Portland : lighthouses

I’d always wanted to stay in a lighthouse so, three years ago, when I got the chance to join a Glamorgan Bird Club weekend in Portland, I jumped at the chance – and I’ve just been back for my third such weekend. Of course, the purpose of the weekend is birding but Portland Bird Observatory and Field Centre is a former lighthouse, now filled with bunk rooms to accommodate the visiting birders who come to check out the rarities this extreme location always seems to attract.

There are, in fact, three lighthouses at Portland Bill, the narrow promontory at the southern end of the Isle of Portland: the Old Lower Light (now Portland Birds Obs), the Old Higher Light (now converted to holiday accommodation; not covered in this blog), and the current operational light.

When you’re at the Bill, especially in stormy weather, it’s easy to see why the lights are necessary – as the Trinity House website explains

The Portland Race is caused by the meeting of the tides between the Bill and the Shambles sandbank about 3 miles SE. Strong currents break the sea so fiercely that from the shore a continuous disturbance can be seen.

The Old Lower Lighthouse, the attached cottage and its boundary wall are all Grade-II listed structures. The current building, built in 1869, is, in fact, the third lighthouse to be built on this site: the first began operating in conjunction with the Old Higher Light in 1716 but was replaced in 1789. The 1869 structure, the existing Old Lower Light, was built, appropriately enough, of Portland stone and is 63 feet high.

Both the Old Lower and Old Higher Lights were decommissioned in 1906 when Trinity House had the current lighthouse built. The Old Lower Lighthouse has had many incarnations since then: for a time in the early 1900s it was a tea garden, and it has also been a family home. By the 1950s it had been abandoned and was derelict but, thanks to the beneficence of Miss Mary Brotherton, the building was saved, restored and converted for use by visiting ornithologists. And so the Portland Bird Observatory and Field Centre was born, in March 1961, and I’m delighted to report it is still going strong, as a registered charity supported by the passion, hard work and generosity of its warden, staff, volunteers and supporters.

The present lighthouse, the red-and-white-striped tower that stands close to the end of Portland Bill, is 135 feet high. According to Wikipedia, Trinity House   

acquired the required land in 1903. The builders, Wakeham Bros. of Plymouth, began work on the foundations in October 1903. Chance & Co of Birmingham supplied and fitted the lantern ... The lighthouse was completed in 1905 at a cost of £13,000, and the lamp first lit on 11 January 1906 ...
On 18 March 1996, Portland Bill Lighthouse was demanned, and all monitoring and control transferred to the Trinity House Operations & Planning Centre in Harwich [in Essex].

Though I haven’t been in, there is a visitor centre in the former keepers’ cottages at the present lighthouse. As well as perusing the various informative displays about the lighthouse, visitors can also climb the tower to enjoy the views from the top. It’s on my list for my next visit to Portland!