We spent most of the day at the Portsmouth Historic Dockyard. We started with a visit to the HMS Warrior, Britain's first iron-hulled, armoured warship and then went to the HMS Victory, which was launched in 1765. It was Nelson's flagship at Trafalgar and there is a plaque to mark the spot where he died - talk about history coming to life. And then more history with a visit to the Mary Rose Museum. The preservation of the ship and artefacts found is impressive. We were going to do a harbour cruise but the weather turned nasty for a while so we caught the waterbus and went and visited the submarine HMS Alliance, the only remaining WW2 era British ocean going submarine. That was a very good decision as our tour guide was a retired submariner cook and his stories were so interesting. I would not be a good submariner!!!
We headed out to Bishop's Waltham and discovered our hotel is opposite the ruins of Bishop's Waltham Palace, which was used by the Bishops of Winchester, so we had a little explore there too.
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| HMS Warrior |
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| HMS Victory |
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| On board the Victory |
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| West Tower, Bishop's Waltham Palace |
History come to life! Sounds like you enjoyed it all and you learnt a lot too.
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