Visiting Brighton

One of our first daytrips (our first by car) was to the south coast of the UK. We went to the Brighton Pier.

I've been here before, but I still love it! It is deliciously cheesy and touristy. It is the kind of thing you'd think a native Floridian would avoid like the plague, but I love it. The pier has dodgy food stalls selling fried doughnuts, fried burgers, fried potatoes, fried sugar… if you can fry it and put it on a stick, it is there. They also have extremely overpriced carnival rides, overpriced souvenirs, and overpriced drinks. All of which we wasted our money on.

We drove to the pier (the weather foreboding and drizzly all the way to Hove) and arrived to an afternoon with broken skies and interesting lighting effects on the water. Once there, we lucked into what could almost be called "Rock Star Parking!" We were in the first lot and not a long walk from the actual pier.

My first target at the pier: The Crazy Mouse! I love this roller coaster. The other roller coaster is nice, but The Crazy Mouse is still my favorite.

After a few rides, a few drinks, a few hours looking around, we decided to quit the pier and start a ride cross-country up the coast to the town of battle (where the battle of Hastings - 1066) was fought. We got there, unfortunately, too late in the evening to actually do anything or see anything while we were there, but there it is. After a drink at The Pilgrim, whose sign looks amazingly like the card The Fool from the Ryder Tarot deck, we headed off to Bodiam Castle.

This also being closed, we crossed a style into an adjoining pasture, walked up a stream for a while and took some pictures before heading back to Thames Ditton. (The pictures from Bodiam Castle are a bit dark, but I have a pretty good camera. On a cheaper camera, I would have gotten nothing.)

We didn't get to do everything we wanted to yesterday, but hut hopefully we got enough in that everyone had as good a time as I did. Today, we are off to the west. Oh, and yes! It’s raining even though the weather prediction was for the rain to end some time last night!

Wherever you are today, I hope you're having a great day and doing all the important things on your agenda!

Don Bergquist - 22 August 2007 - Thames Ditton, Surrey, UK