7. HANGING OUT WITH THE HIPPIES

By Patrick Forbes, series director
English Heritage owns the stones at Stonehenge and the Trust owns the thousands of acres of land around it.

This year was thought to be problematic because the solstice fell on a weekend and no one could agree when it was going to be. The druids wanted it to be on Saturday night because that was correct according to their astral charts. English Heritage, for the sake of convenience, wanted to stick to Friday night. It is their biggest night of the year and the security preparations are stupendous - razor wire is laid, there are secure communication links and swat teams fly overhead.

"I had not expected to be standing in a field with 30,000 whacked-out hippies"

We had to think how to cover this and elected to have two crews - one running with the officials and one running with the druids and somehow at solstice we would all meet. The druid crew set off and the first thing that happens is the guy they are filming can't get a lift. Naturally, he's completely chilled about it. I meanwhile am filming with the increasingly nervous English Heritage and National Trust people.

The night wears on and I could do with a little sleep. I'm there on the razor wire side getting calls from the druid crew saying, "We've been 12 hours without any form of sustenance and we haven't touched an illegal substance - everyone else has, not us." I say, "Stick it out for the good of the BBC." Eventually everyone is let in. It is an absolutely crystal-clear night with a large moon that adds a curious, unearthly beauty to the whole thing. Thousands of people are congregating with their various rituals and the police and English Heritage are nervously watching.

Industrial quantities of hallucinogens are going down left, right and centre. Making this series I had not expected to be standing in a field in Wiltshire with 30,000 whacked-out hippies. At dawn everything's okay, the sun comes up and it's beautiful. Heritage and Trust are nervously circling each other wondering are they going to stay, are they going to go. The tense moment passes and the police come to clear everyone out of the site.

You would not believe the passions that this event raises. You are dealing with a group outside society’s boundaries. It tells you so much about what works and what doesn't. Tolerance works, beating them up does not.