freak me out, I guess that was what it was designed to do' but I really didn't like it. I stood up and left the building. I waited for a moment on the threshold at the doorway and looked outside, hoping for something peaceful to attach myself to. Then It suddenly dawned on me that I was in the middle of nowhere with nothing to hold onto at all, I didn't know my arse from my elbow. My arse by the way at this point kind of dropped to the floor and as I stepped outside I heard the thought, 'Where the fuck was Brian?' I knew had to find him, he was the only thing I related to, but where the fuck was he?