Stones – especially the mysterious megalithic sites – hold a strong fascination for me, as do sacred sites, ley lines and the places of energy, power and sacredness around the earth.

My research and investigation has repeatedly shown me that our ancient ancestors were skilled in crafts like astronomy. Many cultures have echoes of these people who built great stone skywatching towers and huge stone sites that worked as a giant calendar to mark solstices, equinoxes and other important times in their world. The sacred sites of our modern world.

In the southwest of the US I followed the trail of the Anasazi people, an ancient tribe of American Indians who built incredible brick apartments into the precarious sides of huge cliffs. Like others of these ancient skywatching people, the Anasazi disappeared - suddenly and seemingly without reason - in the 1200s, some 700 years after making their home in the area.

In New Mexico the remnants of the great civilisation can be found at Chaco Canyon - artistic renderings of how the city would have looked a millennium ago shows something akin to a 21st century space station.

Like the mysterious ley line and sacred sites in Britain, Chaco Canyon has a great network of prehistoric roads running in straight lines out from the settlements. Some 450 meters above the canyon floor, the Anasazi built a sun watching station. Here two rocks are engraved with spiral carving and for just an hour or two each year, the sun hits the centre of the spiral in perfect accord marking off important days.

These pueblo sky watchers had a civilisation bound up in celestial observations for practical purpose: today astronomer-priests among the Western Pueblos – including the Hopis and Zunis – still treat skywatching as a solemn religious duty. They stand on mesa tops at dawn, as the ancients once did, marking the location of the sun.

At least 19 sites that may have been used as solar marker have been identified in the northeastern Arizona – most probably of Anasazi origin.

Meanwhile the Hopi Indians have their ceremonial kivas and the intensely rich spiritual life that includes the appearance of the kachnas in their village, said to live in the distant hills but visit the mesas at important times of the year. These are a people whose sacred dances are done, they believe, to keep the whole world turning and in harmony.

In a mystical trip to Ireland I traced the old pilgrimage routes, moving from one megalithic sacred site to another as I travelled the country on my mission.

Here the great spiral carved Newgrange is said to vibrate to specific electrical frequencies; the sacred Hill of Tara where the high kings of the land once lived and were crowed; the hidden Hill of Witches; the old pilgrimage sites of Lough Derg, Croag Patrick, Clonmacnoise places that humans have been journeying too for eons. In Country Sligo is Carrowmore, Ireland’s largest megalithic sacred site which recent evidence has shown is older than the great Egyptian pyramids.

In Ireland I saw the old ogham stones cut with an ancient runic alphabet and felt the mysterious pull of magnetics as the stones seemed to first lead and then hold me as I moved about the land.

On other trips to the United Kingdom, I explored the wonder of stone circles across Scotland, while in England I visited Avebury, Avalon with its huge star map, the sacred site Temple of Stars, and the tor at Glastonbury.

All over the world we see the evidence of this civilisation whose culture deeply encompassed building stones in alignment with the stars and movement of the planets: we see their footprint in Egypt, throughout the Pacific, Australia and New Zealand; China, India, Mesopotamia, Britain and Europe. More of their story is constantly coming to light – who knows what the message when fully revealed might tell us.

Another recent trip has been to the rawness and splendour of my own land, Aotearoa New Zealand, the middle earth of the modern world with its mystery and adventure and openness around every bend.

Trips planned for 2004 are to investigate the Mexican pyramids and sacred sites in the US and Hawaii.

That stones still have significance today is strongly illustrated by the huge fanfare when Scotland's ancient stone of destiny, the Stone of Scone, stolen by the English 700 years ago receive when it was returned to its home at Edinburgh Castle in 1996. Some 10,000 cheering Scots lined the streets to cheer as the 200kg stone made its journey homeward.