Visiting The Georgia Guidestones

This past weekend, a couple British friends came round for a visit. It was great to see them again. We had taken a 3,000 mile road-trip together back in 2013 so I was more than happy to play tour guide on their road-trip this year.

They requested to see The Georgia Guidestones at some point. Now, I confess, I had never heard of the Georgia Guidestones and ended up using Wikipedia to bring me up to speed. The story behind them borders on the bizarre and by the time we left, I was anxious to see the site myself.

The stones, giant granite slabs, have - for lack of better phrasing - 10 new commandments on them to help save humanity. They are written in 10 languages on the slabs, and in 4 ancient ones like Babylonian around the top stone. Only one of the 10 could be called a real mystery. The rest were more or less common sense.

But the stones have become a tourist attraction because no one knows who erected them back in the 1980's. The person who arranged it remains anonymous to this day. The structure sits in a field by itself in the middle of the Georgia countryside. You have to want to see it to go there, you won't just be passing by.

As it turns out, people do want to go there. There was a steady stream of cars pulling up and leaving again during our short visit. There is a floodlight that will allow it to be viewed at night (although we didn't know that ahead of time). Vandals do tag the structure every now and then, probably for lack of anything else to do out there in the middle of nowhere.

My impression is there is nothing mystical, sinister, or other worldly about the Georgia Guidestones. The person(s) who erected them never made such a claim. Personally, I think some rich guy wanted to pass on his or a friend's pearls of wisdom and that was that. However, being what they are, the site does attract its fair share of wackos.

We encountered one during our visit. A lady who lives down the road, and who apparently keeps an eye on the site, swung by. My one friend talked to her for a while but I had to hold my temper and practice non-violence by walking away when she said she thought the Sandy Hook Massacre was a hoax. She also thought Jews were behind the hoax and running the world. The Illuminati were everywhere according to her. She thought people were doing animal sacrifices on the site - there was no sign, evidence of that and she offered none when pressed. But her presence reminds us how inadequate our mental health system is these days and how willingly some people buy into any conspiracy theory thrown out there. My guess is, there wasn't one she didn't subscribe to when given the chance.

Apart from the wacko, the stop was enjoyable. It was different. An oddity, sure. But it did provoke thought and conversation about the pearls of wisdom man needs to move forward as a species.

I am linking the Wikipedia page here so you can read more about the stones, plan your own visit, and explore the different theories about who put the stones up and maybe why. WIKIPEDIA-GEORGIA GUIDESTONES LINK