Milford-On-Sea

Joyce and Oliver always take me somewhere great for lunch when I go to visit them. This time it was the restaurant of a hotel that used to be the house of a gentleman. It was built in 1897, and still has the Art Nouveau stained glass windows the owner had put in because he didn't like curtains. We had lunch sitting in the rear window of the hotel watching activity on the sea - lots of motor boats, sailing boats and yachts, a dredger, a container ship and a small navy "rib" - an inflatable vessel from which instruments or divers might have been lowered under the waves.

From the nearby beach you can see the Isle of Wight. For my non-UK readers, this is a small island off the south coast of England. It is a popular holiday destination. Queen Victoria had a holiday home there, Osborne House, which is now open to the public. The island also has some places of geological interest, such as The Needles (just going out of view on the right of the picture - you can't get people to pose these days, animals are easier) which are the remains of a rocky outcrop that hs been eroded by the sea. Other visitor attractions are Blackgang Chine (a gorge that was transformed into a beautiful garden, but is now a theme park) and Alum Bay, famous for its multi-coloured sands.


Of course, even when the beach is shingle, like it is at Milford, the coastal resort where the hotel stands,I have to have a paddle for a few minutes if I am anywhere near it. There was this narrow strip of sand at the water's edge which was almost like quicksand, it was sucking my feet in. As the tide was on its way in, I suddenly got a shock as a wave hit my skirt which, like my mother used to do when she visited the seaside, was tucked in my knickers (panties).

When I go to visit Joyce and Oliver, I travel by train to Southampton, which is an important port. It's from there that the Titanic sailed in 1912, and many of the lost crew members were from the town.

Driving through the New Forest, we saw an large number of ponies either grazing on the heathland or wandering aimlessly by the roadside. There are even cattle roaming free. We passed a lot of beautiful thatched houses, but the road is busy and narrow, and we were unable to stop for me to film them.

By the way, don't be confused by my saying these houses were "in the forest" - there are whole towns and villages in there. It is not just a huge wooded expanse.

As you can see, by the afternoon the day was warm and sunny. When I got back to London, the ground was still wet, and even this morning the promised better weather has STILL not arrived.