The Dark Horse

There used to be a public house - really a foodie house which also sold beer - in the middle of Brading called the Dark Horse. A place which we rather liked. But it fell, to be replaced in due course. And the replacement or replacements fell in their turn, with the result that the place has been empty for some years, looking increasingly derelict from the road.

With the first snap being taken through the gates to be seen in the second, above. The scaffolding did not look active to me.

A story which epitomises the difficulty the very old town of Brading is having adjusting to the loss of its role as a stopover for coaches serving Sandown, a busy seaside resort a little to the south until the invention of the package holiday.

[with thanks to the Ordnance Survey. The orange spot mark the approximate location of our holiday cottage]

First thought is that they need a by-pass, but the second thought is who is going to pay for it and where are you going to put it, with Brading being on the edge of the downs, perched above the marshes, once Brading harbour, now the province of the RSPB. A trick which BH's Exminster pulled off, perhaps fuelled by its proximity to the busy regional capital, that is to say Exeter. A village which now thrives to the extent of having both a primary school and a small Tesco's. Contrariwise, the railway running past Exminster is a rather more serious affair than the one running past Brading - which is nowhere near wide enough to convert into a by-pass. Which the heritage people would probably fret about anyway.

PS: there is a lot of heritage in Brading, some of it very old indeed.

References

Reference 1: https://pumpkinstrokemarrow.blogspot.com/2010/07/round-up-on-holiday-grub.html. From near fifteen years ago.

Reference 2: https://psmv3.blogspot.com/2016/08/firestone-copse.html. The replacement.

Reference 3: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2024/07/yaverland.html. Near the end, the view from the road last year. It was also early days with the PayByPhone car parking app: much more confident with it now.