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The walk towards the end of the rainbow.
Mr.. Mojo's Rising said the writing on the wall of the column holding the bridge under the rainbow.
Hard Cottage 1870 said the name on the wall of the brick house located between the nature reserve and the petrol station.
Soft mud and barbed wire was what we eventually found at the end of the rainbow!
To get there;
We had had to cross fields, navigate tidal rivers, face lion dogs, greet container ships sailing to distant shores and peer closely at oyster catchers and other amazing creatures.
We had had to stride speedily past silvery slithery stinking refineries with their imposing smoke hazed metallic shapes adding an ugly distorted beauty to the texture of the landscape.
We had had to crush thousands of shells on the long crunchy beach path. Big, small, deformed and dead shells, trying to overcome their emptiness by nestling one in another, and another, like a Russian conch babushka.
The Rainbow, which appeared after lunch, was not a gastronomically induced vision but was as real as all the other sky apparitions that had materlised throughout our day.
This Rainbow was as real as the island rain cloud that had followed us from Netley, pouring its liquid on us, an on us alone, as clouds invariably do in cartoon animations.
The Rainbow was as real as the airship - or Zeppelin as they say in both German and English - that had floated over us at Eastleigh, maybe to mark the start of our walk.
It was as real as the other cloud that we saw. near the end of the walk, whose mushroom shape sent shivering post-nuclear images into our minds.
Name and shame people had said immediately after lunch!
Name those who do not finish the walk and shame them!
Name those who do not reach the end of the Rainbow!
So towards the Rainbow we had to go -
Out of the pub, across the bridge, past the fish shop is now open and selling fresh fish sign. Over the marina under the watch of the still and silent powerboats, all-new and expensive, showing off their opulence in an understated and quite way.
Turning right, the profile of the old and arching iron bridge provided a mat metallic mirror image to the Rainbow that was hovering close to it.
The Brixedone Farm wreckage crammed full of crushed scrap was yet another rickety metallic ruin, very near the edge of the rainbow, but not exactly it.
As we were nearing the end, as we were almost touching the rainbow, we came to an expanse of dry sea full of crippled boats on stilts.
A bearded Captain Bird's Eye emerged suddenly from behind a big sailing boat that was suspended in mid air, as though trying to fly. Bird's Eye did not even notice us, but proceeded to disappear furtively into a tiny Robin Reliant, lodged right under the starboard of the flying yatcht.
It was as though man, vessel and vehicle had, in their aviary quests, all ceased to be what they had been originally created to be. But unlike the Rainbow, none of them could actually touch the sky, so we had to carry on because that was were we were heading.
It was then that we glimpsed the silhouette of a lonely fisherman contemplating the calm sea, sitting silently below the third bridge - the motorway cement bridge groaning with four lane dual carriage traffic.
That was also where we saw Mr Mojo 's Rising and Jim Morrison boldly etched as garish colorful graffiti on the concrete columns that held up the bridge which lay right under the rainbow.
The strong metallic colours engraved on the grey cement contrasted with the ephemeral see -through hues of the rainbow.
But this was it. This was the end. We had finally arrived at this Rainbow reality of conflicts and contrasts, of calm and noise, of beauty and ugliness.
After the Rainbow, as though we were never meant to move away, we found ourselves stuck in the soft, hard, fluid and solid world of deep mud whilst surrounded by fences of razor sharp barbed wire.
Once free, and down the fields, we encountered the unreal world of miniscule islands on tiny lakes, the fantasy world of toy manor farms with heritage machinery and noisy chicken fights…the romantic world of the lover's lane, and the raucous world of the rebellious passenger who wanted to smoke and read the Red Star.
But the sun was now shining and we were happy. Mojo had risen - as had Jim Morrison. And the Rainbow was now gone!
Marian 19/01/02.