We spent a whole day at the Portsmouth Historic Dockyard, and that was really not long enough.
The first stop was HMS Warrior . She is one of the first armour-plated ironclad warships and has been extremely well restored and opened to the public. A beautiful ship, and visitors could wander almost anywhere they liked.
Next was HMS Victory; this was also very interesting, but visitors were much more restricted as to where they could go, and some interesting parts were closed off. We saw a brass plaque on the spot where Nelson fell!
Finally to the Mary Rose, Henry VIII's warship, launched 1511, sunk 1545 and not seen again until the 1800s, and finally raised in the 1980s. She is nearly dried out now, there are still big black heating pipes in her, but they expect these to come out at the end of this year. Then you will get a much better view of her, almost all the starboard half. There are a great many artefacts to see, all taken from the Mary Rose and all in remarkably good condition. The reason for her sinking is unclear and we will probably never know the exact reason. The work that has gone into raising her and making her available to the public is phenomenal .

On this stage of the trip I have also visited The National Motor Museum at Beaulieu, somewhere I have wanted to go for a long time; and the Isle of Wight where we went to Osborne House, Queen Victoria's private house, and the Brading Roman Villa.

The motor museum is well worth a visit if you like old cars, which I do. Among other, probably more noteworthy vehicles, we saw Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and Elvis Presley's last cadillac! The house would also be well worth a visit but there was no time.
Osborne House is very interesting, especially if you are interested in the royal family's antecedents, again which I am, but very ornate. This is partly typical of the Victorian era, but Queen Victoria obviously had a great liking for statuary and India!
The Brading Roman Villa on the Isle of Wight is an exceptionally well preserved villa from the 1st century AD, with many magnificent mosaics still very clear. This place is not at all well advertised, we only went because the open-top tour bus stopped there and we thought we might as well have a look.
On the Isle of Wight we also saw a nice little parish church with a very short stubby tower, and with pillars inside leaning at quite an angle from the vertical; since it seemed they have been like that for some centuries, presumably they are safe enough.

I had never been to the Isle of Wight before but will happily go again if I get the chance.