Heritage Attractions
Visit Gosport and you can find out what lurks beneath the waves at the Royal Navy Submarine Museum. Here you can take a tour on-board HMS Alliance Britain’s only surviving Second World War era ocean-going submarine and discover what it was like to live and work on a submarine.
Learn about the weapons used by the Royal Navy at Explosion! Museum of Naval Firepower. This award-winning museum contains weapons used by the Navy throughout the centuries and is housed in the 18th century buildings of the Navy’s former armaments depot.
These two museums are part of the National Museum of the Royal Navy, and are linked by the Waterfront Trail it is a walking trail that runs for two miles. The trail offers spectacular views across Portsmouth Harbour, and takes in the Falkland Gardens and the ‘Timespace’ sundial en-route.
The Museum of Diving was voted one of the top six family-friendly museums in the UK, 2015 and its exhibits cover all aspects of diving from underwater sports and spear fishing to military, commercial and scientific research diving. There is plenty of diving equipment on display, including some used by James Bond!
You can find more James Bond equipment at the Hovercraft Museum. The Museum has the hovercraft that featured in the opening chase sequence from ‘Die Another Day’ starring Pierce Brosnan. You'll discover a range of hovercraft: military ones, sports ones and a huge cross channel one, plus ones that have featured in the Top Gear, Scrapheap Challenge and Salvage Squad TV programmes.
Moving away from the maritime theme, step back in time with a wander through the 1642 Living History Village and see ‘villagers’ dressed in period costumes demonstrating the skills of the blacksmith, lace-makers and weavers.
You can find out more about Gosport’s history at the Gosport Discovery Centre.