It had been quite a few years since I last visited, in fact it was well before the days of the Mary Rose being found and the only attraction in the Dockyard was HMS Victory so I was very keen to see the new Historic Dockyard Museum.
We arrived just in time to catch a boat trip around the Harbour as our starter and armed with video camera and still camera we were fortunate to see quite a few Warships including the 3 aircraft carriers.
HMS Victory is still for me one of those great ships that justs lets my imagination run away with itself. A period of history I particularly enjoy.
Since my last visit they have opened up more of the ship. Originally the lowest part you could visit was the Orlop Deck, but they now allow access to the Ships Hold which is a vast cavernous area in the very Bowell's of Victory.
I remember when they recovered Henry VIII ship Mary Rose from the depths of the Solent but didnt realise how much of the ship had actually been recovered.
On the television pics of the day it just looked like a few timbers but in actual fact, its almost the majority of the Starboard side complete with rudder. The remains are housed in a special climate controlled building and is constantly sprayed with preserving chemicals and wax so you actually view the ship from behind a wall of perspex. It takes a few minutes to get used to the light but it is a fantastic display and well worth the entrance fee alone.
Time was running out and we ended our tour by visiting Queen Victoria's first Iron Hulled Battleship HMS Warrior
The best part of this ship, not just its size but the fact you can wander its decks unescorted and can get into alsorts of nooks and crannies and have a really good explore.
Our final attraction of the day was a visit the Spinnaker Tower which dominates Portsmouth's skyline.
This Tower rises 170 metre's above the Harbour. Encased in glass on three walls with three levels and a Glass section of floor on the lower level.
Laura nor I have very good heads for heights but we were very brave and we managed to get our backs to the solid wall on the first level not daring to go anywhere near the glass walls or the glass floor.
I then got extreamly brave and got my video camera out and began to shuffle slowly around the deck looking only through the viewfinder so that i didnt have to actually look out of the windows for real. I was shaking like an idiot and so we dashed back to the lift back to the safety of terra firma. Coming back down in the lift Laura was laughing at me because the sweat was pooring down my face....Vertigo, it sounds so silly but its horrible.
We had a quick beer in the bar below and I checked out the video camera to see what sights I had managed to record while up the tower.
It appears all I had managed to capture was our feet climbing the stairs to the lift. In my fear I had forgotten to press record, so when I thought i pressed pause to end the recording I had only then just presses record so no video at all of us being brave in the tower of death. Doh!!
We ended the day back at the Swan and Bottle for a slap up meal.
2 comments:
Eeeek! I've got so much to read here now. Looks like some great posts here, so will be back later today...looking forward to it!
A grand day out indeed, Geoff. I'm very impressed by the pics of the Mary Rose, and your other ship pics are beautiful too. Once again, you had gorgeous blue skies didn't you? How lovely that you could have a boat trip as well. By the way, I've made that mistake with video too, but maybe with you nerves, you wouldn't have had much more than the wobbles anyway? Bad luck all the same.
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