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It’s cold and rainy so it must be England…  We had grand plans of taking the ferry to the Isle of Wight and visiting the Brading Roman Villa “one of the finest Roman sites in the UK. It’s Visitor Centre and Museum offer unique insights into Roman life in Britain from beautifully preserved mosaic floors to an extensive collection of Roman archaeology. It’s a great day out rain or shine.”  Nonetheless, it sounded complicated so we decided to stick with the included bus tour.  I’d still like to visit sometime—I realize we’ve never been to the Isle of Wight, and we like archeological sites.

But I maligned England.  Low and behold by lunchtime the sun had come out, and it wasn’t too cold—though it was windy, and I could actually wear the warmish jacket I brought on our tour.  There seemed little rhyme or reason to the places we stopped—not where I wanted to take pictures—but it was pleasant enough.  At the top of the ridge, we had a great distance view of the port and the channel. 

Portsmouth is unusual for Britain in that it is an island city, and there certainly are many bays making a very lacy landscape.  It is the home of the Royal Navy and the port at which the D-Day invasion was planned and executed so we saw where Eisenhower was headquartered, received his intelligence, and made his decision.  There is a D-Day Museum that is supposed to be excellent, but we didn’t visit it.

One of the fortification castles Henry VIII built in the 15^th century to guard against the French is here, and we saw it from the outside.  In the 19^th century fortifications were again built to defend against the French including on the ridge behind the town so an army couldn’t land somewhere else and come by land; other small fortifications were built in and along the harbor—small circular stone buildings attached to the sea floor, some are now hotels or venues to rent for a wedding or conference.  Portsmouth was so important because the Navy was here.

The Spinaker Tower is a recent monument on the renovated harbor to commemorate the millennium; since a major corporate sponsor was Emirates Airlines it is officially renamed the Emirates Spinaker Tower.  The design is to evoke sails billowing in the wind (and we had a lot of wind)  and has an observation platform on top.

We were docked at the pier of the ferries to France and right next to a Brittany ferry.  The ferries’ bows open up like a big mouth and vehicles exit on two levels—interesting to watch.

Since I have a Mini Cooper, I’ve been noticing Minis wherever we are.  Interestingly (to me anyway) I’ve seen some in almost every port—not Senegal and maybe not another but almost all.  Not surprisingly, I saw more Minis in Portsmouth than I had in any other port.

We sat in the Explorers Lounge—high up and in the bow—to watch the ship sail out and around the Isle of Wight.  Later we actually attended the evening performance which was our Cruise Director Heather Clancy singing with the Viking Band to back her.  She really is an extraordinarily gifted and versatile singer from opera to country western to anything you can name.