Carolyn O'Donnell 

Ever-increasing circles

Carolyn O'Donnell meets the strange world of aliens, hoaxers and earth forces in Wiltshire.
  
  


The fifth annual Crop Circle Conference takes place next weekend in Devizes, a small town in the rolling patchwork of Wiltshire, home to country estates, sacred sites and Dyson vacuum cleaners. It is also a busy area for crop circles, the mysterious patterns that appear in wheat and barley fields from mid-April to late August to the consternation of farmers and joy of mystic investigators.

"We have 12 speakers, as well as musicians and healers," says Francine Blake, organiser of CCC 2000. "We look at anything connected to crop circles. It's a big subject that touches on many things."

Such as?

"Mathematics, sacred and Aristotelian geometry, sound, physics, energy, healing, nature and the power of mindset," she says. New this year is an exhibition of drawings and photographs of crop circles from the past 20 years.

The origin of of the circles is still hotly debated. Are they the work of pagan earth forces, aliens, or the efforts of someone with too much energy and a rather large lawnmower?

I went to last year's event at the nearby village of Alton Barnes. On the way, there was a growing sense that strange but benign forces were at work. Crop circles could be seen from the car. Streams of people wandered reverently among the squashed barley.

Near the village, the Alton Barnes White Horse was plainly visible, one of five carved into the chalky soil of the local hills. Avebury, Stonehenge, Silbury Hill and the West Kennett Long Barrow were all nearby.

We parked at the Barge Inn, beside the Kennett and Avon Canal. The front bar has polished brass, stained wood and chintzy bits. The back bar is the official crop circle HQ, the ceiling resplendent with images of Henge, celestial beings and Celtic triumph in matt acrylic. The walls displayed photographs and drawings of crop circles - some of astounding geometrical scope and complexity. A map charted the appearance of crop circles, colour-coded by year. There were hundreds of coloured dots on this map. Someone, or perhaps something, had been very busy.

The CCC was a mile or so away in the village hall, the venue for lectures on New Age subjects and various therapies. In an adjacent field, we found the main marquee, the yurt, a tepee and a "problem-solving labyrinth" made of string and twigs.

Inside the marquee, snacks (vegetarian), books, tapes, crystals and crop-circle fashion were on sale. A whiteboard detailed who was healing what and where (astrology in the tepee).

We ate pasta with tofu and pesto and chatted to a young woman who was passionate about crop circles. Watches can stop when you're in a crop circle, she said. Another time she fell asleep in a circle and a being took her on a journey to another dimension - escorting her back of course. It's comforting to know that beings from other dimensions are well mannered.

The practicals

For details of the Crop Circle Conference, send an SAE to PO Box 939, Devizes, Wiltshire, SN10 3TA (admission free, lectures £25 per day, £45 for the weekend). The Barge Inn (01672 851705) offers camping facilities. The Devizes Tourist Information Centre (01380 729 408) can recommend B&B accommodation (around £45 a double). See also .

 

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