Hayling Island lies just off the south coast near the mouth of the Solent, just east of Portsmouth. It's England's 7th largest offshore island and 5th most populous, some way behind Wight and Portsea respectively, both of which are nextdoor. It nestles between the tidal fingers of Langstone Harbour and Chichester Harbour and is sometime described as having the shape of an upturned T (although if you have a decent imagination you could do a lot better). It's both a retro holiday destination and a retirement backwater, and unless you've got a boat there's only one way in or out, which is where I'll begin. [Visit Hayling Island][map][map][13 photos]
The first bridge to Hayling Island was built in 1824, prior to which travellers took their chances crossing a tidal causeway called the Wadeway. A railway branch line followed suit 40 years later, though both bridges had serious weight restrictions and tended to close in bad weather. It took until 1956 for a proper concrete road bridge to be built, after which Dr Beeching axed the railway because the cost of bridge repairs was entirely uneconomical. The railway has since become a popular walking/cycle route - the Hayling Billy Trail - and curves a mile south from Havant to the harbour and then a further 3 miles down the main body of the island. I walked that way after my visit to the museum, an easy stroll, but was very glad I deviated across two fields beyond the A27 because I stumbled upon this gorgeous jigsaw-box panorama.
This is the small harbourside village of Langstone, Havant's quaintest corner, where quirky buildings meet the lapping waters of watersports nirvana. The most obviously photogenic building is the black tower of a former windmill, its exterior tarred as protection against sea winds and with a rare tidemill alongside. A little further up the one-sided High Street is the Royal Oak, a dreamy pub with views of kayakers and passing yachts, then a teensy walk-innable chapel with boards of historical photos. The conservation area also includes Langstone Towers, an odd domed building which in its time has been a military hospital, Nevil Shute's aeronautical works and a pre-Scalextric factory. A teetery path hugs the harbourside to an even more popular pub, The Ship Inn, where I watched four blokes unload a very homemade raft from a trailer and head out onto the mirrored water. I suspect a lot of people get no closer to Hayling Island than this.
The railway crossing may be gone, bar a chain of wooden foundations across the harbour, but the two breakwaters remain fully accessible. The northern arm curves out beside an artificial creek to a low chalky drop where the bridge once launched. Here I disturbed two fish-seekers, one an angler with two rods hanging over the former wharfside, the other a startled heron. The southern arm is higher and properly surfaced, thus providing a useful midstream jumping-off point for locals with inflatable dinghies, canoes or whatever. Since 2015 it's also supported a restored semaphore signal, thankfully set to Stop. These days it's a good 20 minute walk from one tip to the other, this across the low-slung stilted road bridge, from the deserted tollhouse on the mainland to the applegreen garage on the island.
On the island's northwest coast is Creek Point, now the Hayling Billy Nature Reserve. Step through the hedge to find yourself on the lip of a dishevelled sequence of manmade lagoons formed from reclaimed mud flats. In the 19th century these were used as overwintering oyster beds, from which 700 tonnes of oysters were exported by train to Whitstable every summer to complete their growth spurt there. Although the bund walls are long collapsed the site has been successfully transformed into a breeding and roosting site for multiple seabirds. From the shore I watched a swirling black flock in collective ballet above the creeks, then turned my eyes to the silhouette of Portsmouth on the far bank of the harbour, so that's two reasons to bring binoculars. Refreshments are provided at Hayling Billy Bites, a foodvan parked on the former site of North Hayling halt, offering ice creams or bacon rolls depending on the season.
The Hayling Billy Trail continues alluringly down the west side of the island, heading towards what's now a community theatre in a goods shed at the terminus. I instead broke off here to see something of the centre of the island, a patchwork of fields through which a single main road delivers all the beachbound traffic via a chain of tiny hamlets and car-park-friendly pubs. I decided against visiting the only Grade I listed building on the island, 12th century St Peter'schurch, because it was too far away along dubious footpaths and might well have been locked when I got there. Instead I waited for a southbound bus amid a cluster of rough and ready postwar bungalows, just as the two residents of the turquoise house opposite returned home after getting married! Their driver whipped out a bottle of champagne from her boot before positioning the happy couple beside the pink-ribboned limo for a celebratory photo, then let them head inside while she lit up a cigarette. It's not all holidays on Hayling.
The number 30 bus relocated me to the far corner of the island so I could walk its full four mile width from east to west. The beach here faces across the mouth of Chichester Harbour to the glorious sandy spit at West Wittering, which looked much more rammed with sunseekers than the handful of us here on the Hampshire side. The foreshore at Eastoke Point is liberally scattered with granite rock groynes in an attempt to prevent flooding, backed up by a high shingle beach because nobody's taking any chances. The council thoughtfully preserved 45 acres of heath and dunes at Sandy Point, these kept permanently human-free, but beyond that it's streets of holiday lets and dream retirement homes all the way. Those facing the shingle along Southdown Road each have their own set of steps through the flood defence, some with saltproof gardens decorated with questionable statuary, others with sun terraces where pugs snooze while their owners redden on bloated loungers.
Eventually the houses step back so that Hayling Island's beachfront road can slot in, although 'Sea Front' never gets too close to the shingle, leaving a broad scrappy stripe as a recreational barrier. Into this nomansland slips the Hayling Seaside Railway, a mile-long 2ft narrow gauge line operated by a merry cabal of local retirees. It kicks off opposite a shuttered cafe whose painted menu I considered a Wimpyesque work of art, and continues via a halt at the foot of the road where the island keeps its proper shops. The western terminus is at Beachlands, site of Hayling's former Butlins, where pie and mash and fish and chips coalesce with slot machines, pirate golf and the family-friendly Funland amusement park. Its most obvious attraction is the runaway mine train rollercoaster which zigzags above the shingle, but numerous other rides have been shipped in from minor theme parks elsewhere, and please remember Shirts Must Be Worn At All Times.
A lot of the seafront beyond Beachlands is given over to parking, at least in summer, like a sponge to soak up the stream of traffic pouring down from the mainland. There used to be even more beyond the lone beachside pub but the sea swiped it two winters back, the coastline retreating closer to the pitch and putt as the council controversially prioritises defences elsewhere. I'd like to have roamed that way past the dunes at Gunner Point, but realised I had no time because I needed to make a beeline for the ferry at the island's western tip. That meant passing the WW2 Heavy Anti-aircraft gunsite at Sinah Common, now a scheduled monument, and also the former holiday camp at Sinah Warren where BestMate used to be dragged most summers, now a slightly more upmarket hotel. The main road to West Beach is over a mile long, intermittently pavementless and has zero inbound public transport connections, so I was impressed to find the Pride of Hayling packed with passengers.
A lot of them were cyclists, the ferry being small but optimised for bikes. The fare for crossing to Portsea Island is £3.50 and they don't come round to collect it, they expect you head inside the cabin and reach up with cash or card. With departures only every 45 minutes many choose to wait instead in the adjacent Ferry Boat Inn, a watering hole as packed at the weekend as the beach below, as if this is a far as many daytrippers from Portsmouth get. The crossing is a mildly exhilarating chug across the mouth of Langstone Harbour, the fruits of watersport all around, although it doesn't take long and our first passengers were disembarking less than three minutes after casting off. Bus connections on the Portsea side are much better organised, but I skipped that for the chance to walk east to west across a second island, i.e. four more miles to the mouth of Portsmouth Harbour. Hayling's a lot lot quieter, I can tell you.
