I want to be bee-side the sea-side

Google is our best friend. Not knowing anything about the Isle of Wight, a quick search revealed that it is a favourite holiday destination and easy to get to.

So, for a change, we took the train. From home to London Waterloo (1 hour), then a South-West train to Portsmouth (2 hours), then a FastCat ferry from Portsmouth to Ryde on the IoW (18 minutes), then a train from Ryde to Sandown (20 minutes) where we had a B&B booking.

It was a lovely journey.

The transfers were smooth, no hassles, no delays, no stress of driving on the motorway at the break of dawn. It's expensive, what with all those tickets, but I still think it made a better experience than the motorway.

Once at Sandown, we walked toward the beach to find our B&B. Sandown is on a bit of a slope - no escaping hills in England - and we were grateful to find a friendly postman who dropped us to the doorstep of the hotel. Once there, we rang the bell and waited. And waited. Then waited some more. Did they forget we were coming?

Tired and a little bit irritated (check in was 2 pm, it was now 1:45), we went next door to the little restaurant with the intention of having a meal. With the rotten luck that was starting to stick to us like sand, they had closed for lunch and were laying the tables for a school dinner party later that night. Like school-boys on hearing the bell, we beat a retreat and lugged our luggage downhill to the High Street, where (thank God) there was a Chinese place open. After a hearty meal (the only other customers were a noisy Keralite family) we called the B&B and were glad to find the owners home. They were out stocking up on groceries, apparently ("We have to go out when we can make the time.")

Grumbling under our breath, we were shown to our room, which was nice, but smaller than what I'd expected.

Anyway, you could see the sea - although it was just a patch above the neighbours rooftop.

A weekend by the sea-side. Surely life couldn't get more exciting?