Netley Abbey — Attraction in Eastleigh

I am always going to try and give 5 stars to historical ruins/sites, as they take us back in time, and we get some insight of our heritage here in England.

I visited the ruins here at Netley Abbey, where I was actually taken aback by how large this Cistercian monastery is, (the pictures on Google reviews do not give it much justice).

The ruins themselves are also fairly well preserved. Quite like the ruins that I visited of Waverley Abbey in Surrey, in which I would recommend that you pay a visit to as well.

The grounds that the Abbey resides in are also large, and would be suitable for something like a picnic.

The ruins themselves are extremely impressive, you can see on some of the walls, people have carved their initials into the stones to their date of visit (I found one going back to 1889!).

Boards around the site, will give you a good idea of what the monastery (and as it became a private manor house in the 1500s) would have looked like back in the day.

A great visit overall, I would recommend history nerds like myself, and anyone who wants to look back into our history.

The only thing I can say about the site, is that the car park is very small, and I would suggest parking around the corner (like I did), or finding a suitable public car...

A very high frustration factor totally ruined this visit, which was only meant to be a quick one anyway, for a picnic and leg stretch en route to our main destination. For some reason Google maps misdirected us to the centre of the Netley postcode, so we got a bit lost in a maze of residential streets. Then the navigational convolutions caused my son to throw up just as we got to the car park down the road from the site- the one that previous posters had helpfully mentioned had toilet facilities. Those toilets are no longer there. They were gated and locked, with a sign saying they had permanently closed as of January 2019. So after cleaning him up with baby wipes in the car park, we went to the Abbey site to find that it seemed to be the weekend hangout for the local teenagers. I honestly wish we...

A fantastic historic extensive ruins that is a pure delight to visit. This 13th century Abbey's ruin is a gem of a photographic, painting or drawing experience, even John Constable painted here. It is even said that Jane Austen visited here and subsequently provided an inspiration for her book, Northanger Abbey! There is much to see and explore and has an appeal for anyone who comes. It's a great place for a picnic too. There is a small car park and that, and the entry to the Abbey, is free. Please note that there are no facilities here so plan ahead. Also please check beforehand that it is open as I visited once and it was closed when it should...