If the aliens had come in search of porn, they would have been disappointed

It had been three days since we had started our epic road trip around the United Kingdom. That means we were currently enduring day three of Ian’s awful girlfriend correcting our Canadian pronunciation, snarling about the noise of the radio and constantly referring to the trunk of the car as the boot and the front of the car as the bonnet. (I am aware that’s what they are known as in England and I honestly don’t have a problem with that. But I did have a problem with Rachel so I refused to use that vernacular and tried to work the words ‘hood’ or ‘trunk’ into every sentence I could). All would be well however for the next 36 hours as Aris, Ian and I had managed to dump Rachel at her friend’s house and were going to explore some of Southern England on our own.

I was falling in love with the quaint town of Portsmouth, despite the garish portside carnival, until some bloke yelled at us to “stay away from Chinese embassies”. What an odd thing to yell at a stranger? Happy he just didn’t use the words “boot” or “bonnet”, I mentally forgave him and we pushed on to the town of Basingstoke. (Addendum – unbeknownst to us there had been an accidental bombing of a Chinese embassy by the United States earlier that day – this is why Canadians wear flags wherever they go)

Basingstoke is the ‘home of the roundabout’. I have no idea if that is their town motto, but it should be. I swear 10 min in that town and you’ll be as dizzy as a top. All the circles made us hungry and tired as well. It was late at night, at least by British standards, when we found the only open dining options…a mysterious falafel stand or a Burger King. Aris and I would have been fine waiting until morning but Ian, an ultra marathon runner with a hurried metabolism develops a weird type of food stress when he has not eaten in 3 hours. Deciding to break the ‘no chain food’ rule out of desperation, we were approaching the Burger King when the back door to the kitchen opened and a squirrel ran out (that was my first thought anyway, having never seen a rat before). In the end we choose falafel food poisoning over the plague and ate some sort of gamey tasting lamb wrapped in flat bread.

Here’s another travel tip for anyone out there reading this; rural England is closed by 9 pm. This means if you do not have anywhere to rest your head, you won’t that night. We tried in vain for a while until a lady that I imagine to be sweet and grandmotherly on a normal day but who was mighty upset that folks with accents rang her up and disturbed her at 9:15 at night explained, in that distinctive haughty British tone that at this late time absolutely no sleeping quarters will be open. Surely she cannot be correct, we’ll just head to a more touristy part of the area – to Stonehenge we go. I guess in my mind I was imagining something similar to the Anaheim area that is around Disney Land – plenty of fast food options and motels. You know what is around Stonehenge…fields.

Do you ever get that feeling that you are drunk even though you are 100% stone cold sober? We were laughing and giddy when we pulled our rental Renault over to the side of the road, in absolute darkness, by the simple sign marked ‘Stonehenge’. Aris, always the mastermind, comes up with this brilliant plan that we are going to get a jump on then next days’ activities by breaking into Stonehenge now. Best to his recollection, from 10+ years previous, the stones should be just a short walk from the road. My concerns regarding security are quickly dismissed by Ian who explains that there is no security in England. Feeling the call of nature, Ian and Aris step off into the ditch to relieve themselves while I mentally prepare the statement to my father explaining why I am in a British jail.

Bless the men at Stonehenge security, who by now I am sure were ready to explode with laughter, as they emerged from their clever hiding places in time to stop us before we went too far. It is quite obvious that they have been listening to us for the past several minutes as we hatched our hasty plan to break in and photograph one of their national treasures. Polite as most Brits are they simply ask if they can offer any assistance with no mention as to the stupid course of action they just diverted us from. We stammered some nonsense about being lost, also carefully not acknowledging the previous conversation, and quickly hop back in the Renault and peel off into the night.

Ian, knowledgeable on all things British, explains some bizarre law where it is legal to sleep anywhere on anyone’s property. I am skeptical as his “Britain doesn’t have security” reassurance certainly didn’t pan out, but still homeless for the night, and realizing that it best we just settle down before we get ourselves into irreversible trouble, we opt to sleep in the Renault. We pull into a laneway between what appears in the dark to be two fields and decide to call it home, despite the inherent eeriness – it seemed like a landing area for UFO’s. While large by European standards, the Renault is a small car for three platonic adults to try and sleep in, especially when one of them is 6’3.

Following much contemplation we develop a strategy to realign the luggage and seats to make the most comfortable bed possible. I am deep in the heart of the car, shoving our belongings between the seats while Aris and Ian are changing into warmer clothes outside when all of a sudden we are immersed in a bright light. It was the kind of light bath that I had previously only seen on the X-files. I started hyperventilating and repeating to myself, “there is no such thing as aliens” over and over when all of a sudden, the cheery voice of a Bobbie come over a loudspeaker, “just having a bit of fun are we lads?” I look back to see, Aris bent over putting on socks while Ian, standing behind him, is struggling into a pair of running tights – the two of them look like deer caught in headlights. I still don’t know how we did not hear a Range Rover pull up. I pop my head out of the car to help explain the situation and surprise the two officers who by now are certain we are having some sort of romantic Renault ménage-a –trois. The officers are completely unconvinced by our reassurances that we are just planning on sleeping and after a good laugh leave us alone.

I had a restless sleep that night, bothered by the notion that some of Britain’s finest thought I was some sort of UFO hunting sex pervert. So it was groggy eyed that I emerged the next morning and looked at the field next to the car…it was full of crop circles.