Not a great night's sleep last night. In bed and asleep by 9.45 however they were doing roadwork on the street out front till around 4.00 am. Unbelievable, D&K's street is a suburban one with only enough room for a car to travel in either direction. No on street parking. The intersection 150m down the street can take around 3 or 4 minutes to turn green and often you have to wait for the second change of lights to get through. Gotta be the worst intersection in the world.

Coming home from dinner last night, the intersection was closed as they had already started on the roadworks. From 9.45 pm till 4.00 am, there were trucks pouring asphalt and at 2.00 am a woman walking up and down outside calling our "Please someone help me" also other dialogue however all we could comprehend was "Please help me", "Help me please". Finally one of the truck drivers spoke with her. No idea what that was about. I gave up at 5.15 and got up to write my blog.

We set off for Bournemouth, Poole and Christchurch at 10.15. On our way, decided to go as far as Poole and work our way back toward home. There is great rivalry between the two towns, with Poole claiming to be the superior. All we knew about Poole and Bournemouth had come from several UK reality TV programmes …. really. As Drew said "Romeo & Juliet". Husband from Poole and wants to buy a family home there. Wife from Bournemouth and just wants a nice family home they can afford anywhere." Every house he sees he says "Great, but it's not in Poole". Get the idea? On a similar programme, Ches had seen a "fantastic castle on an island off Poole". That was it.

Tom had no problems navigating all day. Ches overrode him twice and she was wrong both times. By the end of the day I ignored Ches's directions and followed Tom's.

Poole appeared to have fine housing and shopping streets, however we only passed through on our way to the harbour. I consulted Wikipedia and it says "The Isle of Purbeck is surrounded by water on three sides". It forms the southern shore of the harbour and it is where the castle is located. Keep pondering the concept of an island that is actually connected to the mainland in the west.

We have only come here to see the castle. Ches said that on TV it had looked spectacular, so we had to see it. We drove along the waterfront and discovered that wind sailors were taking advantage of a spectacular wind to fly across the harbour. Well, some were. Others were coming unstuck at great speed. Around 30 people, mainly women, were kitted out in full wetsuits and in and around two rubber pontoons were conducting a bonding session in the shallows.

We stopped to watch all the activity and then drove out to the end of the peninsular to see if we could see the castle on the island. All we saw were very expensive houses and in a small shopping strip, one of Rick Steins restaurants. We parked again and using my telephoto lens, I located the castle. I now know it is Brownsea Castle, or historically Branksea Castle, and built by Henry VIII between 1545 and 1547 to protect against the French. He took the French threat as seriously as the All Blacks took the British and Irish Lions threat. As the TV ad said, 3.5 million against 60 million … that seem fair. Henry garrisoned the castle with 6 soldiers, the locals and 8 cannons. That's all you need against the French.

Extended over the years, the National Trust restored it in the 60's and now lease it to the John Lewis Partnership who use it as a hotel for their staff and retired employees. The best I could do was photograph from a distance.

Driving back around the harbour, we were struck by the quality of the blocks of four and five story apartments which we're pretty sure are largely holiday lets. Kinda low rise Noosa with the long sand beach facing the English Channel.

We drove back around inland to Bournemouth. Down to the sea through low rise Gold Coast. The summer school holidays don't start till tomorrow, so despite the car parks being full, not a lot of people on the beach on either side of the pier. With the wind up, the flying fox from the end of the pier to the beach wasn't operating and while some kids played on the sand and in the water, most of the adults were rugged up behind portable wind breaks. We waked along the promenade, had a New Forest Icecream (excellent), and within the hour, decided it wasn't really our scene. Off to Christchurch.

When I had announced that morning that we were going to Christchurch of the Avon River, Keith had commented "How unoriginal, they have a Christchurch on the Avon River as well". His father lives in Christchurch NZ.

This was our sort of village, and we spent several hours wandering the paths beside the creeks and rivers as well as several of the main streets. Did I realy write that, "creeks" ... make that "streams". I'll get it right sooner or later.

Unlike most if not all tourists, we parked in the town admin. centres car park, which was well off the beaten track. We found the tourist car parks as we wandered around the original town landmarks. The rivers Stour and Avon meet around 2km from the sea, they then run as one for a km before forming a largish harbour. The major sites are the Priory, Mill and Norman House & castle ruins. These are between the two rivers as they merge and the town itself further inland, immediately behind the Priory.

We walked beside a creek around the Priory toward the confluence of the rivers where there was the old Mill, moorings for hundreds of yachts and a café. Big mistake here. Instead of waiting to have lunch in the old town, we found a table out of the wind beside the café and had a very ordinary lunch. Cornish Pasty signs have been up everywhere we go, so I had to give one a try. While there were identifiable vegetable pieces encased in the pastry, not much in the way of flavour. The milk shake was actually a glass of room temperature milk with some choc. syrup and a dollop of soft serve icecream. Ches's Dorset Pate (course ground pork) only just OK.

Still, the setting was very relaxing beside the Place Mill. Wikipedia says: "It's a Grade II* listed Anglo-Saxon watermill located a short distance to the south of the Priory on Christchurch Quay. It is mentioned in the Doomsday Book and features a mediaeval stone base underneath red brickwork the mill belonged to the Priory but stopped working in 1908 and stood derelict until purchased by the council and restored in 1981. It is unique in that it takes water from one river the Avon and spills it into a second river the Stour. Amazing, a 1,000 year old flour mill and it still functions. I've got a feeling however that it might be like the 1,000 year old axe that has had five handles and three heads over the years.

I'll save you all the full guided tour, and resist the temptation to post Wikipedia details. Gotta say however that I absolutely loved seeing my first "Motte-and-Bailey" castle and a Priory that survived Henry VIII pillaging of the churches. I can't resist however:

I've been using the pen name "Galgano" for the last 15 years. Italian for Gavin, he was a knight who renounced warfare and drove his sword into a rock. The sword is still there, in the rock, on a hilltop just out of Siena. They have recently tested the iron of the sword and verified it is of the vintage claimed in the legend. There is no scientific explanation as to how the sword could have been, or even could now be driven into the rock.

Similarly, the legend of the miraculous beam in the Priory church dates to the early 12th century. The story is that a beam was found to have been cut too short when it was hoisted into place. This would have been embarrassing for the carpenters since the wood was expensive and would be difficult to replace. There was however a mysterious carpenter who had worked and eaten alone. The following day the carpenters returned and found a beam was now fitted in place. A new beam that hadn't been on the site the night before. The unknown carpenter was never seen again, and the story came to be that it was Jesus Christ who had intervened. The church became Christ's Church of Twynham in commemoration of the event. In time the town became Twynham-Christchurch and eventually shortened to Christchurch. The miraculous beam can be seen today and is located in the Priory's ambulatory.

The other two things we found amazing in the church were that almost every flagstone in this vast church is in fact a tombstone. So many people buried below the flooring, you couldn't avoid stepping on them. The other was that the choir stalls were carved timber and older that Westminster Abbey.

In order to avoid peak hour traffic in Southampton we headed home at 3.30.