A day trip to Brighton

Got the Thameslink from London to Brighton last Saturday afternoon; it cost 15 pounds return.

The one above is of one of the amusement machines on the pier. You put a coin into the slot, and you hope that it falls in such a way that the moving tray below will push it over the edge, triggering some of the coins below the tray to fall through the collection box underneath. There are also rubbish prizes stacked on top of the coins, like a Bagpuss brooch.

Where Rob and I are from, Brighton beach means Brighton-Le-Sands, a pseudo Anglo-Franco name (it's next to a place called Sans Souci!), a suburb of Sydney I grew up in. Full of drag racing down The Grande Parade, souvlaki, palm trees and, of course, Coles Ramsgate. Confused? Good. So, this is Brighton the real deal, where Lydia and Mr Wickham in Pride and Prejudice went for a dirrty weekend, where my friend N. got exasperated, where my colleague Tim commutes from every day, where people have come for hundreds of years for magic cures to their ills.