Just over two months ago when this blog goes live, on 12th September 2025, we started our journey from Peterborough to Dresden, to begin our two-week holiday in Germany. With members of our travel party not being fond of flying or tunnels under water, our options of getting off the island of Great Britain were limited to ferries, however you should know by now that with me involved our plans wouldn’t be as simple as Dover to Calais. No, this trip to Germany was without a car, and as such we decided to make use of one of the UK’s few remaining rail and sail options by sailing onboard Stena Line’s Harwich to Hoek van Holland route.

Having enjoyed a day on the Isle of Wight exploring both the Island Line and the Isle of Wight Steam Railway, it was time to head back to the mainland. On my way to the island I had caught the Wightlink Catamaran from Portsmouth Harbour to Ryde Pier Head, and so for my journey back across the Solent it only seemed right to try out the competitor, Hovertravel. Whilst Wightlink’s Catamaran is pretty speedy, Hovertravel do one better, with their Solent crossings being operated by the UK’s only commercial Hovercraft.

A bit of a shorter post for the final one of the year, partly due to struggling to find time to write in a packed December schedule and partly as I’m sure you’ll all be busy with the festivities so won’t have much time to read my musings. Nonetheless, the show must go on and so this post is all about my journey onboard Wightlink back in August, as I travelled from Portsmouth Harbour across the Solent to Ryde Pier Head on (well just off) the Isle of Wight.

With our two weeks holiday pretty much at an end, the final day was met with an early start and a drive back across northern France. From our base in Normandy, it was about a four hour drive back to the Port of Calais, and with extra time for traffic and delays at border control, we set off about eight hours before our booked Ferry crossing.

Just a couple of weeks after we’d booked our tickets to and from France with P&O Ferries, the news broke of them sacking hundreds of workers and suspending all services, pending inspection from UK authorities. Unfortunately, with non-refundable tickets, we were stuck with our choice and watched with anger, frustration and concern as chaos once again struck the Port of Dover.

The Isle of Wight is the 12th largest island in the British Isles and sits off the south coast of Great Britain close to Southampton and Portsmouth. Isolated from the mainland and with no bridge or tunnel connection, there are six ferry links to connect the island with its neighbouring towns and cities. Three of these are standard vehicle ferries that connect Yarmouth, East Cowes and Fishbourne with Lymington, Southampton and Portsmouth respectively, however the other three are slightly more exciting.