Hilary's Adventure: Brighton

Today we had a day adventure to Brighton. We got up at about 8.30am to leave the house at about 9.15am for the walk to the station. We needed to be on a train going to London by 9.30am. We had to negotiate the ticket machine again. This is always a fun adventure. We worked out what tickets we wanted and hopped on the train. We needed to change at Clapham Junction, which was good because we didn’t need to go all the way into London. Even though Clapham is London it is one less stop we have to pass through. At Clapham we had to work out what platform we wanted. Lucky Clapham is well signposted and we found what platform we need easily. The wait for a train wasn’t long and on we hopped.

The train journey was uneventful. We saw more of the quaint English country side which was nice. When the train come rolling into Brighton we saw the houses on the hills and the ocean. It was very pretty and picturesque. Once off the train we wandered down the main street to the beach. There seemed to be a pub on every corner. I think people like to party in Brighton lol.

Once we got down to the beach we wandered along the top of the beach wall till we found stairs to wonder down to the ‘beach’. We got to the beach and started looking for the sand. People had warned us of the beach but the ‘sand’ as much bigger then what I expected. I knew it was pebbles, but these were river rocks! We had a walk along the beach till we hit the Brighton Pier. The Brighton pier is an icon of Brighton. It’s full of donut, ice cream and jewellery stalls before you hit the arcade area. None of the food looked that appealing so we just walked passed into the arcade. The arcade area is full of old and new machines all making pinging loud noises and all the lights on flash to dazzle and amaze.

After wondering the length of the pier we headed for the lanes and some lunch. We first had to find the lanes. It wasn’t too much trouble because there are maps everywhere. The only trouble is the streets are not clearly named. So after walking up the beach for a while we just picked a street and hope to find either another map or the lanes themselves. We found the lanes easily in the end. The lanes were fun to wonder around in. it was full of pubs restaurants and antique shops selling anything from jewellery to furniture. There were a few cloth shops too.

After having our fill of wondering round we found an Italian restaurant to have some lunch. It was quite good. It was nice to have a sit in the sun and just relax. We started off the day thinking we will need umbrellas and jackets but by lunch time it was clear blue skies and warmish, well jeans and t-shirt weather.

After lunch we headed for the Brighton pavilion. I had heard this was worth seeing but I had no idea what we were in for. We decided that if it was like £15 or something stupid like that then we are not going but it was less than £10 so in we went. So glad we went inside. It was spectacular and well worth the visit. Every room was spectacular and amazing. The banquet room was the crowning glory to the house. It had a chandelier handing from the ceiling that was 20feet long. It was a dragon flying from the centre of the roof holing the light. Furth down the light there where 8 more dragons which were holing up a lotus leaf lights from their mouth to look like they were breathing fire. It’s a pity they don’t let you take photos inside this building.

Next after the pavilion we went to the Brighton museum. It was free entry which was good. We both wondered round all the different exhibitions. They had exhibitions on everything from Egypt to furniture to the history of Brighton. It was worth a look but I was glad it was free. It was one of the most disorganised museums I have seen. It’s not in date order, it’s all laid out in different rooms with like grouped with like.

After the museum we went to have a look at one of the famous hotels on the Brighton foreshore. It’s called the Grand hotel. It was one of the last things on the street maps that looked slightly interesting. So off we wondered, once there we saw the outside and thought it looked tired and needed a lick of paint and a clean. We now decided it was time to head home.

On the way back to the train station we passed all the pubs that we saw before but now they were over flowing with people all yelling and chanting about the soccer game about to start. Each pub had at least 20 police officers on both sides of the road just watching and waiting. They also had the mounted police and dog squads out. It was pretty full on but relatively peaceful. We just passed it all on the opposite side of the road to the pub. I think the police was just there as a just in case. The soccer supporters are known to get very rough. Once past the police and drinkers we reached the Brighton train station and hopped on a train for home. The ride home was uneventful and we got back to the pub at about 8pm. We were both pretty tired after a day of walking so we had a quick dinner and headed to bed.