First Encounters
Ever since I visited my first Crop Circle back in 2004 I’ve been intrigued by these mysterious symbols appearing as if by magic in fields around England.
The first circle I visited was found by a farmer friend of mine just outside a small village called Rudston near Bridlington on the Yorkshire Wolds, he excitedly told me and a few friends about the appearance so we made our way up to the circle one long summers evening, we had to hurry as it was actually my friends job to combine the field the next day and the circle would be lost, it felt special and secret as no one but us seemed to know about this mysterious appearance.
Walking up the field towards the formation I wasn’t sure what to expect, I was amazed to find a complex circular pattern beautifully crafted, It consisted of a inner circle with all the crop whirled neatly all the same direction towards a central point, outside were two rings of fanned sections one going clockwise the other anti- clockwise, the whole thing was big, I’d say at least 150ft across. As we sat in the middle of the circle watching the sun setting with a feeling of expectation, would we see UFOs! Who made the circle & why? We were excitedly talking of the possible explanations, unfortunately I didn't have a camera with me so I couldn't take a photo (this was in the pre camera phone days!)
As we sat pondering we then noticed it was positioned exactly in line with the church spire on the next hill, we realised that the spire belonged to Rudston Parish Church and in the graveyard much older than the church itself stood the Rudston Monolith. At 7.6 meters its Britain’s tallest standing stone, legend says there is as much below the ground as above. Could this Standing stone be the clue to the Circles appearance? I later discovered the whole area around Rudson was a important Neolithic site like Avebury in Wiltshire with the monolith marking the center.
Hoaxers & Mandlebrots
I had no more encounters with crop circles until 2009 though I remained interested reading any articles I came across, researching online. It seemed most appear in the areas around Wiltshire often near ancient sites such as Stonehenge, Avebury & Silsbury hill. The phenomenon actually reached the front pages of the newspapers in the early 90’s & the general public were getting interested, it was then that two men known as Doug and Dave exclaimed that they had been making the circles all along with string and planks of wood so it became widely excepted that the circles were hoaxes.
Then as if to discredit the Hoaxers in August 1991 a perfect representation of one of the most complex shapes in mathematics appeared the mandlebrot.
A mandlebrot is a set of fractal geometry named after the great French mathematician and philosopher who discovered it in the 1960’s, it represents the science of chaos theory, it's very difficult to reproduce without a computer so it seems very unlikely this pattern could have anything to do with string and planks!
The appearance of the Mandlebrot seemed to mark an evolution as the circles started to become ever more complex, some circle researchers even commented that it was as if someone or something was trying teach a language, starting with simple circles and then getting more and more complex. It does seem a possibility that the circles could contain messages as the patterns include star systems, DNA spirals & even a Solar system with the Earth missing!
Another interesting feature of genuine crop circles is that the crops are laid over in such a way that the stalks are not damaged & continue to grow, this seems impossible to replicate with mechanical means or even by hand also the stalks and surrounding soil are electromagnetically altered when measured with instrumentation.
Inside a Mayan Head-dress
The main Crop circle season is the summer months of May to August so I was excited to be visiting a friend in Bath in July 2009 and had managed to convince my partner that we should see if any crop circles had appeared in the area, as it turned out I was in luck as my friend had heard that some had appeared around Silsbury hill, a huge man-made earthwork near Avebury.
We headed there the next day and after parking up in the small car park by Silsbury Hill we weren’t sure at first what direction to head in so we started walking along the footpath, we soon could make out a gathering of people on the brow of the opposite hill but we still couldn’t see the circle from there but felt sure that must be were the circle was. I felt a rush of excitement all we had to do now was try and find a way in to the field as it was hedgerow all along, we started walking & soon met other ‘pilgrims’ trying to find the quickest way to the circle too!
The only way into the field was following a path which took you passed the West Kennet long barrow, one of the largest most impressive Neolithic chambered tombs in Britain. We walked into the dark chamber touching the damp stones a air of mystery began to creep over me, it’s the feeling I often get in these ancient sacred places. Standing on top of the chamber I was excited to see in the field to the left of the barrow another crop circle, not the one we were trying to get to this one looked further away but seemed perfectly positioned to get the full view of from the top of the Long Barrow.
It took us about another 30mins of walking across fields till we started to get close to the circle we were heading for, it was positioned right on the brow of a hill so you couldn’t get a good view, the excitement was building as helicopters & small planes kept flying over head (the only way to get a birds-eye view without climbing Silsbury hill across the road)
Finally we reached the circles edge with the corn bending over into a huge circular path that carried on beyond what you could physically see. What struck me first was the way the outer circle had been constructed, it was beautifully woven like a rug into large diamond shapes, the atmosphere inside the circle was intense with lots of people inside it felt like we were all some sort of pilgrims visiting a holy place, one lady even made the sign of the cross to me just after I’d walked in, it really had a sense of the sacred about it similar to being in a Cathedral or other holy places, some people were praying or meditating, some were lying down taking in the atmosphere, there were small groups of people dotted round in deep debate discussing the circle. At this point the circle was so big I had no idea of the pattern.
We made our way from the woven outer pathway into the more central area and stood trying to make a mental picture of what shape the formation could possibly be, as we worked our way nearer the center we seemed to be looking at ever more complex patterns with small circles dotted here and there with long straight pieces fanning off into the distance. Once we had reached what we thought was the center (a small circle of about 8ft across) I entered and lay down inside, my partner took a picture of me on my digital camera which strangely as crop circles have been known to interfere with camera equipment there appears to be a slight haze above me on the photo.
I didn’t want to leave the circle and would have happily spent all day taking in the atmosphere but we had a long drive ahead of us so we reluctantly set of back to the car. I noticed a feeling when I left the circle similar to when I have had Reiki, relaxed but energised. On the way home we both noticed a strange feeling when we turned off the quieter country roads on to the busy motorway with lorries zooming by us, its hard to describe but the motorway felt too fast and chaotic, it was as if we had only just woken up to the fact.
The first thing I did when I got home late that night was search the internet for the latest Crop Circles around Silsbury hill so I could get my first glimpse of what we had actually visited. I got a chill down my spine when the image appeared, it was even more beautiful and mind blowing than I could have imagined. It had already been named the Mayan Head-dress due to its resemblance to the traditional Mayan head wear with many Crop circle enthusiast believed it is symbolising the end of the 5126 year Mayan ‘Long Count’ calendar that happened on December 21st 2012. I felt in awe that I had been inside it just hours before especially as I looked closely at the picture at the tiny dots that were actually people inside the circle, this circle was huge,350ft across!
Made by Music?
So what are these amazing creations and who or what creates them, the theories are numerous from the everyday like crop fungal diseases to the bizarre like top secret military experiments.
One of the most convincing theories I have heard is the link to salt/sound wave experiments known as cymatics, this is where salt or sand is placed on a vibrating surface near a speaker, when certain frequencies are played patterns begin to appear in the salt which get more complex as the frequency from the speaker changes. Could it be that there is some sort of sound wave or frequency creating the circles? There have been reports of people hearing a high pitched buzzing noise just before the appearance of some circles so this seems like a possible explanation but even if this were the answer so much still remains a mystery.
I’ve had many debates with people who believe the circles are created by hoaxers but they have never actually visited a circle, my advice to anyone who is interested is to visit a circle themselves, take in the atmosphere & then make your own decision as to whether they are man made, it could be our loss if we do not uncover the messages that they contain before it's too late.
There is some excellent site on the internet if you want to find out more.