Martin's Mag.

South of Bristol, east of Bath, Compton Dando feels like it’s miles from anywhere.

On the east of the river Severn, Aust beach is known for its rich store of fossils, a favourite place for palaeontology students from UWE to sneak off for a cigarette. It is at the east end of the “old” Severn bridge (the M48 mororway), although, before the bridge was built, a ferry ran from here to Beachley (on the other side of the estuary), Nowadays, the most famous thing about the ferry is that Bob Dylan was photographed here on the way to a gig in Cardiff in 1966 (spot the huge power pylon in the background).

Copyright Barry Feinstein Estate.

For those who feel their life experiences are still missing something there is now The Upside Down House next to the ferris wheel in central Bristol where you can, for a payment, pretend you are lying on the ceiling. What strange times we live in. They had something similar in Southend-on-Sea in the ‘fifties, called The Crooked House, in Peter Pan’s Playground – the origin of the popular childhood saying of the time, “what happens in Peter Pan’s Playground, stays in Peter Pan’s Playground”.

It had to be done. The stretch through Newport is not the loveliest part of the Welsh coast. Nor is much of it actually on the coast, as the path goes inland to avoid the commercial docks to the west of the river Usk. Although the centre of the city has many shops and historic buildings, the mood of this part of the Welsh Coast path is “seen better days”. Clearing up the litter would be a good start. Sorry Newport!

The big news in Newport (as we were informed on separate occasions) is that the famous Transporter Bridge https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newport_Transporter_Bridge (built in 1906) is soon to be re-opened.

After a visit to a rather tired-looking Exmouth in South Devon, we nipped along to nearby Budleigh Salterton.

Some members of the Bogs of Somerset Hash House Harriers, and friends.

Copyright Toni Mallin 2025.

We had a nostalgic walk around Brandon Hill and Hotwells, passing Miles’ old primary school.

We’ve had the ludicrous idea of walking the Welsh coast this year, so we thought we should make a start. Beginning near Chepstow, near the island of Beachley. We walked to, and under, the “Old” Severn Bridge (now demoted from the M4 to become the M48), taking pictures, not of nature but this graffiti in the tunnel below the motorway.

Then under the newer M4 bridge to Caldicot.

We diverted to visit The Magor Nature Reserve:

It’s important not to let her get a head start!

I worked, briefly, in this Bristol building over fifty years ago. It is at the junction of Bristol Bridge, Baldwin Street and High Street, at the corner of the pre-war and pre-Luftwaffe main shopping streets, now Castle Park. It was built in the nineteen sixties and surrounded a war-damaged saxon church (St Mary le Port). It housed several financial companies and the Bristol branch of the Bank of England, at a time when there was far more cash used in business. It is now empty, boarded up and, I expect, due for demolition. If there was a law which prohibited the demolition of any building until it was, say, three-hundred years old, we might take more trouble with the quality and design in the first place.

As it was: