Thursday - PT2 Hurst Castle

We eventually got to Hurst Castle at about lunch time.

The castle is on a spit of land in the Solent channel. This basically means that there is a sort of island shaped bit of land connected to the mainland by a line of shingle, sand and stone. The Spit creates a sheltered bay from the onslaught of the sea in the English Channel and ultimately the Atlantic.

The weather, being a rather typically British coastal type of weather, was gray and windy – but, it actually wasn’t really that cold and to our great relief it wasn’t raining.

We had picked up a sandwich on route and when we parked the car in one of those car parks that you get in coastal towns and we sat facing the sea, watching the waves and gray clouds and ate our what my mum would call a picnic (although it bore very little resemblance to anything I would call a picnic). We both agreed that we felt about 80 years old sitting there. It was the type of thing you always see the “older generation” do. Sitting in the car, watching the greyness and drinking dish water coloured tea from a Thurmos flask in a tartan pattern which you could only buy in the late 70’s – as if having, and indeed using, something that old is a way of trying to stubbornly defy the advancing years.

Looking around….. we had one of those sort of, Victor Meldrew moments “I don’t beeeelieve it!” there it was, a Crawley Luxury coach – ohhh GOD, is there no escape from home!? Wondering who, or what, we would bump into we left the relative comfort and safety of the car for our 1.5 mile walk along the shingle/stones to Hurst Castle.

The wind felt as though it was going at about 1 million miles an hour, but of course it wasn’t. Having said that, both of us was almost deaf by the time reached even the 1/3 point because of the wind. 1.5 miles really isn’t that far, until you’ve walked it on soft shingle/stones. Bearing in mind that we had pretty much walked a minimum of 3 miles almost every day on holiday, this should have been a walk in the park – I have NEVER been so grateful to see a castle drawbridge in all my life! I imagine that on a nice day it was probably quite nice, however on our gray and miserable day it was just damn hard work. But, lets try and be positive, it wasn’t raining!?

Wohhha! the castle was much bigger than I had thought. It was first built and used by Henry VIII as one of his many South Coast defences, and then it was used, pretty much throughout time and extended for WW1 and then again for WWII.

Getting there was basically a bit of a relief. Right, first things first, where’s the café? We neeeeed a hot coffee! Paying our entrance (even though we are members of English Herritage, I forgot the passes – another bone of contention), we made our way to the Naffi (or Café). Understandably it wasn’t exactly packed with people, until that is, a group of Private School teenage girls arrived with their posh accents and permanent giggles – we tried to make a hasty exit before the entire place was stampeded.

The castle was great. We chose to look around the WWI and WWII parts first, and saw cannons that were tested in Malta for their power before moving them to Hurst and “active” service. There was lots to see and a lot of the rooms were open to explore. Going into one room, and looking around we found ourselves joined by a couple of the “lar de dar” bunch. Both giggling, one of the girls said to Rob “you should look up into that hole there….. its sooooo dark….”Rob of course did what she said, and then told her what it would have been used for – “its for moving ammunition from a safe room to where it can be used – it’s a lift shaft”. She actually looked quite surprised (huh, can’t have that good schooling then!?). They giggled and left the room. We also left, walking around to the next room.

Rob, walked to the corner – low and behold, there was an identical looking hole here too! (you can see where this is going can’t you?). Hearing more giggling, but this time emanating from the hole in the wall, the mischievous came out in the both of us…… Rob signalled to me to be quiet, and both of us looked to the floor. As if something had read our minds, there it was a small, but perfectly formed stone….. Rob picked it up and threw it down the shaft in the wall….. Ha ha! Have that – hope you don’t watch Most Haunted!? There was a scream and a “ohhh my God, what was that!?”, and then more giggling and a lot of hasty footsteps. Rob and I walked away, as if from a scene of a crime, trying to look innocent and trying to hide the smug satisfaction we both had.

Honestly, we are over the age of 10! Although, maybe there is a good reason for being asked for ID when buying Neuophen……