Our trip, last November, first took us to Portsmouth on the south coast of England.

Portsmouth has long been the principal base of the Royal Navy, and naval sightseeing is its principal attraction for the tourist today, although it is also the birthplace of Charles Dickens and boasts a museum on the Dickens site. Our time was limited, so we were unable to visit other than the naval sites.

Portsmouth lies about 70 miles southwest of London. We drove from Heathrow about 50 miles mostly on M3, a modern freeway. Portsmouth is built on what was once an island jutting between two shallow embayments off the Solent, the body of water that separates the Isle of Wight from the mainland. Downtown Portsmouth is separated by a narrow channel from the town of Gosport, reached by a foot-ferry. The town comprises mostly red brick buildings, many of them rebuilt after World War II during which Portsmouth was heavily bombed.

Portsmouth was the site of England's earliest naval dockyard and the world's first drydock, both built in the 15th century. Today the town's streets are tangled, narrow, and focused on the naval dockyard on the western side of town. Just to the north of the ferry landing is the main visitor gate to the so-called Flagship Portsmouth complex. Flagship Portsmouth bills itself as "the home of British naval history," and comprises HMS Victory, HMS Warrior, the Mary Rose Museum and Ship Hall, The Royal Navy Museum, the Dockyard Apprentice Museum, a Visitor Centre, and "Warships by Water" tours. These several attractions, all within walking distance of one another, are packaged under the Flagship where one gains admission to all for one fare (around £12—about $20 U.S.—when purchased through our hotel concierge.)

HMS Victory, Nelson's flagship at Trafalgar, dominates the complex, sitting in a drydock on a basin with six other drydocks opening on to it. These basins are useless for modern naval vessels, so this section of HM Dockyard with its magnificent baroque and Georgian buildings has been given over to the Flagship Portsmouth. North of the basin one glimpses modern RN warships.

Victory had to be a crowded vessel; it was crewed by 820 men and boys confined in a space about 200' x 50' and three decks deep. Its 100 guns took up most of the crew, each gun requiring about 12 men; obviously there were not enough crew on board to conduct full simultaneous port and starboard broadsides. The ship is well-preserved; most of the huge guns are lightweight moldings that mimic the original. Tours are conducted by volunteers (usually retired RN Ratings) in groups of about 10 and are scheduled in advance at the Visitor's Centre.

Particularly moving is the site on the upper gun deck where the mortally wounded Nelson was taken after being shot by a French sharpshooter and where he died three hours after the battle was joined. There is a tableau set up on the site which depicts the scene. Our guide then told us that Nelson's body was preserved for the long trip back to England by storing it in a barrel of grog.

Next to the Victory site is the Mary Rose Hall, where the retrieved hull of HMS Mary Rose is being preserved in a perpetual bath of water. Mary Rose was the pride of Henry VIII's navy and the king himself was witness when the vessel sortied against a rumored French fleet in 1545, and suddenly heeled to port and sank. Attempts to raise her were unsuccessful until, in 1982 what remained of the hull was unearthed and brought up. Eventually, after some 20 years of spraying, the timbers will be bathed in glycol and the hull will be exposed to the air.

The hull hall, where interpretation is through individual wands, is not nearly as interesting as the Mary Rose Museum, across the street from the Visitor Centre, where the artifacts found in Mary Rose are on display and interpreted. A maritime wreck found after several hundred years is a perfect time capsule of everyday life and technology of the era. Here one can see how everyday life in mid-Tudor England was lived, with individual toilet items and the weapons employed by the king's archers on display, among many other items.

The third preserved ship in Flagship Portsmouth is HMS Warrior, commissioned in 1860, two years before the USS Monitor. Warrior was Great Britain's first iron-hulled ship and after the French Gloire the second in the world. It is a full-rigged sailing vessel with an auxiliary steam propulsion plant. Warrior represents a triumph of preserving a late technology development. Unlike Victory, which was always regarded as a national treasure, Warrior was paid off sold in the early 20th century, and was in use for many years as a petroleum barge. Somehow its historic value was belatedly recognized and through the national heritage trust, funded largely by the national lottery, the ship was rescued and restored.

The Royal Navy Museum across the main dockyard road from Victory has been substantially overhauled and boasts three stunning new galleries: "Horatio Nelson: The Hero and the Man" explores Nelson's public and private life as he tried to balance his roles as naval officer, friend, husband, and lover; "The sailing Navy" is an interactive exhibit where one may discover life at sea aboard a typical warship of the 18th and 19th centuries; and the "Victory at Trafalgar" gallery which vividly portrays the history of Nelson's flagship Victory throughout her career and includes a thrilling recreation of the battle.