Ryde

We didn't spend a lot of time in Ryde this year, but enough to find that the rock shop (the geological sort not the edible sort) in the little tower along Garden Walk had shut and that the second hand bookshop at the top of town was still open. We completely failed to find out what the imposing building illustrated was: for some reason I had thought it was the yacht club, perhaps because of the flagpole and its fine views across the Solent, but now I think that maybe it was an assembly room of some sort, dating from Ryde's glory days. Presently looks to be struggling to find a sensible use and is partly shut up.

And glory days there certainly were to judge by the impressive mixture of old buildings down both sides of Union Street and some of which looked to pre-date the arrival of Queen Victoria at nearby Osborne. One of which was, I think, the oldest shopping arcade still used for shopping in the land. Whole lot probably listed and probably a complete pain from maintenance and retail points of view - but Union Street taken as a whole was alive and reasonably well.

We managed three eatings there.

French Frank's (http://www.frenchfranks.co.uk/), at the top of Union Street did us tea and teacakes. Cheap and pleasantly served, but not the highest grade of teacake, being a little light on fruit and flavour.

Olivo's (http://www.olivorestaurant.co.uk/) half way down. Nice high ceilinged space, light and airy. Nice Polish waitress who boasted a boyfriend from Switzerland whom she had met when on holiday back in Poland. Their language of romance was English. Food vaguely Mediterranean but I only remember what we had for main course; in my case a seafood spaghetti, entirely adequate, and for BH a sea bream served entire, curled round a little to fit on the plate, dorsal fin up. It looked quite spectacular and tasted good too - the claim being that it had only been landed at Old Portsmouth fish dock that morning. Bottle of something white and Italian to wash it down. A good meal, finishing nicely in time to catch the train home from Ryde Esplanade.

Michelangelo's (http://www.ristorantemichelangelo.co.uk/) at the bottom. The corner dining room we used was not as big or as high at that at Olivo's, but comfortable just the same and comfortably busy despite the early hour - around 1800. Genuine Italian with Italian staff rather than vaguely Mediterranean. Mixed meat with bread followed in my case with a pizza, thin and rather good, but which needed to be eaten reasonably briskly as it cooled down reasonably briskly. Bottle of gavi di gavi followed by a snorter of Marsala (the stuff which did for the Duke of Clarence. See '1066 and all that'; page 48 in the Folio edition) from Sicily to go with my almond cake. Nice to have an Italian restaurant which could manage a dessert which was not heavily into either cream or chocolate, neither of which agrees with me very well these days. Another good meal, once again finishing nicely in time to catch the train home from Ryde Esplanade.

The railway line from Ryde Pier Head to Shanklin was very handy for us staying in Brading and a lot quicker and more convenient for eating out in the evening than using the car. And the rolling stock taken from the Waterloo & City Line still had real mahogany trim. Pleasantly old fashioned feel about the whole operation, despite being operated by the same South West Trains which serves Epsom. The station at Brading, for example, boasts antique green shutters to all the windows and waxworks of antique passengers (as featured on the BBC).

In closing, I offer an engaging factoid from Volume I of Hurford's two volume work on language in light of evolution: it seems that you can train pigeons to distinguish the paintings of Monet from those of Picasso. Along the way they lump Cézanne and Renoir with Monet, Braque and Matisse with Picasso. Perhaps the RA should add such a pigeon to its hanging juries.