Walking. Gossip. Travel.

Tag: Isle of Wight

  • Cheverton Copse Holiday Park in Isle of Wight

    Cheverton Copse Holiday Park in Isle of Wight

    Cheverton Copse Holiday Park

    Address: Scotchells Brook Lane, Lake, Isle Of Wight

    Local Council: Isle of Wight

    I haven’t yet visited this pub, but maybe sometime soon….. When I do, this text will disappear and my ‘fascinating’ comments about the pub will appear instead.

    For the moment, here’s my list of Good Beer Guide pubs visited. And for anyone interested, which I accept isn’t likely to be many people, my favourite pub so far is the Hop and Vine in Hull. Untappd is a handy place to see where I’ve been recently (and feel free to add me, the more the merrier).

    I also don’t have an interview with anyone from this pub, but if they want to take part then please do contact me. It’ll also be an effort to update this database with pub closures and updates, but I’ll change the details of anywhere that I’m contacted about. I’m updating on a regular basis new pubs and also removing venues which are clearly more restaurants than pubs. And the pub that I’m saddest about closing is Goose Island in London which shut its doors in late 2022…..

    This project is I accept entirely unachievable, namely trying to visit not only every Good Beer Guide pub in the country but having a fair crack of trying to visit as many pubs as I can. But, I have to start somewhere and here is where we’re starting. The image in the photo is from the Phantom Brewery Tap in Reading.

  • Chillerton \& Gatcombe Community Association (Reading Room) in Isle of Wight

    Chillerton \& Gatcombe Community Association (Reading Room) in Isle of Wight

    Chillerton \& Gatcombe Community Association (Reading Room)

    Address: Chillerton Reading Room, Main Road, Chillerton, Newport

    Local Council: Isle of Wight

    I haven’t yet visited this pub, but maybe sometime soon….. When I do, this text will disappear and my ‘fascinating’ comments about the pub will appear instead.

    For the moment, here’s my list of Good Beer Guide pubs visited. And for anyone interested, which I accept isn’t likely to be many people, my favourite pub so far is the Hop and Vine in Hull. Untappd is a handy place to see where I’ve been recently (and feel free to add me, the more the merrier).

    I also don’t have an interview with anyone from this pub, but if they want to take part then please do contact me. It’ll also be an effort to update this database with pub closures and updates, but I’ll change the details of anywhere that I’m contacted about. I’m updating on a regular basis new pubs and also removing venues which are clearly more restaurants than pubs. And the pub that I’m saddest about closing is Goose Island in London which shut its doors in late 2022…..

    This project is I accept entirely unachievable, namely trying to visit not only every Good Beer Guide pub in the country but having a fair crack of trying to visit as many pubs as I can. But, I have to start somewhere and here is where we’re starting. The image in the photo is from the Phantom Brewery Tap in Reading.

  • Isle of Wight Trip – Day 4 (Old St. Helen’s Church on the Duver)

    This was an interesting sight, the old St. Helen’s Church of which now only the tower remains. There has been a church here since the early eighth century, although the original wooden building was destroyed during a Danish raid in 998.

    The new stone church was built in the early twelfth century and the tower was added in the thirteenth century. The church was used by the Benedictines, but it started to fall out of use in the early fifteenth century and well before the Dissolution of the Monasteries.

    The church came into the ownership of Eton College in 1440 and they owned it until 1799, but they didn’t bother to maintain it. This meant that chunks of it fell down and the locals pinched the stone. Other pieces of the stone, namely the sandstone, were taken by sailors who used the holy stones to scour and whiten the decks.

    After a while of the stones being pinched the decision was made to demolish what was left, other than the tower. The tower was instead painted white, which it remains today, by the British Navy in 1719 and used as a navigational aid. A new church was built inland in the eighteenth century and was also given the dedication of St. Helen’s.

    Today the church remains bricked up and the entrances are sealed with iron grilles to prevent any access. It’s easily noticeable along the coastline and at least the tower has remained for future generations.

     

  • Isle of Wight Trip – Day 6 (Tram Line on Ryde Pier)

    There are three parallel structures which run to the end of Ryde Pier, one takes the railway, another takes the road and pedestrian walkway and the final one is the remains of the old tram line. Some of the tram line structure was demolished when the service fell out of use, although it has been used as a temporary walkway when the main walkway needed to be restored.

    The tramway, as indicated above, ran along the pier from 29 August 1864 until 26 January 1969. Initially the tram was powered by horses, then steam and then finally it was transferred to an electric system. The tram was designed to maximise capacity and there was a driver’s carriage at only one end, meaning it had to be reversed back along the line.

    Although one of the tram carriages was kept after the service ended, the storage conditions were poor and it’s in quite a state. The island’s steam railway has a project to bring the carriage back into use, but as they note, the carriage was designed to maximise capacity and not comfort, making it a problem for today’s health and safety requirements.

    Although the tram carriage itself is likely to be brought back into use once it’s restored, there are no plans to reinstate the former track along the pier. The condition of this is poor and I can only begin to imagine how much it would cost to bring it back into use. However, at least there is a train service in operation, so there remains a public transport option on what must be one of the few trains to operate along a pier in Europe.

  • Isle of Wight Trip – Day 4 (More Photos)

    More photos from day 4 of the Isle of Wight adventure.

  • Isle of Wight Trip – Day 5 (More Photos)

    And photos from day five of our walking expedition around the Isle of Wight.

  • Isle of Wight Trip – Day 6 (More Photos)

    And some more photos from day six of our walking around the Isle of Wight adventure.

  • Isle of Wight Trip – Day 6 (Cowes Floating Bridge)

    I don’t think that I’ve been on a chain ferry before, even though there is apparently one at Reedham. This service runs between East Cowes and West Cowes, with the journey time being just a couple of minutes.

    The information board showing the current list of charges to cross the River Medina on the ferry. There’s a ticket machine to buy tickets, although there’s also a ticket inspector who can sell tickets and they accept cash or cards. There’s no option to buy just a single ticket, as they’re sold as returns.

    The ferry after all of the cars and pedestrians had crossed. We got on at this point to travel from East Cowes to West Cowes. There was a rowing boat service offered between the two towns from the early eighteenth century until 1859, when a steamboat service was introduced.

    The current chain ferry is the sixth one to ply the waters, with the fifth one being withdrawn from service in January 2017 after forty years of service. The new ferry operates from around 05:00 until just after 00:00 and it carries around 1.5 million pedestrians per year and around 400,000 vehicles.

    Looking at a newspaper article from 1930 there were 1.4 million pedestrian crossings, so the number of people needing to use the service hasn’t changed. As there are no other crossings over the River Medina, the alternative is to go down via Newport, which adds around thirty minutes to a car journey.

    There’s a pedestrian area on two levels as well as the facility to carry twenty cars. There’s some seating available, although since the journey is so short, there are no other facilities.

    The ferry landing in West Cowes. We took this ferry as part of our coastal walk around the Isle of Wight, so it presented an interesting and intriguing way to end our walk back into West Cowes from where we had started.

  • Isle of Wight Trip – Day 6 (Statistics)

    This was the third Hike Norfolk long distance walking challenge, the first was in Hadrian’s Wall in 2017 and the second was the Ridgeway in 2018. The Isle of Wight Coastal path was shorter at 65 miles and the terrain was flatter, but we did do extra distances due to walking to hotels, restaurants and the occasional historical walking tour…..

    Due to the slight ridiculously habit some of us have of not using any baggage transfer services, I’ve always recorded whether they were supported or unsupported completions of the path. Not that it matters, the main thing is getting round the path or just enjoying the taking part   🙂   There are never any last places in long distance walking (well there are, but not on these trips).

    UNSUPPORTED COMPLETIONS

    Gordon, Bev, Susanna, Julian and Liam

    SUPPORTED COMPLETIONS OR PART DISTANCES

    Susan, Clive, Ross, Richard, Katherine

  • Isle of Wight Trip – Day 6 (Final Awards)

    Although for the first time in ages we didn’t get round to actually having a formal announcement of these during the walk itself, these were the awards that were made. Congratulations to the award winners from this trip   🙂

     

    BRAVEST MALE OF THE WEEK OTHER THAN JULIAN

    Clive

    BRAVEST FEMALE OF THE WEEK

    Susanna

    BRAVEST PERSON OF THE WEEK OTHER THAN JULIAN

    Clive

    BEST IMPRESSION OF THE WEEK

    Gordon

    BEST LOCAL KNOWLEDGE OF THE ISLE OF WIGHT

    Katherine

    MOST EXPENSIVE FERRY CROSSING OF THE WEEK

    Richard

    PERSON WHO HAS LEFT THE MOST STUFF IN HOTEL ROOMS

    Ross

    BEST TROUSERS OF THE WEEK

    Gordon

    BEST SUPPORT TEAM OF THE WEEK

    Katherine’s Parents