After the massive storm last night, we decided to postpone the trip to Arundel Castle and Petworth House until next week. Next week is "Jousting Week" at the castle. "Tuesday 25 - Sunday 30 July, 2017 Under the shadow of the mighty Castle throughout the Castle grounds, experience the thrill of the renowned Arundel International Jousting Competition, as revered knights from around the world gather to test their chivalry and skill at mounted combat in full plate armour.

Set within an authentic medieval style encampment, with the knights and men-at-arms of Raven Tor, Story Teller and the musicians of Rough Musicke, this is a unique week-long tournament.

The thrilling tournament will be accompanied by have-a-go archery and a host of craft displays and entertainment; this really is the highlight of Arundel Castle's events calendar."

So that's next week sorted.

Today, Drew drove us to Chichester, Fishbourne Palace and Bosham. I guesstimate that there is a population of around 1.5m in the area around Southampton between Chichester in the east and Bournmouth in the west (say a 60km radius). I think most of them are on the roads between 7.00am and 7.00pm, so it's not much different from Sydney or Melbourne in that the motorways are packed and country roads slow as well.

We arrived in Chichester around 11.00 to find that it was market day. The two main streets that meet in the middle of town where there is an old Market Cross, were lined with stalls. The Market Cross was built in the late 1400's, supposedly for the "poor" people to have somewhere to sell their wares under cover. Given that it is probably no more that 10m in diameter, there can't have been too many "poor" people as it is barely large enough to accommodate two of today's market stalls.

We had barely made it 50m down the first street when Ches happened upon a cheese stall that was unattended. The French guy who owned it was off buying bottled water as it turned out. Ches and Drew went into raptures over the cheeses and French Custard Tarts. Eventually the guy returned and they entered into a conversation in French about which wines to drink with the cheese (Bordeaux). Brie de Meaux at about a tenth of the price she would pay in Sydney and instructed not to refrigerate or eat until tomorrow night. Boy is it ripening well!

Next stand was home-made Chilli Sauces and Chutneys/Jams. Some of that too please.

We wandered the streets for a while and then passed behind the Market Cross to the Cathedral. Work on the Cathedral began in 1091 and a 100m tall spire (14th Century), is the only Cathedral spire visible from sea in the UK. It was the main visual marker of the coast for ships sailing to Portsmouth and Southampton. Well, it was until the spire collapsed in 1861.

Thanks to Prof. Google:

The towers at Chichester have had a particularly unfortunate history because of subsidence, which explains the positioning of the 15th-century bell tower at some distance from the cathedral. The south-west tower of the façade collapsed in 1210 and was rebuilt. The north-west tower collapsed in 1635 and was not rebuilt until 1901. The masonry spire was built in the 14th century and was repaired in the 17th century by Sir Christopher Wren. It survived a lightning strike in 1721 and stood for 450 years before it telescoped in on itself on 21 February 1861, fortunately without loss of life. A fund was set up to raise the £48,000 needed for the rebuilding, and the contributors included Queen Victoria. A replica of the old tower and spire was rebuilt.

O.K., so we have established that the area is subject to subsidence … we will revisit this piece of news later.

We entered the Cathedral as a fine shower started and spent some time looking around. One of the women priests saw me looking at the roman mosaic through a glass floor in one of the side aisles and came over to talk. She recommended that we visit Fishbourne Palace, which we had already listed as our next destination, so we headed off.

In 1960, the owner was subdividing and selling his land as suburban lots. He arranged for the Portsmouth Water Company to lay a new water main across the field. By chance, an archaeologist who knew there had been roman finds in the area was observing and saw bits of mosaic being dug up. A dig was begun, with nothing particularly special found, when on the last day she begged the team leader to make one last exploratory trench. What do you know? A 2 foot wide trench revealed the first ever coloured mosaic. All others in the UK had been black and white.

To cut a long story short … which I find difficult, a local millionaire bought up the entire estate that hadn't already been sold and turned it over to the archaeologists. Today it is regarded as the finest Roman site in the UK.

And, this is where the subsidence issues raise their heads again. Much of the country around here had creeks and water courses all over the place. The Romans loved nothing better than to demonstrate to the local Celts (who worshipped nature), that they could dominate nature. The diverted water in and around the site of the settlement. Water was piped into the two large gardens in the middle of the complex to supply fountains and water the gardens, They diverted water around the outside of the complex. Well, they only dominated nature for so long.

Originally the settlement was established as a military supply base for the first invasion of Britain. Within years they had conquered much of the south and west and handed over the settlement to a local chieftain. I assume they provided the money and builders to set him up in a "Palace". And, what a palace. I'll include a photo of the model of the palace, however that still won't do it justice.

While they excavated the entire site, they recovered all of the wings except one; the one with most of the mosaics that were least damaged. This wing is all roofed over for protection. Drew and have made it to the end of the building when I commented "The Romans didn't do Ikea. They built substantial things meant to last for centuries". "Do you think so?" responded Drew. "That coloured mosaic was prepared in large sheets in Europe, and shipped here to be assembled. They didn't bother to take up the existing black and white mosaic, just lay it over the top the way a lazy tradie would lay tiles over existing tiles in your bathroom. They never really addressed the issue of subsidence as the floors sank"

Some centuries on, the buildings were converted from a palace into a "mall". Craftsmen and tradies set up business in the rooms and stored their stock. When two of the wings caught fire, the roofs collapsed. That put the fire out, however too much effort required to rebuild, so it was abandoned. In later years, most of the stone was removed to Chichester to build a defensive wall around the town. When conquered by the Saxons, it was given to the chiefs son, Cissa and named "Cissa" "ceaster". "Ceaster" being "roman fort"

Drew and Ches were footsore and wanted to head home as it was now around 4.00pm. I pleaded to go to Bosham which I assured them was only around 5km away and that they could stay in the car while I photographed the pastel painted cottages on the peninsular.

I was the one who had to drag them away 2 hours later, and Ches declared it one of the cutest village she had ever seen.

On approaching, there are many thatched cottages. Not small cottages but large ones on large blocks of land with extensive gardens. On the peninsular itself, there are the small cottages but only a few shops and pubs, and signs saying "Pop Up Hairdresser not available today"," Pop up Pizza here on Thursday", "Sword and Morris Dancers here on Wednesday" …. Hey, that's tonight.

The town features on the Bayeux Tapestry, with Harold and his men embarking here to invade Normandy where they were captured. This was also where King Canute supposedly tried to turn back the tide in the 12century. In the story, Canute demonstrates to his flattering courtiers that he had no control over the elements (the incoming tide), explaining that secular power is vain compared to the supreme power of God. The episode is frequently alluded to in contexts where the futility of "trying to stop the tide" of an inexorable event.

I thought he had been successful as the inlet beside the "village" had no water in it but a sign saying "This road floods each tide"

It was a slow crawl in traffic back home. Being 7.00, we were all too tired to cook, so we headed off to the Rockstone … a country pub in the heart of the city. D&K rate as the best burgers in Southampton and we're not likely to disagree.