Bexhill-on-Sea, England

My final destination of this part of the trip was Hastings but since the recreation of the Battle of Hastings was on, the nearest room I could get was in Bexhill-on-Sea, another...wait for it....English seaside town. How many can there be in 1 country?

I wouldn't recommend the B and B I stayed at (Bexhill B and B) only because it was not close to downtown. It was a good 30 minute walk, although this eventually led me to discover a great pub, called The Bull Inn. It was a decent 10 minute walk also but I met the nicest people there, including the bartender who was obsessed with American football and was actually a barrister in London during the week.

The best way to describe Bexhill is that it's a Victorian bathing spot. It definitely seemed dated. Since I was staying 2 nights, I hung out a lot at the strip mall down the street from my hotel. I love checking out grocery stores in foreign cities and there was a Tesco I spent alot of time at.

Bournemouth, Dorset, England

Heading back to the East Coast I decided to stay the night in Bournemouth which is (another) English sea side tourist destination. I stayed at the Hermitage Hotel which really did have the perfect location but was difficult to locate at first. It was across from the pier and very close to the center of town. Bournemouth is interesting in that they built a huge central park in the center of town (obviously not as big as NYC's) and it had several cafe's, a balloon ride for the kids and places just to hang out and relax.

Since the beach is the biggest draw and I was there in October, I mostly just walked around. It seemed like a nice place to live if not a little boring. Supposedly there is major night life but since I'm not 21 anymore and I was single this didn't really interest me (nor did listening to bad Brit Techno).

Iwalked the pier both at night and before breakfast. It really is nice but nothing to write home about. It was kind of weird seeing some homeless teenagers living under the boardwalk in the morning. One thing I thought was interesting were the beach huts. I had read about these old in English novels but they are a series of little huts you can rent by the hour/day. You use them to change into your bathing suit I guess but I peeked in the windows and they all had mini stoves with tea pots in order to make tea. How British. Not my preferred choice of beverage at the beach....