The biggest attraction here is the Mary Rose, Henry VIII's warship that sank nearby during a battle in 1545. It was found again in 1982 and the part of the ship that had been buried in silt was raised and transported to Portsmouth where it has been undergoing restoration for 30 years. The Mary Rose has now been open to visitors for the last few months in a spectacular display that is controlled by airlock doors so you can see her without any glass or other barrier in the way (on the third level of the display).
You start the tour by walking through a couple of displays that talk about the ship, the circumstances of her sinking, and the loss of most of the men on board. Then you pass into an area with a sensor controlled door and - there she is! The remaining portion of the ship that was not reclaimed by the sea stretches out in front of you and elicits a "Wow!" reaction. To know that you're looking at a ship that is over 450 years old, and to see the timbers, the gun portals, the place in the hull where the main mast was seated - it's just incredible.
There are loads of items that were brought up with the ship as well. Long bows, arrows, tools, knives, cannon, personal effects of the crew, even the master carpenter's dog (skeleton) is on display. Fascinating, absolutely fascinating. We spent about an hour here on Sunday afternoon and then came back again Monday morning and spent another hour and a half just in the Mary Rose museum. It's displayed really well and you can see the ship from three different levels which gives you a perspective of the activities that went on at the various levels of the ship. There is glass separating you from the ship on the lower two levels but the third level is open except for a half wall of glass. This is good because if you fell off, it's a quite a distance to the ground! It's just really incredible to stand there in the same space as a ship that was built in the 16th century.
There are also some displays about how they raised her without breaking her apart. Amazing job by lots of scientists, engineers, and divers.
We also enjoyed the HMS Warrior. This is an 1860's warship and it was a really good self-guided tour throughout the ship. We really liked seeing the different decks and the coal burners that created steam. The Warrior could use steam or sail power. It had an ingenious method of lifting the long rudder when they needed to, and a nice docent explained how that was accomplished. It was all very well done and we enjoyed it.
We also toured the HMS Victory, Admiral Nelson's warship and the ship on which he died during the Battle of Trafalgar. It was not as interesting as the Warrior in our opinion but maybe that's because we're not British, so Admiral Nelson is simply a historical figure to us while he is a great naval hero to the British.
There is a harbor tour that was included in our admission so we went out on the tour boat to see all the various ships and points of interest in the harbor. Portsmouth is still the home of a naval base, so lots of Navy ships to see. We also found out that Portsmouth Dockyard was used as the setting in Les Miserables where Jean Valjean is pulling the ship in to dock.
A very interesting day capped off with a little shopping at the nearby outlets, a good dinner, then back to our private rooftop terrace at the B&B for a little relaxation.
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