Paddle Steamer

A quiet - or maybe lazy morning. We were very undecided about what to do. As we'd travelled directly from a nice restaurant yesterday, I had my better boots with me, so when PY suggested picking up a bit of the Red Squirrel trail from Wootton Bridge to Newport, I was sceptical as I didn't want to ruin my shoes in the mud. Nonetheless, we boarded the No. 9 bus, got off at the hotel and followed a path. Initially, it took a lot of work to locate the route where we should go as we had only a poor-quality map to guide us. But, eventually, we found the path.

It took around 90 minutes to complete the walk. There was an extra bit to add on at the end from the Island Harbour Marina - where the Spice Girls' bus (used in the movie) is now housed. We decided to take it, and it was the nicest part: running along the river and park. A reasonable portion of the walk, until that point, had been alongside a main road - although the bit that felt the most like following an old railway line was indeed muddy, and I was not happy about it.

There is a slowly rusting away old paddle steamer at the marina. We didn't see it the last time we were here. It's the PS Ryde, a paddle steamer run by Southern Railway to ferry passengers to the Isle of Wight from 1937 to 1969. It's clearly abandoned, but reading the signs, I see that there was a plan to restore it. Later, I read that the project had been abandoned in January 2019. Looking at the ship's state, it would have been a costly restoration.

Before the bus home, we stopped at Caffe Isola for coffee and a toasted sandwich.