This is Hurst Castle, a coastal fort that was built in the time of King Henry VIII, extended and used in the Napoleonic Wars and further modified and in use during WWII. Unfortunately part of the castle is currently closed to visitors due to the fact that one of the sea walls has collapsed due to high seas and the effect of erosion. Work is under way to repair the damage.
It is amazing to think that this has been a working fort for almost 500 years.
This was my second visit to Hurst Castle. The first time I went was about 18 years ago. I had been camping in the New Forest with my young family, we parked up in Keyhaven and rather than take the ferry to the castle I thought it would be a good idea to walk along the shingle spit to make the most of the views across the Solent. I hadn't realised it was a 3 mile walk and although that isn't too far really the fact that it was on shingle made it really hard work. Also as we approached the castle the sky turned a very dark grey and I was dreading the walk back in case it rained. As the visit to the castle continued I heard a rumbling sound and rushed to the top of one of the towers to watch a Spitfire fly past. That was such an exciting and memorable moment but shortly afterwards the rumbling changed and rather than the sound of the Rolls Royce Merlin engine it was the rumble of thunder which was followed by the heaviest downpour.
Luckily the ferry back to Keyhaven arrived in time to rescue us and return us to the harbour and the carpark so we didn't get too wet.
This time round it was just my youngest son and I, we were also on a camping holiday and while I remembered the previous visit quite vividly my son was less sure. Nevertheless he wanted to take the ferry both ways so that's what we did. It was nice to go back and at one point I observed two spitfires flying over the Isle of Wight and then as we were boarding the ferry for the return trip we were treated to a flypast by a two seat spitfire which really topped off the day.
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