1746 The Price of Travelling

On Friday 19th June 2009 I woke early after a good sleep, packed up and sorted car after doing some writing and seeing the news. It was after eight when I set off and did not make the mistake of the previous day which thinking I would be able to get back towards the town centre set off on a road which in fact took to Carisbook Castle.

I have visited Castle and country Houses when a member of English heritage but I am not a great enthusiast and was more interested in the place of such establishment in our history than the particular examples of finery, wealth and individual family power, It si interesting how people concentrate of creating things which mean little as death approaches and not on their relationships and what they do and do not when they are alive.

This time I made no such mistake but then could not find the way into the Morrison’s care park because of the one way system and entered a small car park a few metres from the bus station. At Morrison’s I decided upon a small breakfast of a sausage, bacon, egg, tomatoes and friend bread for a couple of English pounds. I had enough coffee beforehand. I then did a some getting some rolls, a croissant for the morrow and two packs grapes and almond twists. It was eight thirty when I set off for the Ferry landing of Fishbourne arriving just before nine and being able to make my way into the vehicular lanes and into a row where there was only a couple of cars ahead of the one I was following. I had close on an hour to wait for my departure. There were surprisingly fewer private car vehicles arriving for the 9.30 departure and the explanation became evidence as a dozen coaches assembled over several lanes. There occupied almost all the lower deck with the exception of eight or so vehicles packed tightly behind them on the open part of the deck. I was one of them.

Understandable most of the seating was occupied within and outside the lounges when I made may way up the various levels to the outside areas, but after witnessing the departure and having a walk about I settle in an inside lounge and enjoyed a copy of the County Press where I discovered the recent availability of a DVD about old Bembridge and the surrounding villages.

The route out of Portsmouth from the ferry landing appeared to me easier and quicker than that taken what seemed such a long time ago but was in fact only four days previously, This time instead of taking the M27 back the way I had come towards the M3 some twenty miles parallel with the coast I time in the opposite direction and took the short journey to the start of the A3. There was a short detour at one point into the adjacent town of Hindhead where I passed the Devil’s Punchbowl Inn, a large several story building which has adopted the name of the area of a natural amphitheatre and beauty spot and which is not to be confused with its more dramatic counterpart in California, a thousand acre park. The Inn is across the way from the beauty spot and is some 900 feet above sea level and where on a clear day it is said one can see as far London.

Of greater interest to me was the turning off towards Haselmere which I have visited at least once to a sanatorium just after World War 2 where the youngest of my mother’s six sisters convalesced with a order of nuns at their sanatorium on the hillside and where beds could be moved into the open air. She could have had an operation for the tuberculosis’s which could have saved her life but a devout Catholic should put her trust in God. Although she was someone with a warm and outgoing personality, a former unqualified teacher in Gibraltar who had contracted the disease while training to be a nurse she was inwardly sad has her fiancée of several years had disappeared during the Spanish Civil War while training to become a doctor at the university of Madrid. May they rest in peace.

The journey continued to go well until I reached the M25 where earlier an accident had occurred ahead and the traffic had accumulated to a situation of slow, stop and slow, Worse was to come when a further accident on the M1 brought traffic to a standstill. On impulse rather than sit it out I decided to take a detour coming off at the first opportunity and made not one but two incorrect decisions, Instead of following the road into Newport Pagnell and then taking a B road to join in I took a minor road under the motor way into Stevenage in order to take the A5 North route but lost all sense of Direction at one point and ended up at the very roundabout above the M1 that I had started and with traffic at a virtual standstill. This time I went into Stevenage and rejoined the M1 which was then free flowing. I was stopping at the Trowell Travel Lodge for the night but had arranged to make a detour stop between 2 and 4. I had also forgotten about the extent of traffic everywhere on Friday afternoons when many set off home from work early or go away for the weekend. It was all frustrating an not enjoyable. However although much later than anticipated, especially given the taking of the earlier Ferry I and an enjoyable break and it was dusk when I set off to find the M1 before the Trowell. I had been this way before, but a year ago when coming into Nottingham fort he cricket and I knew I was heading for the wrong M1 exit which would have taken beyond the service area. I had to do a little doubling back before getting on track. The M1 north and south of Trowell has been undergoing extensive repairs and changes which involve the banks and bridges for over a year now and continues to look as if the work will continue for the rest of this year and beyond.

I was tired when I dragged myself and luggage to the second floor where the room was located and somehow managed to dislodge the spring held clothes rail. The television did not immediate work although I was able to resolve what was a lose aerial connection and it looked for a few minutes as if I was to have problems logging online.

The following morning I set of relaxed but tired and continued not to enjoy the journey home. I stopped at the Wakefield service area for an early picnic lunch and then called in at Tesco for milk and other supplies before reaching home. The rest of the day was taken with unpacking and sorting the post.

1745 Sandown, Shanklin, Ventnor and Olivio

I have been to Sandown on the Isle of Wight three times in my life before last week. The first occasion was in the later 1940’s when the family took its first holiday at a caravan on a farm close to Bembridge Village and a walk from the Bembridge Rocky Ledge. We would take a bus to arrive midday for a picnic lunch when the weather was fine. We went again the next year or a year soon after because we had not been able to connect with coach trips available from Sandown or attend one of the evening activities on Saturdays. We had the stayed at the kind of guest house where you are expected to leave after breakfast and not return until the evening in time for the one course option meal. Those were the days.

I managed to visit briefly last year on a day trip from Portsmouth, taking the bus from Ryde and after a brief walk through the town and along the sea front, I walked the pier where I had a half of beer before catching the bus to Shanklin and walking down to the front along to the lift and where I had had to wait for half to three quarters an hour for the bus.

I had planned a longer explore on Thursday of last week, June 18th, 2009, but it was just before midday before I arrived travelled in the car the length of the one way shopping street before turning back along the front and found a car parking space almost at the other end. I had time before the arranged meeting to visit the Tourist office where I bought two books of photos and a map book. I had noted an attractive looking hotel and bar with two veranda levels but decided that the food was expensive and as there was no food being eaten to judge its quality, feared a meal similar to that at the Fishbourne Inn. There was a chips with everything eggs, ham fish restaurant attached to another hotel which was reasonably price but nothing appealed.

Instead, returning to the shopping street there was the good fortune to find a traditional English lunch and tea room where staff were attentive and the owner host supervised an checked that everyone was content. I fancied a chicken pie with mash and vegetables served with gravy in a soup type plate followed by a cup of tea, served with two cup tea pots and a jug of hot water. Three plus cups were available for the price less than is paid for one on the motorways and many other establishments. Unfortunately I did not note the name.

It was then time for a walk for a good walk although I did not pay sufficient attention to appreciate what was being suggested. There are a choice of two walks, along the cliff or along the extended promenade and the lower flat route was selected. What I did not grasp is that this route continues through to Shanklin, a distance of approximately two miles. For the major part of this walk there are just a varying collection of Beach huts below the cliff with some opened to view revealing electricity for a cup and picnic cooking but also a fridge and a freezer in one instance. Those at Shanklin or where there was roadway access at Sandown were larger with some long enough to have two rooms and with rear windows and access which could provide for overnight accommodation. On Sunday I walked the Shields sea front and we have some sixteen two room chalets which are hired out for weekly and short rental to provider a beachside holiday and are very popular even thought their view of the sea is obscured by large sand dunes with the exception of those immediately facing a pathway between the two mounds of sands.

Approaching Shanklin the walk was broken by a sit to watch the activities a large party of students possible sixth form but more likely college, some fifty who were with party organisers and instructors learning to either canoe or board surf. This was evidently an established teaching facility which included wind surfers, not be used at the time.

Shanklin and Ventnor are hilly resorts in which there are steep climbs up from the beach side. There is also some distance to walk from the town centre to the reach which I found last year and then an exceptionally steep roadway down to the beach side. There is then a wide promenade with gardens, putting greens and such like was well as cafes and restaurant as well as car parking. Shanklin with a population of over 8000 is bigger than Sandown with over 5000 and still has a Theatre. As with Sandown there used to be shows on the pier with that at Shanklin attracting international performers such as Paul Robson, Richard Tauber and the English Comedian Arthur Askey.

On my previous visit I enjoyed a cup of tea on the esplanade but on this visit the stop was postponed until Ventnor. I remember there was derelict on the first visits some sixty years before, but there were fireworks on a Saturday evening, but modest compared to the digital run displays of today, Shanklin also has a Chine. Chine is a local word on the Island and is a grove with a waterfall covering an area of three acres and with a quarter of a mile from the Old Village entrance and a drop of 100 feet to the esplanade where there is he second entrance or exit. Between July and September the Chine can be visited at night for floodlighting of which there some two hundred. I believe there was even some lighting and evening visits when I visited over sixty years ago but this may be a false memory. The old village has thatched roofs, gift shops and tea rooms but a better example is Brading.

As on my previous visit the lift was taken with taken to the top of the cliff but this time continued upon the cliff walk rather than go directly to the town centre A bus was the taken to Ventnor from which there are spectacular views back over Shanklin to Sandown bay. I have only been on one visit to Ventnor before and remembered nothing if the experience. Ventnor also has a larger population than Sandown, over 7000 and is famed for the Mediterranean nature of its climate with 30 inches of rain a year. Such was its popularity as a Summer holiday destination that there used to be non stop trains from Ryde to Ventnor. Now the train stops at Shanklin and there is a bus connect service on which I travelled.

Between 2005 and 2008 there was a jazz festival weekend to revive the economic fortunes of the resort but this year it was cancelled within one month which does not surprise as the list of performers were unknown to me and did not appear to fit into a jazz genre. There have been problems with performer being paid and a lack of public interest. A festibal is planned for 2010

Tea was taken on the upper level Winter Garden which is an inn and restaurant full of historical items including the old type of cash register with individual keys. When is the last time you saw one of these in operation use. I enjoyed a cup of tea and a Muffin. A small plats of Bourbon and Custard Cream Biscuits was provided gratis. The bar section was full of locals enjoying a chat along with the alcohol.

The bus was taken to Sandown where unintentionally I took the wrong road to Bembridge. This however proved to be a brilliant mistake. First I discovered the various developments along this coast road towards Ryde which includes the Fort Holiday Park, Dinosaur Island, and the I.O.W Zoo, and the Sandown Bay Holiday Centre. The great discovery was the Bembridge down, a high roadway to a National Trust area viewpoint with spectacular views in all directions. My intention has been to call in at the Bembridge Life Boat shop with a thank you card and a donation for participating in the rescue of my car keys. Unfortunately it was shut but I called to the home of the volunteer where we had a good chat, including about Brighton from which she came and cricket which her husband was an enthusiast.

The food treat of the visit occurred in the evening when I found a super Italian restaurant in the town centre, Olivio. This has only recently opened and beset with problems according to internet comments, mainly because of staffing problems and time it takes for a meal, two to three hours. There were no such problems on my visit when there were plenty of diners. I had an amazing tasty salad which includes olives, a soft feta cheese, smoked salmon and crispy bacon pieces with dough balls accompanied by a rose blush wine and followed by an unusual form of Strudel with a mint ice cream and then coffee. It is pricey with the bill coming to just under £40 for 2 but memorable food and a great way to end the island visit.

1744 The Isle of Wight journey and accommodation

Writing about my trip to the Isle of Wight out of sequence is proving a challenge because there are so many other things I need to do during this early part of new week so I have decided to abandon catch up and go with the flow.

In my childhood my birth mother had arranged two summer holidays of two weeks on the Isle of Wight. The first has been disappointing because of the location, a caravan on a farm between Bembridge Village and the Bembridge Ledge, a ledge of rock with remains of Wartime and none of the what was expected of a seaside resort.. In order to get to the seaside proper it was necessary to walk tot he village centre and then take a bus to Sandown in time for a picnic lunch on the beach, a rest, a bathe and before we knew it was time to get the bus back for the evening meal to be prepared. I believe we did go on an explore to Shanklin and may be Ventnor but not much further and this was the reason why the very next holiday was back to the Island to a guest house in Sandown which enabled us to take one or more trips to other parts of the Island and to attend the Saturday night fireworks which I believe were held at Shanklin. These visits took place at rte end of the 1940’s and perhaps in 1950 or 1951. Some thirty to forty years passed before my next trip, by train and passenger ferry from East Croydon Station but where the afternoon was spent at Ryde having walked the long pier. My only other visit was last year on the free day after the 20 20 cup semi finals and final all finished on the Saturday. I had caught an early train from a station near the Travel lodge outside of Portsmouth close to the A3 and M27 and then a bus across the island to Sandown, and then another bus to Shanklin returning from there in the evening. The weather was good and the day full of nostalgia and I promised myself a longer visit. My priority this year when the £9 Travel Lodge special offers were announced had been visits to cricket and London but realising I had nothing planned for June and checking cricket and other commitment I had fitted in three days combined with my aborted visit to Oxford City and partial visit to the Naval Dockyard exhibitions.

However three days would be insufficient to properly explore the island. There were two factors which also altered the nature of the visit. The going into hospital on he island of the friend of a relative and presence of a second relative on the island during my period there. It has not been my practice to refer to living relatives and personal friends in these writings but it was agreed with them to mention something of circumstances in which my car keys were lost and found and the impact this had on the rest of the visit. To some extent I my ongoing work is being governed by the approach of Sophie Calle in the continually repetition of what has gone before but changed by the different perspective caused by the passing of time, but is time only linear an d not multi dimensional, layered and circular? Just as we are in fact clones of past beings so too is much of our experience although set in different environments?

On Tuesday June 16th I awoke early having been to bed and sleep well before midnight. I knew where I was which is not always the situation when travelling. It was sunny and warm and there was time to relax, had a coffee and did some writing before packing and taking the luggage to the car. I was scheduled on the Wightlink 11.30 ferry, and on reflection I should have been more confident tried for an earlier although I had gone for the 11 and for some reason it was not available.

From the visit to the Gunwharf the previous afternoon i had seen the car ferry birth and therefore knew where it was. However to reach the port the one way system first took towards the entrance of the naval docks and then back across Portsmouth towards Southsea. I arrived just before the ten thirty sailing and thinking I had plenty of time went to look at ticket office reception after being checked close to the entrance gate and sent to join several vehicles in a lane next to some parked goods vehicles. Fortunately on leaving the ticket office I notice that the front vehicles in my lane were being put on board the ferry and I rushed back but only the first three maybe four were let through and I was left behind a couple of other vehicles. When the next sailing arrived and unloaded I believed I would shortly be away. Alas the ferry sailed off without taking any vehicles. Later we were told there had been bunkering problems the previous evening. The 11.30 sailing was also delayed because of the arrival of an aircraft . I have not seen such a vessel pass by before as the one already in harbour is in dry dock only visible at some distance and partly hidden by the scaffolding for the refit.

Being at the front meant we were asked to climb a steep ramp to the first floor of the parking to one side of the ferry and told to remain until the cars at the rear were raised to the level of those at the front and we were locked into position and told to sit put until all the vehicles were loaded and we were then free to move to the lounges and outside decks. I opted for the top deck but retreated to second when the top became full of smokers. When will these people learn what a horrible disease lung cancer is?

It was pleasant crossing and I concluded the price which residents pay and the concession price I was able to pay was, all things considered, reasonable. On the return journey I read an article in the local paper where it looked that the charges would not be referred to the Monopolies/Competition Commission.

A feature of the Island is the attempt to retain its essential charm to attract visitors to sustain the economy without overwhelming residents. This seems a sensible approach together with that of organising special events throughout the year to achieve a balanced economy. If you are with people you know you tend to obtain a different perspective of a place and direct contact with local people can be more limited.

I have already commented that the Fishbourne Inn has a warm atmosphere but the food offered was a great disappointment, given its price. Subsequent meals eaten out were a considerable improvement.

My accommodation for three nights was at the Travel Lodge located close to the Lugely Street Car Park in the County town of Newport. With so many seaside towns, harbours creeks and inlets. chines, rocky promontories, waterways and water spots and viewpoints and human attractions and activities to visit, the County Town of Newport could be overlooked during a short stay. This not such as bad thing because in essence it remains a county town for local residents and is not over run with tourists so that it retains its identity. It has an excellent concentrated shopping centre with a giant of a Marks and Spencer’s and a Morrison’s with separate car parking. Together with the well thought out one way system, which it is worth take time to learn, there is an excellent range of car parks and a sensible pricing system which provides for residents and visitors in and out of season. I shall write and find out if it is possible to purchase car parking permits in advance. There is the full range of stores, shops, banks and other services within a short walking of the central area.

There is also a large car park near the Cineworld multiplex which has a covered Bridge walkway into the main level of the complex. The staff at the Pizza restaurant need a kick up their backsides, or the management needs to get their act together. I was delighted to see so many young people enjoying a night at the cinema midweek, queuing in an orderly fashion and wondered about the atmosphere in the Chicago Rock cafe bar just before closure at 3am on weekends while their two meals for £8 whatever it was should attract families and oldies visiting before 7pm. I was struck that although the island is for those who love the sea and outdoors, there is provision for all levels of cultural interests from the rock and pop festival the previous weekend to jazz and opera and all other forms of music, play and dance.

My double bedroom at the Lodge was on the top floor and had an attic feel because of a slanting roof over the window which did mean one had to take care not to bang a head but overall it was spacious and light although I would have preferred some drawer space but I thought the desk unit was unusual and well designed. I stopped at four Lodges during this trip, Oxford, Portsmouth, Newport and Nottingham Trowell Service area and each room is different, some with shower only some with a bath and shower unit combined. One at Oxford and nowhere to put shaving, teeth, washing and other materials while two had excellent wide and long surfaces around the basin. Television is also a variable with some having flat screen digital TV showing all five Terrestrial stations, channel four films Film Four, Ceebies and 24 hour news as well as the four radio stations including Talk Sport. It is not uncommon to only be able to experience four of the five Terrestrial stations at some lodges on the traditional box sets. Outside of London Lodges showing pay to view films are rare.

The number of wall sockets is also variable as I like three in addition to one for the kettle and one for the TV, I have Lap top, phone and camera charger. One of the reasons I must return soon to the island for a longer stay is that I was unable to take the camera because the charge unit needs to be replaced. All the lodges appear to be Wifi linked and the cost is expensive unless one is away for the week when £20 is reasonable. The advantage of the Innkeepers is that the service is free. I had great difficult using the internet on the Island Lodge which may be an Island problem.

However at £9 or £19 a night I am not one to complain!

1743 Portsmouth,Nelson, HMS Victory and the Mary Rose, not forgetting Emma, Lady Hamilton

On Monday 15th June 2009 it was a glorious hot morning and I changed from the brown trousers and thick brown cardigan type jacket to black trousers, white shirt and the black sleeveless waistcoat type jacket, unzipped, made from in the inner coat of the winter’s coat. Going from the Hard, the bus and railway terminus at Portsmouth Harbour to the entrance ticket office of the Navy centre I realised how hot a day it had become. Last year I had only managed a couple of hours of a visit paying the entrance fee of £15.50 which included the ability to revisit some facilities as well as any of those with a once only entrance requirement. I had developed a painful groin rash and had to return to the car via the short train journey to the town close to where I was staying at the Innkeeper’s Lodge and gone to the nearest Boots for some cream, some sun cream or was it after sun, anyway got both for the price of one in a special offer and a late lunch sandwich deal before making the journey to near Burford where I was staying the night. I had eat the lunch at a bench in the town centre speculating on the lives of those around me and regretting my physical condition. I remembered the violent storm which had greeted my arrival at Burford.

At the ticket desk this year there was a delay as arrangements were made to transfer an elderly visitor from her wheel chair to a better one provided by the centre. She would be able to visit many of the exhibitions and centres but obviously not HMS Warrior and HMS Victory. I was asked to take the new ticket with the old ticket and eager to get underway I did not clarify the position and then made the same mistake as made the previous year. The entrance for HMS Warrior is in the main ticket office. I had been last year and made the same mistake as before thinking that this was the main way out to the rest of the site when in in fact it is only to HMS Warrior. I was confused because my second ticket provided for entry to this attraction again but did not mention the others I had not visited. Although I had my ticket cancelled by the same lady as before, understandably she did not remember me, I turned around as I had no inclination to visit this ship again and headed for the Mary Rose Ship Hall. Last year I visited the Mary Rose museum and shop but this time I wanted to see the special centre where the raised remains of the Hull can be seen undergoing the final stages of the preservation process/

I had viewed the raising of the remains of the Hull on TV and at the museum watch the greater part of the hour long film on the events leading to the raising, and then the effort to stable the wreck and maintain in the found condition. When the remains were raised in 1994 it was treated with a low weight polyethylene glycol, essentially a wax, and then ten years later with a high weight molecular polyethylene glycol which will continue until next year when the wreck will be slowly dried into a permanently preserved condition. The wax is constantly fine sprayed in constant temperature environment and therefore can only be viewed by the public through misted windows. There is an excellent hand held commentary which describes the ship from end to end. While all that remains is a full length slice as that above the seabed was eaten away by ship worm, it is a full length slice and a thick slice at that. Ideally one should move from viewing the hull to the museum where every form of recovered find and recreation is brilliantly presented. In fact it is the intention to bring the two elements together once the drying out is completed and to provide additional education and study facilities for the constant stream of school parties who visit.

The significance of the Mary Rose is that it is the only 16th century warship to have been recovered. In 2008 the appeal to raise the £20 million required to build the permanent museum around the Hull was successful, mainly through the Lottery Heritage fund. Charles, Prince of Wales, was one of the main sponsors of the original project to preserve the Hull and put on display. I understand the present running costs are around £250000 a year and while we do not need Trident carrying submarines we do need this remains of our Heritage. At the reception desk for entry to view the wreck the nature of the ticket was explained and I misunderstood and thought that in addition to going to see the Victory I could also go on the trip around the harbour once more.

Before visiting Nelson’s Flagship I went to the Museum which is dominated by the Victory and Horatio Nelson. In one upper area there is the fore topsail, the largest memorabilia from the battle. It measures 54 feet at the head and 80 feet at the base with a depth of 54 some 3600 square feet and a weight of 370 kilos and would have taken 1200 hours to stitch. It has 90 shot holes plus some removal of squares by souvenir hunters. It has been dry cleaned through the Mary Rose society.

Half of one building has been given over to the Nelson Gallery about his life. The most interesting aspect is his size in that he was short and slim and very good looking so it is not surprising women fell at his feet! It evident that he was something of confident, self opinionated, unconventional leader with over 30 years experience before the Battle of Trafalgar. He was involved in several battles including the most famous Battle of the Nile, was also wounded and decorated Viscount and Baron of the Nile and Thorpe in Norfolk, Baron of the Nile of Hilborough also in Norfolk, Knight of the Order of Bath, Vive Admiral of the White Squadron of the Fleet, Commander and Chief of her Majesty’s Ships and Vessels in the Mediterranean, Duke of Bronte in Sicily, Knight Grand Cross of the Sicilian Order of St Ferdinand and of merit, member of the Ottoman Order of the Crescent, Knight Commander of the Order of St Joachim. He became a Colonel of the Marines and became a Freeman of Bath, Salisbury, Exeter, Plymouth, Monmouth, Sandwich, Oxford, Hereford and Worcester. Oxford University awarded an honorary degree.

In addition to his Naval prominence Nelson is known for his adulterous relationship with Emma, Lady Hamilton, who was also married although because he was away at sea for long periods. He contact with limited. His first wife, Fanny was a young widow. Emma was the daughter of a blacksmith who died when she was two and then raised by her mother with no formal education. She had various jobs including working as a maid to actresses at the Drury Lane Theatre and supplementing her income working as a prostitute.

Emma developed as a model and a dancer and progressed into an up market brothel. She was still only 15 when taken by a Knight of the realm to his country estate where he spent most of his time drinking and hunting with friends leaving Emma to establish a relationship with a Member of Parliament, Charles Grenville, second son of the Earl of Warwick with whom she had a child. He then wanted to make a financially advantage marriage and passed Emma to his uncle, Sir William Hamilton, the British Envoy to Naples. Grenville had wanted her back after his marriage was established but instead she married Hamilton. When Nelson returned to Naples he met Emma who was overwhelmed by his legend fainting in his presence! Believe that and you believe anything. When Nelson fell ill she arranged for Nelson to stay at her home to nurse him with the approval of her husband.

They became loves with Emma bearing his daughter, Horatia who survived and a second daughter who only lived a few weeks. Emma was very popular with the people who followed her and his activities closely, the Celebs of their day. The navy establishment were not amused and sent Nelson to Sea and away from Emma as often as they could. He had left Emma, Merton Place in his Will and their home in what is now Wimbledon and although he left her family estate to his brother, he had indicated that he wanted Emma and his daughter to be looked after. She had only a small pension from her husband which was quickly spent trying to turn their home into a monument to Nelson and she spent nearly a year in a debtors prison before going to France to escape her creditors where she turned to drink and died in poverty from a form of dysentery. The British establishment, as hypocritical as ever, disregarded Nelson wishes, turning him into the hero they wanted.

Before the visit to the Victory, I was familiar with the layout of the vessel as well as the details of the Battle, having acquired in 1970 a copy of David Howarth’s Trafalgar, the Nelson Touch through World Books.

The tour is organised so that one enters on the third gun deck, then visits part of the two upper decks and onto the quarter deck where a plaque marks the spot where Nelson was hit by a single bullet from which he died. From the quarter deck one then descends into the lower decks including a view into the hold and then finishes via a separate exit at the lower gun level. Having explored the Iron ship Warrior previously I was familiar with the layout of the gun decks and that the crews lived in virtual darkness when at sea eating by the guns and with hammocks slung closely together at night. I did not appreciate until visiting the modern navy exhibition that the provision of fixed bunks was only introduced in the later part of the twentieth century. I regard myself to be of average height at 5 feet 10 but had to constantly watch my head given the space between floor and ceiling of the decks, and demonstrating that with better diets and health monitoring the nation has grown taller.

Being a flagship Nelson had his own grand quarters with a table at which could sit all his captains of the fleet of some 23 vessels. The captain of the Victory had his own grand quarters and the officers their own separate dining facilities. The ship was full of school parties and their teachers. The on hand ships staff enjoyed explaining everything to the children. One area of the ship on one of one the decks was off limits because a film crew were making a video.

On arrival at the centre I had a cold drink in the large cafe part of the extraordinary Antiques storehouse. Here there are several thousand square feet of items on display and for sale, not just maritime and military but also collectables of various kinds, including furniture, ceramics and glass ware. I also made a phone call while sitting at a picnic table under a canopy before being surrounded by a school party and made a quick retreat. When visiting the Warrior, the Mary Rose Museum and the main museum the main attractions had been crossed out on the ticket and the reissued additional ticket. My visit around the harbour had not been crossed out so I assumed this had been overlooked and that I could make second trip. However when I visited the Mary Rose Hall, instead of crossing out the name of the attraction, the ticket had been clipped. It was only after the ticket was clipped for the round the Harbour trip that I realised that the original ticket may have been already clipped in this way rather than crossed out. However whether because the individual was kind or because of my age, if this was so, I was not turned away and enjoyed a second trip around the harbour. There were fewer vessels in the docks whereas previously I had attended just after the open day weekend when a number of foreign navies had sent ships. On that first visit there were several decommissioned ships waiting for the navy to sell them or dispose by using for training gun crews and rocket launches.

During a visit to the modern navy exhibition there was references to some 3500 female members of the service today but the available assistant was not able to tell me what percentage this was of the total establishment. Later on the internet I checked and it is 40000 thus making the female composition under 10%.

I decided to get off the boat tour at Gunwharf Quays but was not tempted to take the elevator to the top of the Spinnaker. Some men were absail cleaning or painting the lower level which was awesome. In the area of the Spinnaker there a dozen contemporary restaurants with the main shopping area behind and which includes a cinema complex. I was interested that the Vue was showing live performances of operas and a live showing of Phedre on Thursday, also on the Isle of Wight. Alas when I checked the Newcastle film theatre performance is sold out. However there is showing of La Traviata on Sunday from the Royal Opera House where there are still tickets which I will investigate tomorrow after I have made progress on the growing list of priorities.

The turn ups on one trouser leg had lost their thread and looked bad so I went in search of cotton thread and needles. Thus I came across a sale of shoes and invested in a pair of casual browns and blacks for a modest total of £45. I had thrown out my everyday paid of black laces ups before the trip, such was their condition. I swapped my sandals for the brown casuals and went in further search of the needle and brown thread. I then discovered the quick way from the Hard to the Spinnaker shopping centre and Vice Versa, and back to the city shopping centre. I wished there was time to visit the Old Town now turned into attractive looking Inns and Restaurants, and to Southsea, the City beach much as Seaburn is to Sunderland.

Woolworths the usual standby for needle and thread no longer exists but Debenhams was a good prospect, but alas not. Across from Debenhams was what appeared to be a comparative new shopping precinct and here in a shop selling materials and ribbons I bought a packet of needles and was then directed to the reels of thread. I was able to thread a needle and sew later at the Travel Lodge but I need to do a better job.

I exited from a different entrance and found myself across from a car park and this led to the decision to attempt to find my way to the Travel Lodge on foot. Across from the car park was a Sainsbury supermarket and across from this was the entrance first to some private terrace villas and then to a large estate of Council run flats surrounded by grass verges. I knew I was going in the right direction as I spotted one and then a second bus stop which include the same number of route on which I had travelled into the city. This reminds that on one of the busses I encountered an interest situation.

At a stop a young girl of primary school level got on and skipped towards the first available seat. She shouted uncle and his name, and repeated this, “its uncle so and so and gave him a hug and a kiss on the cheek as he was sitting in front of me on a side view seat. A woman with a smaller child who I assumed was the girl’s mother had paid the fares but then sat at the first seat almost next to the driver on the other side of the aisle. While she looked to where her daughter was sitting she made no recognition to someone who was either her brother or brother in law. Now what do you make of that?

On the long and hot walk later afternoon to the Travel Lodge I found a local pub, a sports bar where I enjoyed an apple and mango J20 and here the bar man confirmed that I was going in the right direction and indeed I was soon passing another local pub night club and the Lodge came into view. I decided to check in first and find my room which was on the third floor and then sort out the luggage to take up, including food for the evening. It was only when I had dome this and switched on the lap top that I discovered that England were playing their vital game against the West Indies within a few minutes. The restaurants and bar attached to the Lodge had no TV so the next action was to go to another mother across the roadway. Yes this was a TV pub but alas it was football showing as England were playing in an under 21 competition. I decided to listen to the cricket on the internet radio ans then found a difficulty but there was a commentary on Talk Sport available on the TV relay. Within a few overs it was evident this was not to be England’s day. I blame Paul Collingwood. They were beaten by the West Indies in a rain affected match where the operation Duckworth Lewis system meant the opposition had only to score 80 in nine overs. I was ready for an early bed after so much walking in the hot sun so after the evening use up and make up meal I was in bed and asleep, looking forward to going over to the island in the morning.

Before then I had moved the car closer to the Lodge entrance once the sun had set. Apart from the cricket I was very satisfied with my day. It was the second part of completing the trip commenced the previous year. I had visited central Oxford and the naval base. I knew that my unfinished business with the Island would continue unfinished because of such a short visit.

It was Monday June 15th, a week ago and I woke early at the Oxford Travel Lodge and was away before eight o’clock, first calling at the reception to report that the hot water tap did not function and I had obtained hot water by taking cupfuls from the bath taps I then got petrol and set off immediately making a route mistake. I had forgotten that I had come off the A34 at the adjacent roundabout and reversed to the next and for some now inexplicable reason set off towards Witney. Nor can I pretend that after forty years I had triggered an automatic homing button which used to take me daily towards Witney and beyond and back, every day for three years in work as a child care officer for Oxfordshire County Council. No, I simply was not on the ball and paid the penalty by having to continue to the Cassington turn off, the village where the Children’s Officer lived until her death. It took sometime for the traffic lights to let me turn and then by the time I had reversed that had changed again and a further wait was necessary. Then there was a hold up because of work on the bridge, the bridge in question carried the A34 from North to South Oxford and then I had a further slow down approaching the roundabout in the early morning rush hour and continuing to reverse the journey just made to take the left turn up the rising slip road onto the A34. There was then further delay approaching the turn off to Oxford and the M40 at Botley Bridge.

It was therefore a relief to have an open road and I was pleasantly surprised how quickly I was approaching the turn off Winchester with the M3 and the M27 ahead. Before then I had a service area stop for coffee and a roll, may be two. I was already thinking that on the return journey I would skip the M27 spur of some twenty miles from the outskirts of Southampton, past the airport and the Rosebowl turnoff before coming to the M275, and instead take the M27 back just a little way in the other direction and join the A3 road to the M25 and M1. On Monday I continued to almost the end of the M275 coming off at the main roundabout just beforehand but missing the second exist turn to the Portsmouth Travel Lodge and had to continue to the next even bigger roundabout and then back but without needing to rejoin the M275 and taking a lower road to the original roundabout and taking the correct exit to where within sight and opposite a large office block there was the Travel Lodge with a large restaurant fronting the road way. I entered the large car park and discovered there was a vacant space one of eight undercover . Understandably the hotel reception is from within the car park from the far end to where I had parked with an entrance into the restaurant adjacent. I thought it wise to check that it was OK to leave to the vehicle until registering later in the day and found there was no problem and the registration number was not required then or later, It was only 10.30 am so I had the rest of the day to explore Portsmouth. First I had some more food and coffee prepared at Oxford and then reorganised the car so that there was little luggage in evidence. I had seen a couple go towards a road which was between the hotel and the overhead roadway and decided to follow the to a bus stop where there appeared to be buses going direct to the city centre and to The Hard which I believed was the bus station adjacent to the port station and to the Gunwharf Quays, the new shopping and restaurant development with the Spinnaker Tower, the second highest building in the UK and which I was to learn and cost twice as much as planned and where the civic party had become stuck in the lift for several hours on the first day. (£35.6 million). It was designed for the Millennium but came in six years late and required public funding, nearly a third by the city council.

I got on the first bus and unsure about its direct got off at the city centre thinking I was closer to the front than I was and then got on another to the bus and train station at the front. This was all to good when it came to return journey that evening and going for the car ferry in the morning. This is because Portsmouth has been organised on an effective one way system but which confuses ones north south east west sense of direction. I hoped I would complete the visit I had commenced a year ago to extraordinary Naval Dockyard attractions, the restored MHS Warrior, the first Iron Warship and the fully restored HMS Victory. The remains of the earliest surviving Warship in the World from the 16th century the Mary Rose, together with the presently separate museum and shop. The Three enormous Museum buildings which includes presentations about Nelson and the modern Navy as well as a topsail from the vessel. Action Stations a large activity centre for young people and there is one the largest collections of antiques of every description for sale or just to look at. The all in one ticket which lasts a year to enable as second visit to see anything left on the first includes a trip around the harbour where one can get of if you wish at the Gunwharf Quays and the Spinnaker Tower.

1741 A summer night in Oxford University City

Last night I enjoyed a balmy summer’s night in Oxford watching England win against India in an important 20 20 match at two pubs at both ends of the High, having invested a small fortune in car parking charges. Both the match and the nostalgia was worth the expenditure. The breakdown disaster of last year was not repeated as I commenced my journey to Portsmouth

On Saturday I had returned from Durham’s win against Lancashire via Sunderland to fill up with petrol and replace the vacuum flash which I had carelessly dropped on concrete. I had then systematically set about preparing for the journey. One travel bag with tins of rice, beans, crab, salmon and sardines, packets of soup, Kitchen roll and rest I cannot remember. The picnic utensils were placed in back compartment of the cool box with tin and bottle openers plus kitchen towel.. I prepared Tupperware type boxes for the remaining strawberries and watermelon, the latter cut into chunks with other boxes for lettuce and cucumber, olives and sliced gherkins and tomatoes. I left buttering rolls and filling them with meats and the rest of the coleslaw until the morning.

There was a little ironing to do and as on the trip to Brighton and Hove I did not pack the trousers and shirts of long and short sleeve but placed a cover of them and then placed the cover over a seat in car. I would take only one other bag and the rucksack. The this bag would take the pyjamas, underwear, track suit bottoms, clock lap top computer, headphones and mobile phone charger, plus one new and unopened shirt. The haversack would take the paperwork for the trip, personal information I like to carry with me, a book to read, a couple of DVD’s, sun creams, spare pair of glasses and such like and the unfilled thermos flask.

Some of the plants were watered, I say some because there was a single bright flash of lightening filled by the crack of thunder overhead, then distant but a torrential downpour which lasted less than half an hour but was disconcerting.

There was also paperwork, some upsetting. First the insurance wanted return of the old certificate before releasing the new or a declaration that it had been destroyed or misplaced. I searched high and low but could not find it although I knew it had not been lost. I wrote a letter and completed the form ready for posting in the morning. Then there was a problem with House and contents insurance and as it was after six on a Saturday before I got round to the unopened correspondence I could not resolves the issue which I will not bother to go into now.

Now I have briefly summarised it is difficult to understand why all this took until midnight with several walkabouts in the house thinking over what I had done and was still to do. I did need to work out how to get to the car Ferry although getting to the Travel Lodge. could be left until Sunday night or Monday morning I also took time off to watch the Cardiff Singer of the Year final round. I had also intended to watch a DVD but the machine has developed a sound problem which together with the top of the washing machine replacement I will leave on return over the three weeks or so before the hectic month of July with two trips and a jazz festival and more cricket.

For once the following morning went exactly as hoped for. There was only myself to get up, rolls to be filled, cold water for the night wakings in a flask, loading to cool bag with contents prepared the night before and doing the final checks that I had everything. In fact I left behind a pair of casual trousers I had planned and binned the everyday shows which I had discovered were in dreadful condition. I was to motor to the midlands for lunch without stopping so I had a coffee fro breakfast.

There was great joy in being able to drive with a cold airflow system and a radio CD player. I have been listening to a T Rex best of CD over the past few days. Children of the Revolution and all that. I must list some other hits. He was a limited singer and the format of his songs was the same with repeating chants with back up singers Metal Guru endlessly. It is difficult to hear what he is saying and his slogans are now dated but reflect the times in which they were created. I will switch to the more articulate and creative Bob Dylan best of at some point. For the start of the journey it was Classical FM appropriate for a Sunday morning. I stopped at the new Azda for cash and had to advise a little old later with shopping bag standing by the unopened huge glass doors that it was Sunday and 24 hour shopping applied between first thing Monday and closure on Saturday evening. I wondered how far she had walked as there is no housing immediately nearby. I was tempted to offer a lift but I needed to get somewhere for lunch by midday. The journey and the lunch were excellent. A chicken and bacon salad with a baguette accompanied by a J20 and then a coffee. I was on my journey again around 2pm and in Oxford about 4.30.

I had joined the M1 having travelled the A19 and A1 before lunch and then followed the route which becomes the M40 for a while and which took passed the road to Silverstone where the previous year I had been held up because of a car fire and which I had bypassed by coming off and the going back onto the motorway as convenient for me the accident and fire had occurred under the roundabout. I had stopped at the first lay-by after having turned of the road on to that leading to the M40 and at this point the starter motor had failed in the roundabout. I had remembered vivid my experience of standing there waving at the traffic to avoid a collision and my relief when the AA arrived, and then got the vehicle jump started so I was able to drive to Bicester when it was garaged over the weekend and I was given a hire car to complete my journey down to an Innkeepers for the weekend and the finals day of the 20 20 at the Rose Bowl. On the Sunday I gone over to the Isle of Wight for the day, whereas this year I looked forward to spending three nights and on the Monday before setting off to Burford for the night stop I had spent half a day at the Naval dockyard where I was given a year long ticket after signing off the income tax relief.

This time there was high drama and my destination the Travel Lodge just off the Peartree roundabout was just off the A34 which continued to near Newbury and on close to Winchester before joining the M3 to the outskirts of Southampton when the M27 took me to where I was staying in Portsmouth.

It was a beautiful evening as I arrived at the site which next to a holiday Inn. Did I not stay here once before. I have stayed at the Peartree Travel Lodge before now once during a Drug Advisory Service visit for the Department of Health although I had stayed with the team in hotel close to Walton Street and Ruskin College. And we had gone out for some great meals in the evenings at Government expense. After booking in and unpacking what I needed, leaving the rest in the car I decided to go in search of a sport bar or pub to watch England play India in the must win match of the World 20 20 cup. I knew car parking was impossible in Oxford except at official sites so first I went to see if the Park and Ride scheme nearby was in operation. As anticipated it was by the last bus back was at seven. I headed for Summertown where I lived for two years in my first rented accommodation as an employed child care officer from 1964 to 1966 and where there was car parking behind the high street where there was now restaurants from around the world in what was a villagey area with BBC Oxford and the headquarters of OXFAM, the Oxford Committee for Famine relief. The car park was expensive as anticipated so I decided that I might as well park in the town centre, not realising it would cost even more. This was my first mistake. The second was on the way to the Walton Street car park on impulse I went for that at the bus station which proved to be underground and where the charges were lethal £3 for the first hours and over £7 for three. I should have driven out and onto Walton Street but took the hour which would be sufficient time to find out if there was a cricket showing bar in the immediate town centre. I passed a pub which I did use from time to time when at Ruskin and having rooms in Walton Place and then in college building in Walton Street during my second year.

Close to the cinema and a popular French bistro, especially for dinner parties out there a miserable atmosphere Euro Bar with ground level seat looking up to an above standing head TV and with steps then up to the bar. In was a curious place staffed by young women with European accents and where the drinks were expensive. One young man made do with a pint of iced water. England were put into bat by India and Luke Wright was out almost immediately , however Bopara 37 and then Petersen 46 scored well and reasonable quickly. As the hour of car parking ended I returned to the car and moved onto the original destination where £5 covered the charges until 8pm and then from 8pm until 8 am in the morning and returned to watch the rest of the English Innings where they reached 153 six about twenty to thirties runs short of a winning total. The problem is that middle order, including captain Collingwood were unable to move along quickly or hit 4s and 6s with the regularity required..
It looked a fantastic night outside and it was Oxford and it seemed wrong to be sitting there in an atmosphere I was not enjoying so I decided to walk the High to Magdalen Bridge. Sunday evenings in most shopping centres away from pubs and restaurants, and other recreational facilities. However this was a university in term time so there were students heading for a function at the Union, some from society meetings, or activities with friends, most busy bicycling. Oxford is usually full of people from lands far and near. There were always students learning English or being finished, but then nothing like the influx taking causal and menial jobs. The only Chinese/Asians one would see were serving in restaurants or glimpsed behind a half opened kitchen door. On Sunday I observe red several pairs of Chinese far East students and a couple of mixed relationships which suggests the Colleges are doing good business in this respect. In addition to Examination Schools there are only four colleges in the High All Souls which does not take undergraduates and Fellows are elected and included Sir Christopher Wren and Lawrence of Arabia and current John Redwood the right wing Conservative Member of Parliament ,Queens attended by Henry V, and University with Shelley and Clem Atlee and CS Lewis, Bill Clinton, and Bob Hawke together with Stephen Hawkins as alumni.

And Magdalen where on May day from its tower the choir sing at dawn Cardinal Wolsey, John Betjeman and Oscar Wilde, I have seen his room, could say I was there. So could beyond the Fringe Dudley Moore.

Having got as far as the bridge I could not resist going on a little further to the small village of shops and pubs with St Hilda’s once Ladies only college on the left and one of two roads leading up to Headington Hill, the former home of the notorious owner of the Daily Mirror Sir Robert Maxwell and which has become part of the new Oxford University which developed from the Technical Colleges across the way, and the on to Headington centre where I lived for over a year before moving to London and where in Headington Old Village was located Ruskin Colleges other building where at the Rookery I had lived for my first year. In the area across from the Bridge and the now silent punts to one side and the meadow and the Botanical Gardens with the walks down to Christ Church and its Meadow and down to the Thames called Isis here I had taken to lunch a student friend of a friend at St Hilda’s who had stayed only for the main course and then got back to work, cutting me adrift such was the evidence of the cultural and educational difference between us and that there was nothing between us to sustain further interest. I went to see if the eating place was still. T was but under a different guise. Later on the return journey after passing Shepherd and Woodward the university suppliers of gowns and ties and scarves which made me up a large red scarf to represent Ruskin and from where I hired the gown and white bow tie required to be worn before one could sit a public examination in the Examination schools, I been to lunch at a first floor Chinese restaurant with my friend from St Hilda’s (not the friend of the friend if you see what I mean but the friend) established on two walks across the Pennines from Liverpool to Hull over Christmas and New Year organised by the Youth Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. Now some fifty years later it was a Thai restaurant.

Anyway this is a monumental digression at the village across from the Bridge there were three public houses. One advertised some live Irish music that very evening but a little way further on the other side of the road where there were a number of drinkers and smokers enjoying the warm evening air, The Old Black Horse is its name there is the most attractive looking sports pub I have encountered in many a day. There was a choice of viewing areas and I opted for a the wooden walled upper room where blinds masked the light from large windows not to affect the large screen projection. Other screen although large and offering high definition quality were less than a half perhaps a quarter of this one. There was only one couple, she more interested in him than the cricket when I arrived but later I was surrounded by part of a cricket playing team, complete with whites and bats and one sporting a multi coloured cap reminding of Brideshead days. The match was coming to an end and as it did he excitement increased. Sidebottom had taken two of the early Indian wickets and this had slowed down as well as the wicket the run chase. Swann had two wickets leaving at 85 for five, leaving Dhoni and Pathan to get the seventy off runs required. Some tight bowling from Broad 4 for 21 as well as Swann 2 for 28 won England the match and survival until the following day as India were all out for 150 just three runs short.

On the return journey I had been tempted to go through to the Broad and return to the car along Beaumont Street with the Randolph Hotel is located, the Playhouse, the Ashmolean and my former dentist. Instead I went onto Carfax and turned into the pedestrian only area where the Kardomah Tea rooms used to be. The tea room of the same name in Swansea became more famous because Dylan Thomas and friends would meet. On either side there is a small lane off where there were former pub haunts. One on the right was a known haunt of city girls who would hand jive to the Twist and where with a former army sergeant then at Ruskin we failed dismally to get off with two we chatted up. Admittedly I was inexperienced hopeless of similar age to them whereas he was experienced but ten years or more my senior. It is now a restaurant and the Kardomah long since vanished into a shopping precinct. And so the flood of memories then and now overwhelmed the night. I was tempted to stay out, go for a drink, remember more but I wanted an early start for the next adventuresome day.

1742 Somebody Up There Likes Me at Bembridge Isle of Wight

In future, the 17th of June will be known as Someone Up There Likes me, Bembridge on the Isle of Wight Day.

Some sixty years ago, or more, my birth mother, Mabel, booked and paid for a caravan holiday for two weeks at Bembridge on the Isle of Wight, for herself, her eldest sister Lena, her younger sister Margaret who was known as Harriet and who was my care mother, and me. I cannot remember if this was the first family holiday. We had been prevented from having holidays at the seaside because of World War Two, we were poor and because she had her sisters had cared for a sister who had become progressively, deaf, dumb, blind and bedridden from school age meningitis.

It was not our first trip away together as during the last year of the war when Croydon, and the surrounding area, became the target for the greatest concentration of rocket bombs dropped in the UK, over 140, and all five of us went to stay for part of the year with a married sister who lived in army officer’s quarters with her baby son at Catterick camp in Yorkshire, then a few houses away from the base and surrounded by corn fields where we would walk in the evenings. I mention this because there were aspects of the Catterick experience, especially the travelling and being in the countryside which I remember as being similar to that at Bembridge.

In the last year of the war with Germany I had travelled with the disabled sister in an ambulance, and my care mother and her elder sister had travelled separately by train, with my birth mother staying behind until the end of the school term and then had travelled on her own to join us. When we returned to Wallington, after the bombing ceased, we had come back by train, my first long train journey experienced. It may even have been my first train journey of any kind My birth mother arranged the trip to the Isle of Wight from a newspaper advertisement without any prior knowledge or information about where we going, except that someone had said to her, or to one of her sisters that the Island was the place to go, perhaps reminding them of the peninsular island of their homeland, Gibraltar which they had been required to leave in 1938 and again in 1939.

The journey there and back would have taken some organising as it would have been necessary to take the Trolley bus, the 645 from a stop in Wallington close to our home and then walk from one part of Croydon to another and then catch the train to Portsmouth and take the passenger ferry from the Harbour to Ryde and then the Island train and then the bus to the village and then walk to the farm where the caravan was located. I can remember that there was a walk with cases from the village to the caravan and from the caravan to the headland of the Bembridge Ledge. No sandy beach and no seaside of a pier, a fish and chip café, ice creams, candy floss and amusement arcades, that we were expecting.

I have no picture in my head of the village as it was then, other than there were a few houses, an Inn but was there a store? I remember the disappointment, especially of my care mother that there was no beach and no seaside when we explored that first evening after a cooked meal. I recollect that there were still traces of the war defences which added concern about the location. Our other task that evening was to gain directions for the nearest Catholic Church and then how to get to the nearest public beach which was by a bus to Sandown. I cannot say for certain but I believe there was only a limited service there and back.

I do have a strong recollection that by the time we got up, had breakfast, made sandwiches for lunch and flasks of drinks and then caught the bus, it was around midday and time for lunch. It was a rule not to bathe for two hours until after a meal so it would mid afternoon before anyone would go into the water. I was afraid of the water so would only splash about. I cannot remember if either my birth mother or elder sister changed in to bathing costumes or went into sea but my care mother did and I having photos of her and friends sun bathing at various haunts in Gibraltar.

I remember that we returned late afternoon when a meal was cooked and we would go for a walk before bed. I remember walking to the harbour which was just an inland waterway. I will leave until the next writing the experience of Sandown, the trips to Shanklin and Ventnor, around the Island to Ventnor and Cowes, and the Shanklin Chine. I can no longer remember what we were able to do on this first trip, or the second when we stayed in a guest house at Sandown. We usually went to a different place each holiday but because of the isolation and inability to stay late and attend a Saturday night firework display held I believe at Shanklin we returned the following year or a year soon after.

We would have appeared an odd family group, three ladies, one in her fifties and two in their early forties, speaking Gibraltarian Spanish, so that no one, including me, could understand what they were saying. I saw them as English and it was only decades later that I comprehended that they were a mixture of Mediterranean Catholic, with mother and grandmother of Spanish, Italian and Gibraltarian mixed ancestry, and a grandfather from three hundred years ancestry from pre Victorian Calne in Wiltshire. Unknown to me, until I was sixty, my background was a mixture of this and four hundred years of Maltese ancestry. I had not been back to Bembridge since that holiday and wondered how much if anything I would recognise. It was something of a pilgrimage, unfortunately combined with visiting a friend relative who was incarcerated in hospital at Newport.

I set off from Newport and almost immediately got lost. The previous day I had been led in convoy from the Fishbourne Inn to the Hospital and then to the Lugely Street Car Park across from the Travel Lodge where I had secured threes nights accommodations for £19 a night and although I had commenced a walkabout, first to find the Tourist office for a tourist parking permit, but it was closed until 9.30 the following morning, I was too tired to explore further.

The following morning I had risen early and made my way to the car park for a ticket valid from 8 to 10 and then set off on an explore, first to a phone box as I needed to confirm continuation of my building and contents insurance after the mix p created the previous week when I had enquired about raising the limit on the contents insurance and something I must still sort out given the replacement value of my work materials, my books and such like. The work itself will have little or not value at present but just printing the photos and available print matter from disks and computer hard drives would involve several thousand pounds. I must work this out sometime to ensure that I am covered.

I then needed some short sleeve shirts and soon found the bus station with Morrison’s in the distance and then at Morrison’s, Marks and Spencer’s where I arrived just after opening at two minutes past nine. I bought three short sleeve shirts in a pack of blue, white and cream for £18 and then checked out the café where two creams teas, mixed sandwiches, scones, cream, jams and tea could be had for under £9 and an assortment of breakfasts and breakfast filled rolls were available. As I had a coffee and an apple turnover for breakfast I resisted the very strong temptation to have something here and then at Morrison’s although I promised myself I would indulge on the morning before taking the ferry to the mainland on Friday.

I then went to the Cineworld to find the film times for Angels and Demons and then went to the Quayside where I sat on a bench and made notes before calculating it was time to go to the tourist office in time for the pass to commence at 10am. As usual I kept finding things I wanted to do such as stay longer and then go on a walkabout both sides of the river, but other priorities prevailed. Bembridge beckoned.

I was immediately impressed by the tourist office where there was time to take in the large array of books, maps, souvenirs and informations. Some was booking a combined ferry and train trip and it took a surprisingly short time. A gentleman arrived with posters for a fete and was disappointed it would be several days before they would be put up at other offices. I did not understand why if this was so he and or someone else could not arrange to take them personally to each office during the day time.

I bought a map book as the one previously purchased on my day’s visit to Sandown and Shanklin the previous year was not comprehensive and obtained the two day permit which is excellent value because it enables movement all over the Island. While it costs more than the Brighton 7 day unlimited use pass for £27,50 at National Car Parks one is restricted to the particular park.

As a consequence of the morning walkabout I had worked out to leave the car park by the other exit and found my way into the what I believe is the High Street and Quay street on to the roundabout. However having spent several minutes studying the map I remain confused as instead of taking the road to Sandown I think I took a road marked Bembridge via Staplers, although at some point I reach a junction which said towards Sandown or Newport where I had come from. It was only the following day that I came back via the magnificent Down’s route.

On reaching the village centre, instead of finding parking and doing a walk about I was determined to find the Bembridge Ledge and drove around a couple of times trying to work out which route to take and ended driving along the harbour road to St Helens. I remember that we did walk here at least one evening commenting that there was nothing there either. I wondered when the houseboats were established. I was able to have a brief look around from the car as traffic was held up while children disgorged from three coaches heading for some watery adventure.

I decided not to continue around to the viewpoints the other side of St Helens and turned around and headed into the headland area and was soon lost in the winding Love Lane, Meadow Drive and Swains Road and eventually finding Swains Lane and Lane End Road and then coming to the car park overlooking the works on the Lifeboat Pier, the Lifeboat shop and the public Toilets, my first objective. There were only a few vehicles with those of the workmen in a compound a little distance away.

On leaving the toilet I noticed that the vehicle in the corner of the car park closest to where there was a row of four or five benches looking out over the Ledge and Pier workings was leaving and moved mine into this space. I would sit on the nearest bench if free after an on foot explore. The first impact had been yep this was where we had come on that first evening but I did not remember the lifeboat pier.


I then commenced an explore on foot going left and found the café at the start of the coastal path. All I wanted was a cup of coffee but I could not resist mentioning that this was my first visit for sixty years and I remembered the Ledge but there had been nothing else here on this part of the headland, but was my memory being true?

It was then time for a walk in the opposite direction and I could not resist exploring the grounds of the Hotel which commands the headland and which prevents the continuation of the coastal path requiring detour through the now residential headland, but then farmed land. Was anyone left who was a child at that time and would remember what the area had been like.

The Bembridge Coast Hotel is a fine hotel with extensive grounds ideal for elders or adults without children and appears self contained with places to lounge in the sunshine, pitch and putt golf green and Archery, Tennis, Croquet, Air Riffle shooting, Boules and a Spanish Garden. Inside there is an international standard four lane bowling green, heated swimming pool and sauna with exercise bikes and there is also a full beauty treatment suite including massage and facials.

The standard deal includes a full English breakfast and a three course evening meal in the Four Tides Restaurant which was beautifully set out in a grand traditional manner and for lunch there is the separate Solent Café which serves everything from fish and chips, baguettes, Panini’s, Baked Potatoes and salads including the Ploughman’s. There is music entertainment in the evenings from Tributes to Queen and the Be gees to Tom Jones and Glen Miller and Joe Loss. The all in price ranges from £214 to over £500 for 3 to seven nights plus range of extras in terms of room quality, views and facilities and services. The hotel is part of the Warner Chain.

Having explored so far I return to the car, and then sat on the first bench studying the map and reading the short notes on the history of the village. I then made a phone call which led to this writing being called Someone Up there likes Me- Bembridge.

It is not my practice to refer to living relatives or friends other than in the most general terms but this is the first and possibly the only instance where I will do so although without specific identification. A friend of a relative lives in Bembridge and for the past month has been incarcerated in the Island Hospital at Newport with major health problems. I had arranged to meet up with the relative after my exploring, and have lunch with another relative also staying at the home of lifelong friend in the Sandown area. However because of a previous commitment the other relative would not be free to late afternoon.
I had sat on the bench closest to my car noticing that there was another man sitting on the bench furthest away. There was a vehicle with a coach type vehicle with young people which had taken benchers in the grassland next to the car park.

I then got into a kafuffle about the phone. I had four pockets in the sleeveless waistcoat type jacket which is idea for travelling and part of a coat where as in fact the phone was a trouser pocket. I also remember having my car keys in my hand and a pocket address book at some point.

Having made the phone call, found about the changed arrangements and that the property was within walking distance via the grounds of the hotel, I elected to leave the car where it was, and walked continuing to listen to directions on my mobile phone.

It was close to 5pm before I was about to get into the vehicle of my relative to be taken back to the car park to collect my other relative in convoy and then visit the friend in hospital. It was at this moment that I attempted to get out the car key in readiness and could not find it. I emptied all pockets onto the passenger car seat and then went to where I had sat talking. I decided again checking everywhere I had been, especially the garden of the property because instinctively I felt I could have left the keys in the car. As we approached my car it was evident I had been right in one respect. Someone had found the keys, as stuck to the driver’s side window was a large notice which included a map. The note included the name of one individual and a mainland telephone number and the telephone and address of the person holding the key, the address provided in case I did not have a phone. I made the phone call and then travelled to the address to collect.

A holiday maker, it is presumed, had found the keys on or near the bench where I had sat and which I must have put down or dropped when I made the phone call and had then set off phone in hand following the directions. The individual had worked out that the keys related to the only other car and waited and waited assuming that I would be returning from a walk. Having reached the point when they had to leave the initiative had been taken to visit the Royal National Lifeboat station and left the keys with a volunteer who had provide notice, the map and the sticky tape. I had been very very, very, very lucky, due to the observation thoughtfulness of the visitor and the RNLB volunteer. I had already experienced the kindness of the Bembridge residents having had a little chat at the Solent view café. On my way through the grounds of the hotel, I had been advised that there was gate behind the Spanish Garden with led into the residential area where my relative was staying. I had seen the gate but hesitated because adjacent to it was a private residence and I had gone back in the grounds toward the main entrance and seeing a member of staff making their way to a car I asked about the gate and the individual accompanied me to where I was able to point to the gate, technically gates, one for vehicles and one for pedestrians, and which was used by hotel staff on occasions.

Some five hours had elapsed since losing the key and it had been handed over and one of several amazing aspects of the day is that the RNLB volunteer not only knew my friend in hospital but lived in the very next road.

It will not surprise that my friend found the tale entertaining or that it was pointed out that none of this would have happened had I taken the car round to the property rather than decided on the walk though the hotel grounds. I have only recently acquired the bright red Suzuki Wagon, as a replacement for one owned for ten years and where my own key had become bent and the dealer taking the vehicle in part exchange had advised that had it ceased to function it would have been expensive to change the car locks. On my way from Newport to Bembridge in the morning I had passed the Suzuki dealership on the Island ( I assume there is not more than one) and the thought had crossed my mind that if anything happened to the vehicle at I knew there was a dealership and where it was. I must stopping having such tempt the fates thoughts.

Meanwhile during the period of discovering the lost key and setting of my other relative had been patiently waiting at the end of her road to be collected.. Again had not last minute changes been necessary and she arrived for lunch we would have set off earlier for the hospital and the key loss could have been discovered several hours earlier.

It could be thought, with justification, that this was enough adventuring for one day for anyone in their sixties and seventies but our trio could not resist going out for a meal and the late evening showing of Angels and Demons at the Cineworld. We managed to find two of the last places in the Quayside area car park with the bridge into the main level of the Cinema and we had then gone down to have a meal in Pizza restaurant attached to the complex. Here we found that between a dozen and fifteen tables were occupied but another dozen were not, There appeared to be only two young members of staff attending to the tables and the two steadfastly ignored the two other parties waiting for tables as well as ourselves. We waited for only five minutes and went instead to the Chicago Rock Café, clearly an establishment designed for young people with a passion for exotic drinks and staying up to 3am at weekends. I enjoyed a BBQ chicken breast with chips and coleslaw while my companions had several pieces of battered fish with chips presented with theatricality and reasonable priced, with even better value had we arrived before 7pm when there was a two for one offer. . The meal obliterated the disaster of that at the Fishbourne Inn the previous day The Inn has a great atmosphere and location. The food was however expensive and appalling. The staff indifferent.

Returning to the cinema where we obtained our tickets beforehand having exchanged vouchers obtained from my credit card firm having put the deposit for the car on the card. We then found over a hundred young people held in a queue. There had been a fire alarm earlier in the evening which had put some programmes back twenty minutes or so as apparently the cinema had been cleared because of the fire alarm. I later learnt from this had happened before, recently. As I had seen Angels and Demons and written at length, I will leave further comment except to say that the hilarity and incredulity about some aspects of the film was shared and with Wimbledon fortnight almost here, I am reminded of the McEnroe call, You cannot be serious? There are still some great shots of Rome and some significant issues about religion and science, the origins of the universe and the nature of faith within the film.

As my companions set off to their respective homes across the Island one joked about my getting lost in the one way system and then not being able to get into the Travel Lodge at that time of night. No problem I said having been in a position to advise not one but two other visitors to the hotel about car parking and the one way system. I had also gone down to the reception about 12.30 to buy a cool drink from the drinks and snacks machine only to find that this was the one travel lodge in the land that did not have one. However still affected by the narrow escape of the car keys and tired I was in no mood to sit and work out my way home and finding that I had missed the turning to get to Lugely street I opted for another town centre park Chapel Street which I mistook for the double park of Drill Street just along from Lugely. I realised that on getting out of the car and I cannot remember how I managed to get myself directly to the Travel lodge as I was in no mood to go walkabout. Then I found that the my key card did not work but had to wait only a couple of minutes before having pressed the external call button I was let in and the card renewed for the remaining period of my stay.

The following morning I had to ask for directions to get to the Chapel Street car park and the first person approached took part of the way before going off in a separate direction. I then decided to buy a thank you card at Smiths, seen earlier on a previous orientation walk, and also draw out some cash from a bank machine in order to make a cash donation to the Lifeboat fund. I then could not immediately work out in which direction I should go and then a lady came out of her house so I asked her and she accompanied me to Smiths before going on, and I discovered that there are a number of tiny alleys and shortcuts familiar to the locals. We had a good chat along the way. By this time I was feeling good and that Someone Up There Like me. And then I placed my card in the cash machine, entered my code and the machine went off line taking my card with it. I had to wait for fifteen minutes while the machine was opened from the back and the card removed because until this happened it was important to keep watch in case it came back online and ejected the card. I found my way back to the car taking the same short cuts and in the car I was able to toot the individual as she returned to her home.

Yesterday I bought a copy of the County Press Island newspaper onboard the Wightlink ferry and came across their advertisement for the DVD with film and photos of Bembridge and the area from the 1940’s and 1950’s. Wow I cannot wait to get home and place an order, Somebody Up There Does Like me and Bembridge, Isle of Wight.