Carisbrooke

Up early (for me) and decided to stroll to Carisbrooke Castle. I walked up Castle Road to the mini roundabout, and instead of walking up Castle Hill as intended, I took my life in my hands and walked up Whitcombe Road instead. There are no pavements on this road, just brambly, nettley, thistly hedges and quite a lot of traffic coming in both directions. I kept leaping into the hedge and ended up nettle-stung and prickled. After a while I noticed a turning for Carisbrooke Cemetery; this can be seen from Newport as you look up the hill. As I had never been in there, and had meant to visit for some time, I took the opportunity. I'm so glad that I did.

The cemetery road winds uphill to a chapel, which is surrounded by ancient gravestones rising from wildflower meadows. The footpaths wind round and among the burial grounds, with the grounds becoming more clipped and tidied the further from the chapel you get, around the more modern stones. Here you find memorials adorned with plastic flowers, photographs, solar lights, football scarves and the occasional beer bottle, as well as war graves commemorating individuals who dies in the First World War. Benches line the top path, giving spectacular views across the north of the Island, with the sweep of the River Medina to the East, the Solent in the North, and the hills above Chillerton in the West. Newport and Carisbrooke lie below with the ancient tower of Carisbrooke Church, Newport Minster, and Carisbrooke Castle juxtaposed with the modern buildings of Christ the King and Carisbrooke Colleges.

From the cemetery I found a footpath crossroads that led to either Whitepit Lane, Nunnery Lane, or Whitcombe Road. I choose Nunnery Lane and plunged downhill along a dusty path between hedges before coming out on the quiet, narrow Nunnery Lane. Turning right here I passed a Catholic Retreat before coming to the junction with Whitcombe Road with Carisbrooke Priory on my left. Ahead of me lay Carisbrooke Castle. I crossed the road and followed the road round to the left, sticking to the verge where possible, turned right into Froglands Land, and shortly after turned right onto a footpath that led downhill across a field and into a tunnel between two hedges, before emerging at the bottom of a chalk path leading up to the embankment next to the castle moat. I turned left at the top and followed the moat round to the gatehouse and then took a left over a stile, following the path through a sheep paddock and into Millers Lane. 

I didn't really recognise this bit, so turned left and followed the lane past some lovely houses to the junction with Clatterford Shute. Here I turned right and walked along towards Clatterford Road, over the ford where Lukely Brook floods the lane. From Clatterford Road I headed back towards Carisbrooke, crossing straight over the road at the roundabout (had to wait a while for the traffic) and into Gunville Road. The next footpath was opposite Dave Death Motorcycles (great name!), and led past a large pond and down to Wellington Road past various schools. The path resumed on the other side of the road and I followed this back to Newport and a much longed for breakfast!

Distance: approx 6km

Cemetery Chapel

Brighstone 2019

Well, we were invited back to Brighstone to house - dog - and - cat sit and leapt at the chance. The weather started off cool and damp but we had some nice walks with the dog. Our first was from the National Trust car park at the top of Lynch Lane, up the downs as far as we could until the path started dipping back down towards Brooke. We turned back then as I had a nettle sting under the strap of my sandal. And there was a big hill to walk back up. During the afternoon we had to go to Newport, so we took the dog, let her scare off all the cats in my garden, then went to Carisbrooke Castle and walked twice around the moat, watching teenagers struggling to jump off walls. We didn't laugh, honest. In the evening we strolled  along Coombe Lane, up the green footpath and then back along another which was somewhat overgrown and nettley, and back to the cottage.

On Monday we drove to Chilton Chine and had a lovely walk along the beach throwing the ball for Rosie, as far as Grange Chine, and then strolled back in the driving drizzle picking up litter on the way. We got a reasonable amount. After lunch we left the dog at the cottage and went to Mottistone Manor gardens; I had never been before as I always got the day it opened wrong. The gardens were much larger than they appeared from the road, and had many well planted herbaceous borders and mature trees, with a particularly spectacular Mulberry tree. I hadn't seen one before, and it was covered in fruit. There was also a lovely specimen of a weeping lime tree, absolutely humming with bees in its canopy. We finished with a look at the plant stall (I bought one, oops), a cup of tea and a cake in the tea garden, and a look around the 'shack'; this was a wooden building raised on staddle stones and laid out rather like a boat cabin, with high level bunks, two large desks, a kitchen area and bathroom. It was used as an architects office by the owner in the 1930s. I want one! In the evening we went for another walk with the dog along Coombe Lane, up to the top of the down, across a sheep field and down a gully into a sunken lane and back into Moortown Lane in Brighstone, and then home. Lovely, except for the biting flies.

Tuesday was hot. After breakfast we took Rosie for a walk in the shade of Brighstone Forest, which was lovely and cool and had lots of interesting smells. We came to a crossroads and started walking on, but Rosie picked her ball up, turned around and trotted off in the direction we had come from so we gave up and followed her back to the car! One determined pooch!

The rest of the week followed a similar theme with walks on the downs and the beach. I did a lot of paddling. We had lunch one day at the Piano cafe in Freshwater (lovely open steak sandwich), and also went and explored Ventnor on the opening day of Ventnor Fringe festival. We had lunch at a little Italian restaurant on the seafront, then mooched around the town, ending with delicious ice creams from Crave, a visit to the book bus and a look at The Shed, which had an exhibition about Greenham Common, and sold handmade pottery.

We had a lovely week exploring the countryside and chilling out. We saw lots of fauna, including woodpeckers, coal tits, red squirrels, lots of butterflies, dragonflies, newts, toads, pigeons, herring gulls, buzzards, kestrels, and water boatmen to name a few. This truly is a magical Island.

Sundown at Chilton Chine