Mosaics, old boats and daleks
It was a bit dull this morning, with rain forecast for later in the day (after all that lovely sunshine yesterday as well) so we decided to do touristy in-the-rain activities today. The grand plan was to go to the sculpture park, which C said was really worth visiting, and for which I had picked up a leaflet in the pub yesterday. There was a bit of a discussion about how things were often closed on Mondays out-of-season, so we checked the leaflet carefully before leaving... Drove there past some amazing houses, living here could really, really give you house-envy, then round the back of Goodwood, to the sculpture park. Which is closed on Mondays.
After some inter-car discussion, we headed back to Fishbourne Palace, which is open every day. I've wanted to visit here for ages, ever since Tam at the boys' archaeology club (years ago) told me that it was the only Roman site in the UK worth going to. It was definitely worth the visit - much bigger than I expected, the actual palace would have been huge by todays standards, let alone then. Although thinking about some of the houses we passed earlier, perhaps not that big by Sussex standards! I think I had visualised the mosaics as fragments rather than whole floors, so seeing the size they were was almost a shock.
Cutesocks and his parents had to leave before us - I suspect he didn't think much of Roman floors, although he liked running up and down the viewing platforms. As soon as he hits primary school age he'll probably have masses of school trips here, certainly there were schoolkids of all ages visiting today.
We went to Portsmouth this afternoon, as it had changed from merely dull weather to active drizzling - just us, as Cutesocks needed to sleep and his dad needed to work. We had a bit of a wander around the historic dockyards, gazed in awe at Victory, and took photos. Looked in vain for a pirate hat for Hairy.
And then, we absolutely had to go and look at the aliens exhibition at the Spinnaker Tower.Actually, Handsome and I had no intention of looking at the aliens exhibition, and had in fact given Mouse the money to go in himself, but they wouldn't let him. Apparently he had to be accompanied by an adult, in case the dalek got him.
There was a fantastic view from the top, even if it was obscured by Ewoks...
Mouse and myself found ourselves with a small shopping opportunity afterwards - Portsmouth has a handsome outlet shopping centre with a Ripcurl shop for Mouse (hoodie without hood and t shirt) and a White Stuff for me (trousers and rather nice reduced-twice-last-one-in-shop jacket). There was a Bose shop for Handsome too (browsing only allowed).
