we are standing at the hole-in-the-wall ATM of HSBC_ in newport: among the many icons advertizing all of its bank, debit, credit and what-have-you cards is the maestro logo, which is the one i need…our b&b unfortunately accepts payment only in cash or by cheque. the word “cheque” — or rather “check” because the swiss are rather US-phil — is useful in a swiss bank only if business is lull and staff are happy to reminisce about the old times (like years ago) but not if you want to obtain a means of payment (well, actually, the do some sort of check issuing, but that seems to involve a lot of poking around in their computer terminals, quite a number of sighs, a lot of head shaking, some more head shaking, and finally the “advice” that they could issue a “bank check” for the small sum of CHF 50.00…well, wow, i mean — that’s a real bargain! so, having passed on this bargain i need to find an ATM that will let me withdraw the necessary funds to pay our landlady. the HSBC has lots of little logos on it and among them is the maestro one — unfortunately, after two attempts, one at each of the hole-in-the-wall ATMs, we come to the conclusion that they must have had a look at their competition, must have seen that those ATMs all had those “little pictures” on it, and must have had decided that their ATMs needed those “little pictures” as well without really grasping that those little pictures mean something: after happily accepting my card(s), my PIN code(s) both machine mull it over, do a bit of slurping, and then inform me that they can’t do anything with my card(s)…by this time i’m lucky that they don’t decided to keep it, retrieve it, and try the next bank…i’m happy to report that we finally strike gold, well, money, at nat west: they not only have the right logos on their kit but also know what these logos mean.
after this bit of ATM-slot-machine-gambling we do some purchases at millets…acquire an interesting sounding book with the title most haunted island at ottakars, stock up on water at safeway, and are finally on our way to: osborne house
osborne house, queen victoria’s and prince albert’s favourite residence is a favourite of ours for two reasons: one, english heritage keeps improving osborne house year after year, and, two, it’s chock full of little details that we end up discovering new things every visit…one thing i found fascinating on our first visit years ago, is the fact that the royal families of europe all seem to be interconnected via the queen victoria and prince albert. the german imperor kaiser wilhelm II was a direct descendent of queen victoria: he was her grandson (one could say that world war I was kind of a family fight on a rather larger, bitter, and acrimonious scale).
new this time is the nicely located restaurant with views across the park and the solent.
dinner is back at the crown inn in shorwell.
