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Top Attractions in Portsmouth

Southsea

Southsea is a seaside resort and geographic area, located in Portsmouth at the southern end of Portsea Island, Hampshire, England. Southsea is located to the south of Portsmouth city centre and to the east of Old Portsmouth. It originally developed as Victorian seaside resort in the 19th century and grew into a dense residential suburb and large distinct commercial and entertainment area, separate from Portsmouth city centre itself. The name of the area originates from Southsea Castle; a fort, located on the seafront and constructed in 1544 to help defend the Solent and approaches to Portsmouth Harbour. The areas surrounding Albert Road, Palmerston Road and Osborne road comprise numerous bars, restaurants and independent shops. Palmerston Road is the main High Street of Southsea and contains two national department stores, as well as the local library. Albert Road is a distinct street containing shopping and cultural venues, which includes the Kings Theatre, a regional theatre built in 1907.

D-Day Museum

The D-Day Museum is located in Southsea, Portsmouth in Hampshire, England. Opened in 1984 by Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, it tells the story of Operation Overlord during the Normandy D-Day landings. The museum houses the Overlord embroidery and the display involves a film show including original footage and archive film. The D-Day Museum is home to the Overlord Embroidery and was specially built to hold it. The Overlord Embroidery took five years to complete and measures 272 feet long. It is the largest work of its kind in the world. Visitors are handed a Soundalive device upon entering the museum, which allows them to hear an audio commentary. As well as the film and embroidery there are also vehicles and displays of other material associated with D-Day and the war. The museum has its own shop and restaurant.

Spinnaker Tower

The Spinnaker Tower is a 170-metre landmark tower in Portsmouth, England, UK. It is the centrepiece of the redevelopment of Portsmouth Harbour, which was supported by a National Lottery grant. Its shape was chosen by Portsmouth residents from a selection. The tower, designed by local firm HGP Architects and engineering consultants Scott Wilson and built by Mowlem, reflects Portsmouths maritime history through its being modelled after a sail. The tower was opened on 18 October 2005. The tower is owned by Portsmouth City Council, but operationally it is managed by Continuum Leading Attractions, a cultural attractions group based in York. Continuum also runs five other visitor attractions across the country. Following a commercial sponsorship deal with Dubai-based Emirates airline, the tower will be renamed the Emirates Spinnaker Tower from July 2015.

HMS M33

HMS M33 is an M29-class monitor of the Royal Navy built in 1915. She saw active service in the Mediterranean during the First World War and in Russia during the Allied Intervention in 1919. She was used subsequently as a mine-laying training ship, fuelling hulk, boom defence workshop and floating office, being renamed HMS Minerva and Hulk C23 during her long life. She passed to Hampshire County Council in the 1980s and was then handed over to the National Museum of the Royal Navy in 2014. A programme of conservation was undertaken to enable her to be opened to the public. M33 is located within Portsmouth Historic Dockyard and opened to visitors on 6th August 2015 following a service of dedication. She is one of only three surviving Royal Navy warships of the First World War and the only surviving ship from the Gallipoli Campaign.

Mary Rose

The Mary Rose was a carrack-type warship of the English Tudor navy of King Henry VIII. After serving for 33 years in several wars against France, Scotland, and Brittany and after being substantially rebuilt in 1536, she saw her last action on 19 July 1545. While leading the attack on the galleys of a French invasion fleet, she sank in the Solent, the straits north of the Isle of Wight. The wreck of the Mary Rose was rediscovered in 1971. It was salvaged in 1982 by the Mary Rose Trust, in one of the most complex and expensive projects in the history of maritime archaeology. The surviving section of the ship and thousands of recovered artefacts are of immeasurable value as a Tudor-era time capsule. The excavation and salvage of the Mary Rose was a milestone in the field of maritime archaeology, comparable in complexity and cost only to the raising of the Swedish 17th-century warship Vasa in 1961. The finds include weapons, sailing equipment, naval supplies and a wide array of objects used by the crew. Many of the artefacts are unique to the Mary Rose and have provided insights into topics ranging from naval warfare to the history of musical instruments. Since the mid-1980s, while undergoing conservation, the remains of the hull have been on display at the Portsmouth Historic Dockyard. An extensive collection of well-preserved artefacts is on display at the nearby Mary Rose Museum, built to display the reconstructed ship and its artefacts. The Mary Rose was one of the largest ships in the English navy throughout more than three decades of intermittent war and was one of the earliest examples of a purpose-built sailing warship. She was armed with new types of heavy guns that could fire through the recently invented gun-ports. After being substantially rebuilt in 1536, she was also one of the earliest ships that could fire a broadside, although the line of battle tactics that employed it had not yet been developed. Several theories have sought to explain the demise of the Mary Rose, based on historical records, knowledge of 16th-century shipbuilding, and modern experiments. The precise cause of her sinking is still unclear, because of conflicting testimonies and a lack of conclusive physical evidence.

HMS Warrior

HMS Warrior was the name ship of her class of two 40-gun steam-powered armoured frigates built for the Royal Navy in 1859–61. She and her sister ship HMS Black Prince were the first armour-plated, iron-hulled warships, and were built in response to Frances launching in 1859 of the first ocean-going ironclad warship, the wooden-hulled Gloire. Warrior conducted a publicity tour of Great Britain in 1863 and spent her active career with the Channel Squadron. She became obsolescent following the 1871 launching of the mastless and more capable HMS Devastation, was placed in reserve in 1875, and was paid off in 1883. She subsequently served as a storeship and depot ship, and in 1904 was assigned to the Royal Navys torpedo training school. The ship was converted into an oil jetty in 1927 and remained in that role until 1979, at which point she was donated by the Navy to the Maritime Trust for restoration. The restoration process took eight years, during which many of her features and fittings were either restored or recreated. When this was finished she returned to Portsmouth as a museum ship. Listed as part of the National Historic Fleet, Warrior has been based in Portsmouth since 1987.

National Museum of the Royal Navy

The National Museum of the Royal Navy was created in early 2009 to act as a single non-departmental public body for the four service museums of the Royal Navy. The museums are: National Museum of the Royal Navy Portsmouth, Portsmouth Dockyard, Hampshire Royal Marines Museum, Southsea, Hampshire Royal Navy Submarine Museum, Gosport, Hampshire Fleet Air Arm Museum, RNAS Yeovilton, Ilchester, Somerset Since 2009 the following have also become part of the Museum HMS Victory, Portsmouth Dockyard, Hampshire Explosion! Museum of Naval Firepower, Gosport, Hampshire HMS Trincomalee, Hartlepool In the financial year starting 1 April 2009, the NMRN co-ordinated Grants in Aid from the UK Ministry of Defence and the four original museums became integral parts of the NMRN. The NMRN is also the custodian of HMS Victory, Admiral Lord Nelsons flagship at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805. HMS Alliance, the only surviving British WWII era submarine, re-opened following a £7M conservation and restoration project, in 2014. On April 3, 2014, The Babcock Galleries opened at the NMRNs Portsmouth Museum. The £4.5M project created the HMS Hear My Story exhibition, which tells the story of the 20th and 21st Century Royal Navy and its people, and a special exhibition space. In October 2014, the Museum received funding to restore D-Day Landing Craft LCT7074. The craft was raised from where it had sunk at moorings in Birkenhead, and was transported to Portsmouth for conservation. In August 2015, First World War Monitor HMS M.33, currently undergoing restoration, will open to the public.

South Parade Pier

The South Parade Pier is a pier in Portsmouth, England. It is one of two piers in the city, the other being Clarence Pier. The pier has a long hall down its centre which houses a seating area and a small restaurant. The outside of the hall is a promenade which runs the length of the pier and connects the entrance building with the small funfair at the southern end. The South Parade Pier, in Southsea, part of the English city of Portsmouth, is a pleasure pier offering typical seaside attractions including souvenir shops, ice creams, indoor amusements and a small childrens funfair. It also contains a fishing deck and two function rooms which are often used for live music. The history of the pier has been eventful; like many UK piers. Construction started in 1875 and was officially opened in 1879. It was partly dismantled during the Second World War in an attempt to hinder any invasion and it has also caught fire several times, most famously in 1974 during shooting of the film Tommy. In the 1980s the piers Gaiety and Albert ballrooms were used several times a week for discos organised by Portsmouth Polytechnic students. The pier appeared in an episode of Mr. Bean entitled "Mind the Baby Mr. Bean." The Pier was sold to three businessmen in 2010, who pledged to restore it to its former glory. The iconic pier is now owned by Frederick Nash, director of Hampshire property firm Matchams South Coast, and partners Tony Marshall, a London lawyer, and Cambridgeshire stud farm proprieter David Moore. Very little has happened to the pier since the purchase in early 2010.

Eastney Beam Engine House

Eastney Beam Engine House is a Grade II listed Victorian engine house in Portsmouth, Hampshire, England. Dating from 1887, it contains two 150 hp James Watt Co. beam engines. The pumps were built as part of a plan to improve Portsmouths sewage system. The other element of the plan was large holding tanks which held the sewage until the pumps could empty them into the ebb tide. The pumps have since been superseded by advancing technology but have been restored . The restoration was funded by grants totalling £10,066 from Portsmouth city council, £4000 from Hampshire county council and £2000 from the Department of the Environment. The Engine House is now open to the public as a museum, owned by Portsmouth City Council but operated by volunteers; consequently is only open on the last weekend in every month.

Portsdown Hill

Portsdown Hill is a long chalk ridge in Hampshire, England. The highest point of the hill lies within Fort Southwick at 131m above sea level. The ridge offers good views to the south over Portsmouth, the Solent, Hayling Island and Gosport, with the Isle of Wight beyond. The hill is on the mainland, just to the north of Ports Creek, which separates the mainland from Portsea Island, on which lies the main part of the city of Portsmouth, one of the United Kingdoms main naval bases. To the north lies the Forest of Bere, with the South Downs visible in the distance. Butser Hill can be seen on a clear day. The hill is formed from an inlier of chalk which has been brought to the surface by an east-west upfold of the local strata known as the Portsdown Anticline. Southwick House is close by the north side of the hill, the HQ for U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower during the D-Day invasions; the generals prayed together before D-Day at Christ Church Portsdown, on the hill, which has a memorial window. The A3 motorway cuts through the east side of the hill while the original A3 climbs over the centre by the "George" pub and Christ Church. The nearest railway stations are Portchester, Cosham and Bedhampton. There are many stories about real and imagined tunnels in the hill. The area contains active military research establishments, including one of the core sites of Dstl and sites run by Qinetiq. Part of the hill has been designated a Site of Special Scientific Interest. Most of the southern flank of the ridge is designated as access land under the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 and thereby freely available for the public to enjoy on foot. During the early part of the English Civil War Royalist forces from Portsmouth were involved in a number of skirmishes with Parliamentarians on the hill In the Victorian era the hill was home to a fair on Easter Mondays.

Portsmouth Harbour

Portsmouth Harbour is a large natural harbour in Hampshire, England. Geographically it is a ria: formerly it was the valley of a stream flowing from Portsdown into the Solent. The city of Portsmouth lies to the east on Portsea Island, and Gosport to the west on the mainland. At its north end is Portchester Castle, of Roman origin and the first fortress built to protect the harbour. The mouth of the harbour provides access to the Solent. It is best known as the home of the Royal Navy, HMNB Portsmouth. Because of its strategic location on the south coast of England, protected by the natural defence of the Isle of Wight, it has since the Middle Ages been the home to Englands navy. The narrow entrance, and the forts surrounding it gave it a considerable advantage of being virtually impregnable to attack from the sea. Before the fortifications were built the French burned Portsmouth in 1338. During the civil war parliamentary forces were able to carry out a successful cutting-out expedition within the harbour and capture the six-gunned Henrietta Marie. In modern times, the harbour has become a major commercial ferry port, with regular services to Le Havre, France, Cherbourg, France, St Malo, France, The Channel Islands and the Isle of Wight. There is a passenger ferry to Gosport. It is also a major area for leisure sailing. Recently, a large area of the former naval dockyard has been redeveloped into the Gunwharf Quays development, including the Spinnaker Tower.

United Services Recreation Ground

The United Services Recreation Ground is a sports ground situated in Burnaby Road, Portsmouth, Hampshire, England. The ground is also bordered to the north by Park Road, along which the railway line to Portsmouth Harbour and Gunwharf Quays overlooks the ground, and to the east by Anglesea Road. The southern end of the ground is dominated by the Officer's Club building, which overlooks the ground. The ground is owned by The Crown. A multitude of sports have been played at the ground, including cricket, rugby and hockey. The ground was used by Hampshire County Cricket Club from 1882 to 2000, serving as one of three home grounds used during this period, alongside the County Ground, Southampton, and Dean Park, Bournemouth. United Services Portsmouth Cricket Club currently play at the ground. The ground is used in its dual capacity as a rugby venue by United Services Portsmouth Rugby Football Club, who have played there since 1882. The end names are the Railway End to the north and the Officer's Club End to the south.

St Ann's Church

St Ann's Church is an Anglican chapel within Her Majesty's Naval Base Portsmouth. It is regarded as the spiritual home of the Royal Navy, and contains numerous memorials to men lost at sea. The original church was built in 1704, on the site of what is now Admiralty House. The present church was opened in 1786, and is built in red brick in Flemish bond. It was possibly designed by Marquand, a Navy Board surveyor, working under Samuel Wyatt at Admiralty House. The contractors were Thomas Parlby & Sons. The church suffered some bomb damage in May 1941, and was restored in 1955-6. As the oldest surviving chapel in a navy yard, it was Grade II listed on 25 September 1972. In October 2012, the church held ceremonies marking the 30th anniversary of the Falklands War, attended by Princess Anne. As of 2015 the current chaplain is Revd. James Francis, RN.

National Museum of the Royal Navy Portsmouth

The National Museum of the Royal Navy Portsmouth, formerly known as the Royal Naval Museum, is a museum of the history of the Royal Navy located in the Portsmouth Historic Dockyard section of HMNB Portsmouth, Portsmouth, Hampshire, England. The Museum was founded in 1911. Known originally as the Dockyard Museum, it was conceived by Mr Pescott Frost, then Secretary to the Admiral Superintendent at Portsmouth. With a passion for naval history he devoted his free time to spearheading a project to save items for future generations, eventually leading to the opening of a new Museum. His foresight ensured the survival of many interesting and important artefacts, several of which are still on display today. In 1985, under the terms of the National Heritage Act 1983, the Museum was devolved from the MoD to become an Executive Non- Departmental Public Body, supported by a Grant-in-Aid. At this juncture, the name was changed to become the Royal Naval Museum, Portsmouth. In 2008, the National Museum of the Royal Navy formally came into being, with the express purpose of providing greater co-ordination of Naval heritage in the broadest sense, and following on from this, in 2010, the Royal Naval Museum became a full subsidiary of the National Museum of the Royal Navy, and changed its name to "National Museum of the Royal Navy, Portsmouth" The museum is part of the National Museum of the Royal Navy, a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Ministry of Defence.

Alexandra Park

Alexandra Park, Portsmouth, was opened in 1907 and was a place of recreation for the people of Portsea Island. It provided lawns, flowers beds, paths and seats; it was an area to escape the toils of inner city life in the early twentieth century. The park was named after Queen Alexandra. At the time of the parks opening the site was already home to a bicycle track. The park is still popular today, and plays host to the Mountbatten Sports Centre, a modern sports facility including a 50 metre swimming pool and athletics and cycle tracks. To the north of the park there are playing fields which host a number of sports including American football, cricket, hockey and football matches. The southern section of the park provides a childrens play area, and retains its trees, flower, beds and lawns, and is an area for general recreation. The Portsmouth Dreadnoughts American Football Team currently use Alexandra Park as their training ground as well as their home venue. The park is connected to the site of the Hilsea Lido via the Stamshaw Esplanade.
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