General Chat

Well I live 5 minutes from the M1 & the M25 & I wouldn't swap for the world - well unless someone gave me loads of money :-)

Ah goo-on! M1 ? I could be seeing my litle grandaughter in Notts in no time if I lived near it!

the M1 is quite a long road - it will take you a while to get to Notts from here

Must be quicker than getting that b****y ferry all the time - then having to drive up the M3, A35, M4, A43 and THEN the M1!

Ohh Allie and I wanted to live in Godsill;; still have to win lottery 1st;; Babs

Babs You would NOT want to live in Godshill if you knew what it was really like! It's awful in the summer - jammed with traffic and rubber-necks LOL

Allie is blackgang chine still there and still all done up;; Its years since I was there with a load of blind peep;; I had them into everything so they could feel/see things got some funny looks and had few rows that w/e babs

Hi Babs Yes it's still there (though bits keep falling off of it into the sea!) Years since we've been, but looking forward to the day we can take our little grandaughter there (though don't want her to grow up too quick). Sounds a bit risky taking blind people there - what with all the cliffs etc! Allie x

I live in West Cornwall, near St Ives and I work in St Ives 3 days a week. I am utterly demented with the sheer volume of cars and people. St Ives wasnt built for cars but the powers that be do nothing to stop cars going through the centre. Their cunning plan to reduce the volume of traffic has been to put up car park charges. As 90% of the car drivers are visitors, they don't know what the charge will be till they get there! St Ives is now filled with shops which are open for a maximum of 16 weeks a year - they make a quick buck and then clear off back to wherever they came from - nowhere in Cornwall, that's for sure. Most of the Tourists are on camp sites or all-inclusive hotel deals and bring their groceries with them or do their shopping in the nearby Tesco, adding very little to the economy of the town.Tesco hand out overtime to their staff who only have 16 hour contracts to cover the quiet time in the winter - so the visitors don't make jobs there, either. My three daughters have all left Cornwall for decent jobs elsewhere - they were all fed up of waitressing and chambermaiding, which is the only employment here.Winter unemployment is about 40% and we have the highest percentage of self employed people in Britain, all barely scratching a living. The Tate Gallery is widely trumpeted as being a major 'earner' in the town (mostly by the Tate Gallery, LOL) but how on earth do you judge if visitors to the Tate spend any money in the town, or just get right back on the coach and head out again. But I love this place, I LOVE it in the winter when its quiet and I wouldnt ever want to live anywhere else now. OC

Hi OC The thing is - I LOVE the summer and it's a shame to wish it away so we can have a bit of peace. The IW is still busy however in winter now - traffic jams - used to take OH 25 mins max. to get to work - now can take anything up to an hour no matter what time of year it is. Road works on the Island take four times as long as anywhere else, so temporary lights and road closures are always with us! It's such a shame when our youngsters have to move away to get decent work. With no Higher Education over here, the brightest ones leave and never really come back. I don't think families moving over from the mainland realise this. Allie x

I think you were lucky Gillian!!!! Several neighbours of my friend in Watergate Road (Newport) had their houses robbed while they were out in the garden! Also, friends of ours have been threatened in their own home by some young thugs. Police were called but didn't charge them, instead charged our friends with assault for trying to eject them! They didn't even do anything when these kids threatened ( in front of the cops) to come back later and sort them out ! It's not as idyllic as we would like to think! (Don't have nightmares!) Allie x

My husband holidayed on the IOW every year when he was little and we have been three times since we married. We usually stay near Shanklin and that side of the island but last time we ended up in Colwell Bay and it was really creepy at night. We were in a chalet and the noises outside, not from anybody you could see, were so scary my son wanted to go to a B & B!! We still like visiting but feel bad now that we are making it uncomfortable for people who live there.

Hi Elsy - sorry - I've only just found your reply! Please don't feel bad about coming over! It's just that they have been encouraging too many people to come here over the past few years by bringing in HUGE ferries and putting hundreds of caravans on sites that only had about a hundred before. - the Island is just too small and the roads are too awful to take the numbers. I know other places are having these problems, but they seem to be worse in such a confined area such as the Isle of Wight. It is a lovely place (mostly!) but feel that encouraging too many people to come here will eventually lead to ''killing the golden egg'' of it's beauty. Allie x