Chichester International
Daytrip to Portsmouth
After a week of hard study it is always good to have an alternative activity for the weekend besides studying (or partying), to refresh your mind and relax, so you can be ready for the upcoming week.
As it is hard to find time in the week to go anywhere other than Chichester centre or Tesco superstore it is good to take a trip to some other city to have a little change in the everyday environment.
Last Saturday I decided to see Portsmouth, as I have already visited Brighton and Bognor Regis. You can go there by bus or by train. Since I went there by bus I do not know much about the train, but I would say that an hour of the bus ride by double-decker is an experience in itself. The bus goes through smaller towns and suburbs before it arrives in Portsmouth Centre. The price for a round-trip ticket was less than 8 pounds.
To say whether the shopping, dining and sightseeing facilities in Portsmouth were good or bad highly depends on the person who is evaluating them.
As shopping would be one of the last things I would do when visiting a new town, and only due to urgent need, then I think I would be totally the wrong person to give any rating to shopping in Portsmouth. Just by looking at the selection of stores and brands in the city centre or Gunwharf Quays shopping district I would say you can find something there for every taste.
Gunwharf Quays is a shopping district by the sea with shops, bowling, cinema and a wide selection of restaurants. Since the prices to eat out are still rather high for a student (like me), you can also grab your lunch from Tesco, and enjoy your meal with a view of the sea and boats. But watch out for the seagulls, who they say are very arrogant and will snap your food from your fingers. When you are visiting Gunwharf, I recommend visiting the Spinnaker Tower, which offers a magnificent view over Portsmouth and to the sea. Last Saturday, there was also an exhibition of police machinery, so the operators work hard to keep life interesting in the Quays.
The only things that I didn’t see in Portsmouth were the little bakeries and cafes that offer locally, hand-made cakes and pastry and a high quality coffee. When it comes to cafes, I could only see Costa or Starbucks. Yeah, you can get your caffeine shot from there also but I don’t like to stay there longer than it takes me to finish my coffee. It could be my personal abnormality, but I’m not the big fan of those chain cafes.
Apart from the missing cafes, Portsmouth was actually a very positive surprise for me, as I have heard from most of the people who have been to Portsmouth and Brighton saying that Brighton is definitely much more worth visiting than Portsmouth. I visited Brighton the week before, and I did not see there very much to do or see. Therefore I was very suspicious going to Portsmouth.
So if you have a free day in the weekend I would recommend taking the tour to see this seaport town in the west and it would be interesting to hear your opinion about Portsmouth as a leisure destination.
Kristofer ☺