Isle of Wight Ferries

Red Funnel are based in Southampton and operate a car and passenger ferry from Southampton to East Cowes (55 minutes), with a high-speed passenger service from Southampton to West Cowes taking (23 minutes).

Website: www.redfunnel.co.uk

Wightlink operates a passenger ferry service between Portsmouth and Ryde (15 minutes), a car ferry service between Portsmouth and Fishbourne (45 minutess), and a car ferry service between Lymington and Yarmouth (35 minutes).

Website: www.wightlink.co.uk

Hovertravel operates the only high-speed hovercraft service from the mainland to the Isle of Wight. Hovertravel is the longest established commercial hovercraft operator in the world. Two modern 98-seater hovercraft run between Southsea and Ryde; a journey time of only 10 minutes.

Website: www.hovertravel.co.uk

Getting to mainland ferry ports

Road: Southampton, Portsmouth and Lymington are all easily accessible for motorists with motorways and trunk roads giving fast routes to the ports from all regions of the country. Several online route planners are available to help you plan your route to the ferry ports from anywhere in the UK if visiting by car, including The AA and Google Maps.

Train: Frequent train services operate from many parts of the United Kingdom to all three mainland ferry ports, either direct or with cross-London connections. For rail travel information, visit the website of National Rail.

Coaches: Over 1200 National Express departure points are located throughout the UK, offering relaxing seats, panoramic windows and a toilet and washroom on all of their coaches to help get your holiday off to the most comfortable start.

Visiting from overseas

If you are visiting the Isle of Wight from overseas, the ferry terminals are about one and a half hours journey time from the London airports of Heathrow and Gatwick. Competitive long haul taxis can be arranged, which are likely to be better value for money than public transport if there are two or more passengers in your group. Visitors from Europe can fly directly into Southampton airport, 20 minutes by taxi from Southampton ferry terminal, or travel directly into London via Eurostar.