We haven't had a Big Breakfast for a while and at present we are reading a novel which features Algernon Charles Swinburne, who was brought up on the Isle of Wight and is buried there (in Bonchurch). We are also preparing a post on the artist George Apperley who was also from the Isle of Wight so why not go back to a breakfast that we had there one sunny morning in August, we thought?
It is to West Wight we go, rather than Bonchurch, which is on the eastern end, to the pretty port town of Yarmouth. Triple P used to visit Yarmouth regularly on his uncle's boat when he was small and, frankly it has changed very little over the years.
Yarmouth Pier from the cafe
The Gossips Cafe has a great location at the foot of Yarmouth Pier and, in our corner table we could see along the pier one way and the other way across to the ferry terminal at the boats coming over to the island from Lymington.
Yarmouth Castle and the ferry from the cafe
The cafe has a good choice for breakfast with everything from toast and marmalade for £1.70, through a hot bacon baguette (£3.80) to the full English breakfast which is what, of course, Triple P took. This consists of a fried egg, two rashers of bacon, a jumbo sausage, mushrooms and tomato. Also included in the £7.30 price is an orange juice, two slices of toast, marmalade and a pot of tea. There are lots of optional extras too, so we added baked beans for 60p.
Although the cafe was pretty busy when we went there, service was quite quick although there was one mistake made on our order which was quickly rectified. The food quality was fair although, inevitably, the sausage was poor quality. The difference in price between poor and good quality sausages is fairly small and yet, almost always, these cafes almost always serve inferior sausages whereas their bacon was good quality.
Inside the cafe is bright and clean and decorated in the tourist friendly nautical style. All in all a very pleasant place to have breakfast, given the excellent views, the food was acceptable so overall we can happily give it 7/10.
