Running - away!

To Chichester

We decided on a few days away to visit our son who is studying to become a teacher. He is living in Chichester and we were last there when I was expecting my daughter some thirty odd years ago and we thought it was a lovely area to visit again.

The Ship Hotel, Chichester

We booked into a boutique hotel in the centre of Chichester called 'The Ship Hotel'. It was a "grade II listed building blending a wealth of original Georgian features with modern day opulence". 

The writing was, literally, on the wall in our 'Uncle Vanya' room - apologies for the terrible puns. And despite being in town it was very quiet with surprisingly little traffic. 

A strange choice given the subject matter in Uncle Vanya by Chekov
 but the wall was papered with pages from a book of the play

Behind the hotel there was a small, but historically important, Priory Park which was enclosed on two sides by the City Wall.

The City Wall in Priory Park

Priory Park organises a 10k run and their next one is on Sunday 8 February 2015 - you can go here for details if you fancy timing a visit to Chichester to coincide with a race.

We spent the afternoon of our first day visiting the Cathedral and saw the famous Piper tapestry, the remains of a Roman pavement and the Arundel Tomb about which Larkin wrote his famous poem. The Cathedral has many other beautiful treasures and is well worth a visit.

The Arundel Tomb, Piper Tapestry
 and polyphony stone and beaten copper font by John Skelton 

We had a delicious meal that evening in a French Bistro called Côte and then went for a drink in the George and Dragon and I would them recommend both.

Côte restaurant (top) where we were given a delicious pear digestíf after our meal
The George & Dragon (bottom) which has a great ambiance

The rain had stopped on the morning of our second day and I decided to get out for a run. However, the cold which had returned over the last couple of days was persisting and I found I really needed to push myself to get out. 

I went into the little Priory Park and up by a ramp onto the City Wall. I followed it round the park then out across the road and up a flight of steps to rejoin it. I doubled back through the park again and then out and across the road. I followed the wall for a while until I felt it was time to turn back and ran along the path beneath the wall until I met some more steps and went back up to the wall again and returned to the hotel by the same route. I had warmed up and thoroughly enjoyed my outing.

I had a touch of sports watch withdrawal as I had forgotten to pack my Garmin but was wearing my new Vívofit so I was able to record my mileage.

We drove into Portsmouth and walked down to the seawall and saw lots of runners of all varieties! We looked at the War Memorial and had a short walk before returning to the car and going into Old Portsmouth to visit The Royal Navy National Museum. We took a tour of the harbour on a boat and learned all sorts of interesting things about the various vessels along the waterside. There we saw the latest Naval frigates looking very intimidating.

Some of the fun things to see on our trip

After the boat trip we went to visit The Victory and I cannot tell you just how much I admire Vice-Admiral Horatio Lord Nelson as a tactician,  a sailor and hero. It was very moving to find myself walking on the vessel on which he fought for this Country and was sadly killed. 

The Victory

We then went to see the remains of the Mary Rose and the many objects rescued from the seabed.

The remains of The Mary Rose and some of the items found on the sea bed

This museum was well organised and gave a real sense of life on board during the sixteenth century.

We had time for a quick bit of retail therapy at the Gunwhales outlet shopping centre (really good discounts on things you would actually find useful!) just by the Museums and then made our way back to the hotel for a well earned cup of tea in the lounge.

Later we had an excellent meal in Raymond Blanc's Brasserie Blanc in Chichester which, like the restaurant last night, had a very good ambiance.

Raymond Blanc's in Chichester

The next morning we met Toby for a coffee in Raymond Blanc's Tea Rooms where we all had delicious cakes and we left for home having had the perfect few days away.

An Easter Cupcake - oops it is Lent and not even a Sunday

If you are wondering about visiting Chichester or surrounding area then I hope this post has given you a hint of how very enjoyable a few days here would be.