That's TRULY incredible!! 🤩

Very cool castle!

As someone who works locally - there is probably at least some comedy material in comparing the Castle with the local shopping centre, which is an awful 1960's wasteland. On a winters day waiting for a bus it is the bleakest, most soulless, coldest, wettest place ever. On a better note - I hope you got to, or will get to, the Artillery Museum at Fort Nelson, up on the hill behind the castle. Lovely as a fortress in it's own way but full of history in the shape of the artifacts. Also right next to where I work (Dstl Portsdown West, the place with the Barbed Wire and Big Satellite Dish). The Portsmouth area is one of those places where you trip over history all of the time. For example there is a random road junction on the hill which turned up a Saxon-era Execution Cemetery when it was built and an anonymous looking fenced off area that gives access to the underground fuel bunkers that supplied the warships down in the harbour during WWII. (WWII had an impact on EVERYWHERE in the area - even the Castle, which was prepared to defend against a German landing) Anyway, as you found, Portus Adurni (Roman name for what became Portchester Castle) is a fascinating place.