Open All Hours?

I'm pleased to report that my Twankey is going down well in Bournemouth! Hurrah! However, it does mean that I've become slightly semi-detached from the Thanet scene. Boo!

Nonetheless, I'm still getting a torrent of emails from my spies around the septic isle, and this one especially caught my eye. It's a proposal to re-open the Granville bars on the trendy East Cliff in the Millionaires' Playground. Apparently Punch Taverns are looking to sub-lease the space, and an application for a premises licence will be made shortly. According to the blurb above, the bars retain 'a very rare... Putin fire place'. Just the thing to go with one's iced Litvinenko Vodka, methinks.

So in the not-too-distant future there could be a boutique hotel, a theatre and cinema, and a couple of bars (if you include the San Clu), all within a hop and skip from the old cliff top mansion.

Crikey! At the rate things are going, it'll be just like Sandbanks! Pip pip!

Click here for more details on the James A Baker website.

Ellington Woots

Jolly well done, and all that, to the team behind the bid to win a slice of lottery money to tart up our lovely, but slightly shabby, Ellington Park here in the Millionaires' Playground.

They've reached the play-off next Tuesday on ITV Meridian East (What's that? - Ed.), and stand to win a whopping £50K if they beat the DFLs from Hernia Bay, who are also bidding to tart up a spot of greenery.

If you want to find out more about their plans, there's an open meeting at Churchill's this afternoon, 4pm kick off. And if you want to vote for them on Tuesday, you can get more info by clicking here.

On Monday it's the turn of Boredstares to bid. They're asking for fifty grand to build a shed, and are up against some poor bastards in Seahaven who need food.

 Pip pip!

Snooze Newz

Cripes! All that talk of my kip being interrupted by knackered old jumbos has forced me to reassess the sleeping arrangements here at the old cliff top mansion!

And who better to consult than the Ile's leading bed emporium, Thanet Bedz?!

Their same day delivery and 'honest prices every day' policy make them the ideal place for the discerning, yet mean, millionaire to find that divine divan or superking snoozeriser at a massive discount. They also do sofas, bedroom furniture and dining tables, so I might as well get the entire place kitted out while I'm at it!!!

Why not tool along to their Ramsgate or Margate showrooms and see for yourself? Or give them a call on 01843 595858. They're also offering a FREE £400 silk pocket sprung divan for every 1000th Facebook like, so you should really check that out as, who knows, you might soon find yourself sleeping like a millionaire too!!!!

NB: The fact that Thanet Bedz are now sponsoring this blog, having left a substantial sum in a manilla envelope behind the hot water pipes in the Cavendish Street khazis, has had no influence on the content of this post.

What A Yacht I've Got!

Excitement is mounting in Boredstares, I'm told, where Victorian bathing costumes are about to make way for the thrills and spills of hemp smocks and bladders on sticks.

Yes, the Dickensians are eagerly anticipating their annual Folk Week (or Drunk Week as it's become known locally), which kicks off today. Around 150,000 men and women with beards are expected to descend on the UK's second best seaside town, turning the camp site at Upton School into a mini version of Glastonbury, with the waft of illicit drugs such as Old Nutty Shag and Nadger's Dorchester Wobbly permeating the air.

Meanwhile, here in the Millionaires' Playground, we're anticipating something much more salubrious. Ramsgate Week, organised by our very own Shirley Temple Yacht Club, will see the cream of the yachting fraternity hoity-toiting on land and sea for six days as of tomorrow. Billed as 'the friendly alternative to Cowes', the regatta is expected to attract matelots from Belgium, Holland and France, as well as the UK.

With one or two financial transactions still being in the, er, pipeline I shan't be participating in the sailing. But I'll definitely be rooting out my CockSox swimmers for the Hunks in Trunks competition!

Eastcliff Richard makes no apology for running this exact same article every year since 2006. After all, nothing's changed, has it?

Avast behind! Participants prepare to get their bottoms scraped
at Ramsgate Week!

Enormous Groyne Spotted On Ramsgate Beach

Well, I was wearing some pretty revealing shorts down there earlier!

No, seriously, I've never noticed this structure stretching out from the centre of our lovely Ramsgate Sands before. Anyone know what it is? (Apols for the grimy pic - click it to big it). I suppose it could just be seaweed from Margate harbour, dumped by The Duffers, who seem hellbent on superduperising the grimy north of the island at the expense of the splendid south.

By the way, it's nice to see the new lights illuminating the excellent Royal Harbour Brasserie at the end of the pier. Oh, and I didn't get the Louis Walsh job, if anyone was interested.

Any Portas In A Storm

Holy shop fronts! I see those splendid chaps at Ramsgate Arts have popped out a quickie in a bid to get my old retailing chum Mary Portas down to the Tip of Kent to display her sexy undercrackers in some of our knackered old units.

I must say, I think they've made the Millionaires' Playground look just the ticket for a Harvey Nics! Take a squiz and see what you think...

Ramsgate 2, WC 1

Being the swinging, bachelor type, I'm hopefully not going to have much use for Mamas and Papas which has just opened at our lovely Brownwater retail park in the centre of the isle.

Actually I thought they'd all choked to death on ham sandwiches in the 70s.

Er, but no. If baby stuff is your thang, Mamas and Papas have it all. Announcing their new Westwood Cross outlet they say: '(Our) fashion-packed credentials are second to none as stars from Hollywood to Hong Kong head for the store as soon as their pregnancy is announced.' Not bad for a chain that's based in that third fashionable 'H' - 'Uddersfield. They continue:

Closer to home, the wives and girlfriends of the UK’s famous sporting and media stars are spotted often at Mamas & Papas stores throughout the country. World Cup sweethearts have already been spotted snapping up ‘Star Dribbler’ rompers to cheer on their partners in the South African tournament!

Should go down a storm with the builders' WAGs from Boredstares then.

Closer to home, and as if to prove that Ramsgate is getting chi-chier by the minute, a high class gift emporium has opened in the Old Custom House (Custom House in old money) down on the front. While teeny-tiny (and not so teeny-tiny) Ramsgate Town Councillors ruminate over their paltry portfolios upstairs, visitors can grab an excellent latte or baguette downstairs, book a B&B at the visitor information centre and peruse Nice Things, which stocks gifty arts and crafts from Thanet and beyond.

Not only that, but if a job ad I just read in one of the local rags is to be believed, the Millionaires' Playground is about to get a Cornish Pasty Co emporium too! How much more like St Ives can it get!?!

Ramsgate Development Rejected (Again)

Good news! The revised application to cram another crappy terrace of mock Georgian houses into a small hole here in the Millionaires' Playground was 'strongly rejected' by the Duffers' planning committee last night!

If you recall, Thanet builder DJ Ellis (he who sponsors the Chrissie lights and tarmacs church car parks in Westgate when the call goes out from distressed Doctor/Councillors), has spent three years trying to nudge this one through on an old bomb site in Adelaide Gardens.

National conservation campaigners SAVE (Save Britain's Heritage) wrote to our Jurassic Junta protesting at the proposal, arguing that the plans contravene guidance policies and that the right thing to do in this conservation area, surrounded as it is by proper, Grade II listed Georgian houses, would be to reinstate the three houses demolished by Hermann Göring's planning department 65 years ago. Now the demolition ball is well and truly back in the builder's court!

Cliff Top Mansion A Snip At £1.75m

No, not my cliff top mansion, silly! I'm talking about the oak panelled, stain glassed, parquet floored, grand staircased, ornamental plasterworked, richly carved fireplaced, Grade II listed East Court on Victoria Parade, a relic of the 'golden age of English housebuilding'!

But it's good to know that, should I need to offload my pile in a hurry, my assets could be flogged for a considerable amount of folding. As the Times rightly points out 'this end of Ramsgate does not overlook the container port'. Quite.

The magnificent East Cliff edifice was a special school for the dylsexic, but planning permission is currantly being sort to convert it into a bootique hotel, with the plans drawn up by a former pupil who's now an archietect.

Speaking of planing permission, we can expect much anti-Duffer huffing and puffing at next Wednesday's planning committee meeting, when the thorny topic of an application to cram another crappy terrace of mock Georgian houses into a small hole here in the Millionaires' Playground is due to be heard. Thanet builder DJ Ellis (he who sponsors the Chrissie lights and tarmacs church car parks in Westgate when the call goes out from distressed Doctor/Councillors), has spent three years trying to nudge this one through on an old bomb site in Adelaide Gardens.

National conservation campaigners SAVE (Save Britain's Heritage) have written to our Jurassic Junta protesting at the proposal, arguing that the plans contravene guidance policies and that the right thing to do in this conservation area, surrounded as it is by proper, Grade II listed Georgian houses, would be to reinstate the three houses demolished by Hermann Göring's planning department 65 years ago.

Needless to say, SAVE's words have fallen on deaf ears, and their recommendations have not so far made it into the briefing notes for Wednesday's meeting. I'm afraid here in Thanet, the 'golden age of English housebuilding' really is long gone!

Click here to read more about East Court on the Times website
Click here for Adelaide Gardens application (F/TH/09/0915)

It's The High Life For Ramsgate!

Ordinarily I wouldn't be seen dead buying a copy of the Torygraph, but my new friend Louise tipped me off that the Millionaires' Playground got a mench today. So off I toddled to the Costcutter clasping 90p in my sweaty paw.

Sure enough, there on page 15 was a list of the world's 50 'most authentic destinations', including Los Angeles, Paris, Venice, and, um, Ramsgate. The list has apparently been drawn up by a panel of luminaries including Alain de Botton, Will Self, and my old chum Pierce d'Organ.

Admittedly some other places you might have heard of got a guernsey too. Like Deal, Hastings and Albania. Not a sausage about Margate or Boredstares though. Ha ha! Still, it does rather beg the question why all the cultural resources are being pumped into Margate, while 'authentic' Ramsgate's are being sucked dry. About the only thing the council wants to pump into my neck of the woods is more pollution from those flippin' knackered old jumbos. Oh how I laughed, then, when I noticed the 'most authentic' list was originally published in none other than... the British Airways High Life in flight magazine!

Update: This story is now running in the Daily Mail. Click here to read more (if you can bear the stench of hypocrisy!)

Ramsgate On The Up

Erm... here goes... Ahem! It's been pointed out to me by my majority shareholder, the Cecil Square Politburo, that I've been a bit, um, negative about the island over the past week. So to redress the balance I've been trawling the papers to find some good news. Et voila! An item about those nice chaps at the Royal Harbour Hotel that was published in the London Evening Standard a couple of weeks ago. The article begins:

There is probably nowhere more agreeable to spend a lazy hour in the south of England than on the balcony of the Royal Harbour Hotel Ramsgate. You look down on the pretty, 18th-century harbour, you watch the departure of the ferry (leaving for Ostend) from the port. With the Sunday papers and a coffee, life holds little better, providing the sun is out.

The piece then motors on for another thousand words or so, waxing lyrical about roaring fires (no mention of roaring, knackered old jumbos), old knick-knacks, verandahs and parapets ect ect. Casting the old mincers over the by-line, I see it was penned by none other than Country Life's Editor-at-Large Clive Aslet, who, the last time I looked, actually had a pied-a-terre here in the Millionaires' Playground, and who was responsible for positioning Ramsgate in Country Life's top five property hotspots of 2006, providing the inspiration, in the process, for this very blog! Good on yer Clive!

Click here to download Evening Standard article from the Royal Harbour website where they're also congratulating RAFLKRMIA on the publication of their Daft Bastard Plan last week, I mean they must be bonkers, do they really want their guests to wake up with a pounding headache in the middle of the night or have their 'Sunday papers and coffee' ruined by the windows rattling every ten minutes I mean

This article has been approved by the Politburo

No Business Like Snow Business

Holy Sundays! It's snowing like a good 'un here in the Millionaires' Playground. Looks like we'll all be dreaming of a white Easter.

Following the application of industrial strength doses of K&M, you'll be pleased to hear the old Eastcliff derriere has healed enough for me to nip out for ten minutes to bring you this photo. Needless to say last night appears to have been the one night this winter that Kent Highways didn't cover the roads in a two foot thick layer of salt and grit, so some of the back streets are looking a bit grim. I'll be cosying up with a blazing fire and a couple of rolls of Andrex for the rest of the day I think!

Happy Landings

Remember Mr Coldfeet, the chap who emailed me recently wanting advice on some of the Ile de Thanet's good points? Well, thanks to all you lovely readers who came up with an exhaustive list of your fave Fannit fings, he's rather rashly decided to cross the Wantsum! He writes:

Dear ECR,

We were glad to see that we were quoted in your Blog (Mr Coldfeet indeed!) - and have decided to invest in some thick socks to enable us to take the plunge and brave life on the East Cliff (starting in Feb/March). As for the Fave Fings which have enticed us, We are amazed by the amount of beautiful buildings that have survived despite a hundred years of neglect and houses at half the price of Brighton ............and a sandy beach! Before we can move we have to sort out a little woodworm and rot first but look forward to a welcoming drink, meanwhile we'll keep as up-to-speed as possible by regularly tuning in.

A Big Thanet Cheers

I'll put the Krug on ice, dear boy!

Favourite Fings

I've received an email from one of my regular, off-island readers. He writes:

We are about to move to your millionaires' playground - but before signing on the dotted line, we wondered if you could advise us of any good things about life on the Eastcliff as your blog tends to be a little on the negative side and we are starting to get cold feet.

Well this is by no means the first time I've been accused of negativity, which mystifies me since I was labouring under the illusion that I was bigging the area up! Hopefully I've redressed the balance with Mr Coldfeet by sending him an exhaustive list of all my favourite things about the Ile de Thanet, which are all far too mawkish and sentimental to publish here without donning a Julie Andrews wig first.

However, it's got me wondering. Do any of you lot have a fave Fannit fing?

All Agog At The Synagogue

Our local biblio-bloke, Michael Child, who owns the splendid Michael's Book Shop in Ramsgate's trendy King Street, has been out and about with his camera again. His latest collection is from the recent rare open day at the Montefiore Synagogue and Mausoleum between Dumpton Park Drive and Hereson Road.

For those of you with only a slender grasp of Ramsgate history, Sir Moses Montefiore was the original millionaire to settle in the Millionaire's Playground, way back in Victorian times. He was a renowned wit, and a huge benefactor to the town. I like to think I'm continuing that tradition.

According to his entry in Wikipedia in 1873 a local paper mistakenly ran his obituary, to which his response was: 'Thank God to have been able to hear of the rumour and to read an account of the same, with my own eyes, without using spectacles.' A local paper making a mistake? Surely not!

Anyhoo, you can see all Michael's photos here. And I'm not one to be picky, but why on earth he's got a link to the flying doctor on his front page, and not Ramsgate's current foremost citizen, heaven knows!

What A Yacht I've Got!

Excitement is mounting in Boredstares, I'm told, where Victorian bathing costumes are about to make way for the thrills and spills of hemp smocks and bladders on sticks.

Yes, the Dickensians are eagerly anticipating their annual Folk Week (or Drunk Week as it's become known locally), which kicks off today. Around 150,000 men and women with beards are expected to descend on the UK's second best seaside town, turning the camp site at Upton School into a mini version of Glastonbury, with the waft of illicit drugs such as Old Nutty Shag and Nadger's Dorchester Wobbly permeating the air.

Meanwhile, here in the Millionaires' Playground, we're anticipating something much more salubrious. Ramsgate Week, organised by our very own Shirley Temple Yacht Club, will see the cream of the yachting fraternity hoity-toiting on land and sea for six days as of tomorrow. According to the lovely Commodore Davena Green, 'Ramsgate Week now provides a real alternative to Cowes', which presumably has had to be cordoned off this year due to foote and mouthe.

Due to one or two financial transactions still being in the, er, pipeline I shan't be participating in the sailing. But you will be able to spot me in my Captain's cap, brass buttoned blazer and deck shoes with the salty seamen on the front. I might even get my Rolex Oyster (Whitstable Edition) back from Hiltons for the occasion. And I'll definitely be rooting out my CockSox swimmers for the Hunks in Trunks competition!

Avast behind! Participants prepare to get their bottoms scraped
at last year's Ramsgate Week

Chocolate Fountain

Good heavens! What on earth has happened to the trendy East Cliff's Festival of Britain Fountain? Here it is in November last year:

And here it is this morning:

I know the KFC gulls have a penchant for irrigating their colons in the fountains foamy spumes (who wouldn't after a chomp on the Colonel's finest?), but this is meant to be a historic, decorative feature not a flaming bird bath! All that gull poop's turning it green!

Late Night Line Up

Whilst making an emergency gin run to the local Murco/Costcutter just now, I observed the following interchanges take place through the late night, plate glass security grille:

First (tracksuited) customer: Can o' Stellaaar 'n er packet o' blue Rizlaaars.
Costcutter dude: £1.30
Second (suited) customer: Do you have any crumpets?
Costcutter dude: Uh?
Second (suited) customer: Round, bread type things. You eat them with butter.
Costcutter dude: Uh?
Second (suited) customer: No, no, you probably don't stock those. Do you have any croissants?
Costcutter dude: Uh?
Second (suited) customer: Croissants?
Costcutter dude: Uh?
Second (suited) customer: A bit like cakes? You have them at breakfast.

With all us millionaires piling into the area, surely it's about time they opened a 24 hour Fortnums Express round here?

Local Customs

All the nice girls love a sailor. Or in this case an HM Customs and Revenue officer, but that's a bit prosaic. This is HMCC Valiant, and we'll be getting used to the cut of her jib here in the Millionaires' Playground, as she seems to now have a permanent berth in the Royal Harbour. Here's what they say about her on one of those websites for nautical anoraks:

Special care has been taken to provide a high standard of living accommodation for the crew during operations. Low noise levels and a relaxation area for those off-watch reduces crew fatigue. The large, well-equipped galley is designed to enable the crew to prepare meals and drinks in all sea conditions.

Cruisey! Assuming she can actually get out of the harbour at low tide, that is, seeing as half the entrance now appears to have sprouted a new beach.

As I rather nosily peeked through the windows, I caught one of those bell-bottomed types peering back at me through an enormous pair of binocs. Maybe I should speak to my accountant about getting those tax returns up to date!

Paint The Whole World With A Rainbow

Aah, what a welcome back to the Ile de Thanet! It's nice to go travelling, but it's so much nicer to come home.

Deary me. I appear to have become rather maudlin and nostalgic after my trip to the West Country. Still, that won't last. I've got a smorgasbord of tasty readers' emails to chomp through, so I'll soon be back to my old self, 'having a pop at everything from pizza delivery men to top Tory Sandy Beach' (©2007 Thanet Times). Watch this space!