Geograph - photograph every grid square

Lifeboat station at the eastern tip of the Isle of Wight. The first station at Bembridge was built at Lane End in 1867, the site of the current inshore lifeboat house. A new offshore boathouse was added in 1922 at the current site on Bembridge Ledge, built on stilts and connected to the shore by a gangway. It was enlarged in 1939, 1970 and 1987 to house new boats and in 1989 the slipway was extended to allow launches at low tide. It was then rebuilt, including a new gangway, in 2010, to house the latest Tamar class lifeboat.

In the background is the Brittany Ferries ferry MV Bretagne, built in 1989 at St Nazaire, France, on a St Malo to Portsmouth crossing.