I absolutely love having a proper road atlas. Call me old-fashioned, but algorithms and Google searches are only going to provide the most popular destinations– and in my experience, it’s hard to find the offbeat, stranger attractions that way.
For instance, the time I was reviewing my atlas in Texas and saw “Stonehenge II” marked and thought: ‘welp, we’re definitely going to have to take THAT detour.’
I asked Moon if she minded going a little out of our way to see Stonehenge II, and to her credit– she smiled, and was game. I blinked at her– “Would it be weird if I wanted to arrive at Stonehenge II right at sunrise?”– at which, she burst out laughing. “If you want to get up that early to drive us there, then sure.”
As the name implies, Stonehenge II is inspired by Stonehenge, which we have hence called “Stonehenge I” for clarity. This was the brainchild of one Texas man and his neighbor: Al Shepperd and his buddy, Doug Hill– who procured a (free) large slab of limestone after a building project, and had the idea to build an homage to Stonehenge out of concrete and wire mesh.
They placed the real stone slab at the center– which Mac was thrilled to find, as he needed a spot to look majestic (pictured above). He celebrated his arrival at Stonehenge II with an epic Zoomie, darting between the pillars like they were an agility course.
And then, it happened: the sun toppled over the treeline, and flooded the area with long, early-winter rays.
As the sun reached through the arched openings, it transformed them from cold, concrete slabs to something… well, something credibly resembling “Stonehenge I”. It was strangely beautiful, and we not been on the side of a moderately-busy country road in the middle of the Texas Hill Country as school buses rolled by– it might have had an awing effect.
Still, it was striking in its own way– a reminder that one person’s will is enough to create something lasting, even if odd. And while plenty of people in Al’s life probably told him it was folly, he continued on– fashioning concrete-molded ‘stones,’ until the last was placed.
In 2010, he sold the land Stonehenge II was placed on, and the entire tribute was moved to the Hill County Arts Foundation, where it sits today. Apparently, the TV series “Friday Night Lights” filmed a scene there, for all you television buffs.
The part of Stonehenge II I most enjoyed were the shadows brought by the sunrise, the yellow-orange of the winter-morning glow — long and low silhouettes thrown onto the stones.
Mac, Moon, and I jumped, pranced, and posed all around, enjoying the funhouse affect.
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