VentnorBlog and Island News

If the Blog has been a bit backward recently, it's not that I have been. On the contrary, I have been busier than ever, supplying a daily piece -- on anything and everything -- to Simon and Sal Perry of the Isle of Wight's award-winning Ventnor Blog and Island News.
No music, no theatre, no horses ... here are my 'reportages' of the last couple of days!

AN AFTERNOON IN FAIRYLAND AT LAS VEGAS-SUR-SOLENT

I said, in my first ‘musings’ on VB, that I was going to have to investigate Niton’s ‘The Enchanted Manor’ and discover just why TripAdvisor rated it Number One amongst the Island’s B&Bs.
Well, I have.
And I have, because owners and hosts extraordinary, Ric and Maggie, were kind enough to invite me, today, to a Mad Hatter’s Afternoon Tea Party at their fairyland palace.



Where do I start?
The name. I told you, the name kind of gave me the chilly willies. But I was wrong. The name is utterly and totally apt.
The rating? Get this out of the way. The Enchanted Manor may provide beds … four-posters with beautiful caramel hangings… and it may serve breakfast ... in a most glamorous and pleasing verandah … but it is quite simply not what you and I understand as a ‘B&B’. Know what I mean?
TripAdvisor has got to stop comparing such as this with Mary’s 20 quid a night tidy sleepover.





The Enchanted Manor is, quite simply an ‘event’. It is a deliciously over-the-top Las Vegas fairyland, glittering with more special effects than I have ever seen. Nymphs in the garden, sylphs in the bedroom ... .tulle and glitter simply everywhere!
Europeans .. save the fare to the US of A … anything and everything Vegas can offer you is (I imagine, for I’ve never been to Vegas) right here!



All right, I will admit, I’m not a newly-wed (I live in hope) and I won’t be having anymore ‘anniversaries’, and I hugely love my beautiful all-white ‘monastic’ room up on the Downs. So The Enchanted Manor is never going to be my Wightish ‘home’. But if you want a Fairytale weekend, a few days in Wonderland, with or without Alice, but with every seen-on-TV luxury you can think of, Ric and Maggie will, I am sure, make you as happy as all those five-star contented customers who have made them Number One B&B (what!?) on the imponderable Trip Advisor.