To mark the summer solstice at Stonehenge, I recollect my experiences at the last Stonehenge Free Festival, before its violent suppression at the Battle of the Beanfield in 1985, when I visited the stones after staying up all night. My experiences of the festival and the stones left a deep impression on me, which, in the ’90s, encouraged me to undertake several long-distance walks through southern England’s ancient landscape, for a book that, eventually, materialised instead as ’Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion’, my unique social history of Stonehenge, published 20 years ago, and still in print. I also reflect on the militarised exclusion zone that existed on the summer solstice at Stonehenge until 2000, when a court ruling led to the reopening of the stones for what is unromantically called ‘Managed Open Access’, when crowds are allowed in for 12 hours, and I also reflect on the latest example of conflict at Stonehenge: a truly absurd comparison between Just Stop Oil and ISIS, after JSO activists sprayed harmless cornstarch-based paint on the stones two days ago.