Until yesterday I hadn't been to Havant.
But I can no longer say I haven't been to Havant.
Because I have.
Havant is a large town in southeast Hampshire on the way to Portsmouth.
If you only get as far as West Sussex you Havant gone far enough.
They Havant got many old buildings because most of the town burnt in a fire in 1760. Only the church and a row of cottages survived.
The church is St Faith's and they found Roman remains in the foundations. It's very central. The cottages are now a pub called The Old House At Home. They say a wooden post in the pub was once used to tether England's last dancing bear, but they Havant provided any evidence.
Havant is one of those rare towns with a crossroads where North Street meets East Street meets South Street meets West Street. West has the best shops, North has the big Waitrose, and South and East Havant got much.
The Meridian shopping centre is on two floors. Head upstairs for school uniforms and second hand Warhammer figures. Stay downstairs for bagged sweets and the street piano. Galvanize by the Chemical Brothers was playing in the gents toilets and I Havant experienced that before.
The bus station was opened by a local councillor in 2006. They Havant got any leaflets.
Havant has some of the best chalk karst springs in the UK. One bubbles up into a small pool just south of the church. The water was so pure that a parchment-making business operated alongside for many centuries. The Treaty of Versailles was signed on Havant parchment! But they Havant made any since 1936 and the mill's now flats.
As a tourist, the best place to go in Havant is the Museum inside The Spring Arts and Heritage Centre. They have the actual Wedgwood nursery rhyme tiles from the children's ward at Havant War Memorial Hospital. I also learned that Havant is famous for making many famous things. Scalextric! (1956-1970) Kenwood mixers! (1962-1999) Tampax! (1959-2004) They have a Kenwood mixer room and a Tampax dispenser but they Havant got a full Scalextric circuit.
To pick up a Havant Heritage Trail leaflet, look in the research room at the back of the museum. Each of the 34 locations around town has an elliptical blue plaque, but many of them have faded away because they Havant thought about long term legibility.
Havant boasts the UK's longest running community radio station which is Angel Radio. They've been playing music from the 1920s to the 1960s since the 1990s. They broadcast on FM, DAB and normally online, but at the moment they Havant got a website due to technical issues. Today's programmes include Simon's Sounds Of The 40s, Willie McIntyre Turns Back The Clock and Angel At Night With Eileen.
Havant's quite ordinary - not too posh, not too rundown. My favourite story confirming the town's ordinariness is that when residents were asked to vote on a new name for the Civic Centre in 2011, the winner with sixteen thousand votes was Public Service Plaza. I Havant got a photo of that, sorry.
