It was a clear moonlight November night when Louisa Pratt and two friends collided with the ghost of a Victorian farmer on a lonely road just outside Shanklin.
"We were on our way to Ventnor for a drink at the Spyglass Inn at about 9pm. There was hardly any traffic on the roads. Ian Bartlett was driving and I was sitting in the back with my feet up on the seat. As we went up Cowleaze Hill there was a tremendous wallop on the side of the car as though we had been hit by something", said Louisa.
In the car headlights she could see the figure of a man with his arm raised. He was well dressed but in a strange old-fashioned way, more appropriate to Victorian times than the 1990s, with short breeches, leather leggings, jacket and waistcoat.
"I seemed to remember a small white dog in the road and I looked at Ian and said, 'Oh my God, we have hit the dog'. At this, Ian and front-seat passenger Tim Grafton turned round and asked what on earth I was talking about."
"Look at that man, he is waving his stick at us. I think we have run over his dog," Louisa told the puzzled pair. "They could not see a thing. To them the road was completely empty and they could not understand why I was so upset."
Strangely however, the two men had heard the loud bang on the side of the car, but although they turned back and stopped to see if they had hit anything, there was absolutely no sign of that ghostly farmer and his little terrier.