Going Over the Water

The Gosport Ferry occupies a special place in people's lives. Day in, day out, it calmly plies back and forth across Portsmouth Harbour, and though the ferries themselves may have changed over the years - from steam-boats with open decks, where passengers were exposed to the elements, to the comfortable diesel craft of today with their heated saloons - they are still the source of familiar stories, handed down through the generations. In this fascinating book, you will read dozens of those stories, contributed by people from Gosport, Portsmouth and further afield. Of the ferry that got lost in the fog, of the man who misjudged the leap from the pontoon and ended up in the water, of the pile of bicycles on the bow, of the Dockyard matey who met the girl of his dreams on board, of getting a stiletto heel stuck between the boards of the pontoon, of seeing down into the engine-room below, and even of the dog that travelled on the first ferry every morning - on his own - to go to Portsmouth Meat Market for a bone. Many recall the 'Floating Bridge' too, with its clanking chains, and although no-one is alive today who remembers the days of the 'wherrymen' who used to row customers across the Harbour, their names and their legacy live on.