Although I’m fairly sure that the top 3 ‘things not to do when blinded by conjunctivitis’ doesn’t include a cycling tour of the Isle of Wight, it much be fairly well up there on the list.
So guess what I did over the bank holiday weekend!
My Dad and I decided a couple of weeks ago that it’d be a nice idea, and since Sarah wanted to partake in a weekend community action event at her friend’s church, it seemed like the ideal opportunity.
We set off at 8am and cycled to the ferry port, bought our tickets and boarded the 9am ferry from Southampton to East Cowes. The ferry was heaving with people since the 8am ferry had been cancelled. We arrived in cowes at around 10:15 due to the delay caused by squeezing as many cars on board as possible. The good thing about taking bikes on board is that you use the vehicle entry/exit ramps and are first on and off the boat.
Both my Dad and I agreed that the journey was at least 70% uphill. Quite how that works I don’t know… But I swear it’s true. We cycled the main road from Cowes to Newport which meant that the first section was a long hill to climb. The positive of course was that we then had to go down the other side, and rather more quickly too. this stretch of road provided our maximum speed of the journey – 35mph.
When we got to Newport we locked up the bikes and sat down for a nice peaceful drink and snack outside a patisserie in the town centre.
A few minutes passed and then we heard BOOM CRASH BOOM CRASH BOOM…etc. It was evidently carnival day. from around the corner emerged A dragon followed by a big drum, a cymbal, and every child on the Island.
There were some really well made costumes and props
After the procession passed us for the second time, we headed out of the town, passing the council’s carnivals officer on the way out who was speaking to the crowd using a megaphone. Presumably she was explaining to the crowd why she had chosen a Chinese themed carnival when as far as the eye was concerned, there wasn’t a single Chinese person on the Island.
After checking our map reading was correct at a garage (due to the lack of road signs – the local policy to confuse any escapees from Parkhurst Prison) we got out into the countryside and the proper cycling started. From Newport we headed west along Forest Road and then North on Whitehouse Road towards the coastal path.
We made much better progress than we had expected so we took a detour to Porchfield where we had a lovely pub lunch at the Sportsman’s Rest. 
It was time for my next installment of antibiotics in the eye
Once the stinging subsided, I enjoyed relaxing in the sun with a cold coke
We headed North, and caught our first view of the coast since leaving the ferry port about 4 hours earlier.
Now we turned off road and crossed fields and footpaths to join up with the coastal path, which proved less than cycle friendly, but boy was it worth it for the scenery!
About a mile along the coast, the path had been closed due to erosion. This forced us inland and back onto the road which we followed to the waters edge the other side of the offending cliff. We stopped for a breather at Egypt Point, where we found this small lighthouse.
We we’re curious about the name as it didn’t seem much of a point, and there were no pyramids locally. After wondering for a while, we found a plaque that told us how the gypsies had moved in when the light was built, so it became known as Gypsy point, which was corrupted into Egypt point. Slightly disappointing and a rather odd corruption we thought.
Having failed to break into the lighthouse out of sheer curiosity, we went in search of an ice cream vendor. About 500 yards later we found one.
It was now time for the last leg of the journey which took us into West Cowes. As we arrived, so the ferry left from the other side of the river. We weren’t bothered about having to wait for the next one, so we took pictures of this one.
Throughout the whole journey so far, there had been a recurring topic of conversation. There was always a chance that the chain ferry from west-east Cowes was out of action. Neither of us had checked. There were no bridges, so if it wasn’t running we’d have to cycle all the way back down to Newport to cross the river and come back up.
Thankfully the Chain ferry was fine. I use the term fine very loosely here, as I have an inkling this boat may have been employed during the Omaha beach raid in 1942. Judge for yourself.
The ferry home was virtually empty, and since it had warmed up a lot, we elected to sit on top deck on the lee side. By now the water was teeming with activity.
Our journey home crossed paths with both the Arcadia
and the current second largest ship in the world, the Navigator of the seas
as well as one or two other interesting boats.
As we arrived back home, the trip meter was just short of 27 miles. Not a Mammoth journey, granted, but plenty for us and we had a really good day.
To see all the pictures, visit my flickr.com account.
I got plenty of sleep that night.
