Since junior high school (Highland Junior High) I’ve been in love with Scotland. My 7th grade year was when I started hearing tales of Loch Ness and Nessie, kelpies, and selkies. My high school years were spent at Ben Lomond High School where our band wore kilts and our pep club learned to do the Highland Fling (no kiddin’! I still remember some of!.😀 ). I was also in my very first musical there, “Brigadoon,” by Lerner and Loewe, about the Scottish village that only returns once every 100 years.
By 1964 I was madly in love with The Beatles and anything British. In my high school years I stumbled across Mary Stewart’s Arthurian Saga beginning with “The Crystal Cave,” and to date have read five series about King Arthur. (Stephen Lawhead’s “Pendragon Cycle” is my favorite.) I also developed a fascination for Robin Hood. Lawhead’s “King Raven Trilogy” does a bit of an about face and places Hood’s birthplace as Wales.
I fell in love with Ireland (and Sean Connery) when I saw Disney’s “Darby O’Gill and the Little People” and “The Fighting Prince of Donegal.”
My point is, I have always been drawn to the British Isles. And a year from this coming Saturday (Lord willin’) we’ll be on a ship cruising around those isles. It’s not quite close enough for me to get REALLY excited yet, but this morning I was reading about sacred places in the isles. Some sacred places seem filled with great power and enchantment. Some folks claim to feel a connection to a deeper wisdom and experience break-throughs into alternate realities. These places are called “thin places.”
According to Edward C. Sellner in Wisdom of the Celtic Saints,
The early Celts believed in “thin places”: geographical locations scattered throughout Ireland and the British Isles where a person experiences only a very thin divide between past, present, and future times; places where a person is somehow able, possibly only for a moment, to encounter a more ancient reality within present time; or places where perhaps only in a glance we are somehow transported into the future. Some of the stories here that associate the Saints with intuitive and psychic powers attest to these “thin places.”
`
Reading about “thin places” got my mind all wound up this morning and I’ve been sitting here trying to decide where I would go if I happened to bump into one knowing I could visit somewhere in history and then return safely. Not necessarily to the British Isles. Lordy! There are so many other places to choose from! But I finally narrowed it down to a Plan A and a Plan B. Plan A would be to visit Atlantis, IF it actually existed. I would be utterly fascinated to see how far advanced this civilization really was.
But on the off chance there really WAS no such place, I think I’d like to be around somewhere close — but not TOO close when the volcano Krakatoa erupted in August of 1983. (Krakatoa Erupts) That eruption was heard around the world. (This is an actual picture, btw.) And the dust in the air filtered out enough sun and heat that the temperatures fell globally for a couple of years. Actually I wouldn’t even mind seeing Krakatoa Katy (as the sailors called her) even now as there is a new volcano growing there called Anak Krakatoa which means Son of Krakatoa. I find myself wondering if it will ever get as big as its mama!
So that’s where my mind has been off to this morning. How about you? If you happened upon a thin place somewhere in your travels, where would you like to go and why? I’d LOVE to hear about it!. 😀
`
`
Picture Credits:
Thin Places — ijboudreaux.com
Atlantis — yournewswire.com
Krakatoa — www.washingtonpost.com
Impromptu Promptlings 
Pingback: Thin Places and the Other Side #AtoZChallenge #folklore – Ronel the Mythmaker
Pingback: Thin Places and the Other Side #FolkloreThursday | Ronel the Mythmaker
I love British histories and I’m a fan of Dr who and another series that if you’re into the Thin Places you will appreciate as much as I did: Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell. It is about the crow king too although I’m not really sure it’s the one you mentioned above. Take a look https://it.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Strange_%26_Mr_Norrell 😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks for the recommend, Luca. I’ll check it out! 😀
LikeLiked by 1 person
Drumheller, Alberta ( the hoodoos) is a thin place for me. So much so, that I feel uncomfortable and a bit anxious. I can feel so many things/beings there. Like someone above said, so many other people have stood before me exactly there. I love that feeling of connection, actually.
A friend who is usually very science-based and rational told me that he had an almost out of body experience at the Coliseum in Rome. Heard voices and yelling, etc. I found that cool. I actually wrote a blog post last year about stumbling upon a thin space while out at the lake where we spent our summers.
I love the way you think/feel! 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
Too cool! Please post your link on here for the post you did. I’d love to read it. I always wondered about the Coliseum. Sometimes I think thin places are where something tragic happened or a lot of blood was shed. That’s what it felt like at Gettysburg for me.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes that is Drumheller for sure! There are the hoodoos, which are from dinosaur times and there is also a penitentiary out there, so lots of souls travelling about! You already read my post about my trip back to the lake and you probably liked it, cus you like everything cus you are a sweetheart! 💜
LikeLiked by 1 person
I LIKE your stuff because it’s always amazing, toots! LOL You SO underestimate your talent, girlfriend!
LikeLike
Thin places is a new term for me, but I understand the concept perfectly. It is where the veil between worlds is – well, thin. I have experienced that often in meditation, but I guess that’s to be expected given meditation is being in an altered state to start with. The places have been many and varied, from the earth plane to space to places beyond imagination. Some animated movies transport me, believe it or not ! And Avatar is a memorable one.
The world has so many sacred sites, but Ireland and the UK are two where there are many famous ones. I look forward to hearing about your experiences when you get there.
LikeLiked by 1 person
The thing I wanna do the most is take my shoes and socks off at Stonehenge and see if I can feel any energy from the ley lines that are supposed to run under there. But then I may not be able to get close enough now. They have it roped off.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I doubt that will make any difference. The ley lines are not restricted to man made boundaries
LikeLiked by 1 person
We share an interest in all things Arthurian, Calen. I’ve read several of those books you’ve mentioned. From what I’ve read dawn and dusk are times when the veil between worlds is thin, as are the Solstices and the Equinoxes. That’s why a lot of religious traditions have prayers at dawn, and many of our celebrations take place around the Solstices, etc. The ancients, who first worked out how the seasons changed and when, incorporated them into their belief systems and the rituals and holy days survived (in different forms), despite thousands of years of change/interference. Lovely post. Thanks for reminding me of these sacred things.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes, yes! I’m especially enamored with Samhain. There was one tradition practiced that night that I just loved. The villages built a huge bonfire then everyone put the hearth fires out in their homes. One by one a person from each home came and got a light from the bonfire to restart their hearth. It was to pledge to each other their company and protection during the coming winter. I think that is such a gorgeous custom.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Have you ever experienced a thin place, Janet?
LikeLike
I’ve been pondering this question, Calen. I recall thinking, once or twice, I had but I can’t say for certain that I have. I guess that’s the nature of a numinous experience. The spirit wants to accept, the rational mind, the mind trained by the academy to doubt such things, questions the experience. It has been a long time since I thought I experienced it and with time I wonder if I wanted it so much I convinced myself I had. Then again, am I denying myself? I believe it is possible but I believe it might also be a metaphor for what we, as human, spiritual beings are … a being that is itself a kind of ‘breakthrough into an alternate reality’. I don’t mean to make us overly ‘special’ but maybe we are powerful, enchanting creatures who are meant to be the (collective) conduit to a deeper wisdom? Big questions; more pondering(s) required. Thank you so much.
LikeLiked by 1 person
“…I wonder if I wanted it so much I convinced myself I had. Then again, am I denying myself? I believe it is possible but I believe it might also be a metaphor for what we, as human, spiritual beings are…” Woman, you will wear yourself out thinkin’ that hard! Why is it we have such a hard time just accepting? We see things every day that make no sense to us, yet our science book in school told us it was true and we don’t question. Yet WE, personally, can’t prove it any more than we can thin places. Sometimes I feel like we fight that spiritual side of ourselves way too much and I wonder why.
LikeLike
I would like to travel back and be in the crowd, listening to Martin Luther King making his” I have a dream,” speech. There are other times, other places, but that’s the top one for me.
LikeLiked by 2 people
So what makes that speech so important to you? We’d love to hear.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’m going to have to leave my answer until tomorrow evening. I’m supposed to be in bed – tomorrow is my Oxfam day…
LikeLiked by 1 person
The comments are so good here today, Lady Calen! Tells you this is a great post. Very interesting stuff!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I often wonder how many people have had those experiences. And I KNOW they can’t just be in the British Isles because the one I had at Gettysburg was so strong I could nearly hear the guns…
LikeLike
Yes, I believe! The first time I saw St. Mary-of-the-Woods, I knew what “thin places” were.
LikeLiked by 2 people
That sounds fascinating, Lori. Can you post something about it here in the comments? Or even on your blog? I’d love to hear about it.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thin places for me are places where I’ve stood and been overcome with wonder.
Standing on the rim of Grand Canyon was one for me. I wandered off and was all on my own staring across the canyon. I got a distinct impression that I was standing where other people had stood back through time – hundreds of years before. I was standing with the ghosts of Native Americans soaking up the wonder.
A send place for me was Machu Picchu.
I think it is the connection with history and people from past cultures. Our present-day culture is so shallow. It lacks that harmony with nature that you feel when you connect with the past.
It feels to me that they were part of that landscape. We are just looking in.
LikeLiked by 3 people
” I got a distinct impression that I was standing where other people had stood back through time – hundreds of years before.” I was just reading an article that said almost verbatim the same thing. I’ve had two experiences with it myself. One on the battle field at Gettysburg, and one in my own kitchen, believe it or not. I think, Opher, that’s what I’m looking for when we go next year. I think I need it or I’m just going to shrivel up and disappear one of these days… I know. Fanciful, huh?
LikeLiked by 2 people