Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
working displays. Some of the themes are reprised in the
International Slavery
Museum,
currently within the Maritime Museum and sharing its contact details and
opening times but slated to get its own entrance soon.
Albert Dock.
&
0151/478-4499.
www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk. Free admission. Daily 10am-5pm.
Museum of Liverpool
MUSEUM Only partly open at the time of writ-
ing, but already an impressive venue, this is yet another reason to linger in Liverpool.
Its most compelling gallery, Wondrous Place, looks at how the city has produced such
an amazing roll call of creative folk, from musicians to footballers, as well as examin-
ing the development of the Liverpudlian dialect, Scouse. Global City, meanwhile, is
focused around a 180-seat theatre where work by local filmmakers, writers, and art-
ists tells the story of how Liverpool came to be the commercial and mercantile equal
of London and New York.
Pier Head.
&
0151/207-0001.
www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk. Free admission. Daily 10am-5pm.
Tate Liverpool
GALLERY A little sister to the Tate Britain and Tate
Modern in London (p. 109), this bright and funky modern gallery is home to interna-
tional modern and contemporary art collections and major changing exhibitions,
some on artists as eminent as Picasso and Magritte. Like other Tates, it's strong on
family activities and events, and has a great cafe (p. 587).
Albert Dock.
&
0151/207-0001.
www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk. Free admission except special exhibi-
tions. May-Sept Tues-Sun, June-Aug daily 10am-5:50pm.
World Museum Liverpool
MUSEUM Since doubling in size in 2005, this
museum has galleries devoted to dinosaurs, geology, “Space and Time” (with a plan-
etarium), the natural world (including live bugs and an aquarium), world cultures,
and the ancient world. Family activities and events are a forte, and the emphasis is
very much on hands-on experiences, but try to avoid school holidays when the place
gets uncomfortably busy.
William Brown St.
&
0151/478-4393.
www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk. Free admission. Daily 10am-5pm.
THE REST OF MERSEYSIDE
Merseyside is highly urbanized even outside the confines of Liverpool, though the
borough of Sefton north of Liverpool boasts some gems on its coast. The first stop north
of the city is
Crosby,
where globally renowned sculptor Antony Gormley—also behind
the Angel of the North (p. 664)—has sited his art installation
Another Place
15
(www.sefton.gov.uk). Along 2 miles of Crosby's beach and about a half-mile out to sea
stand 100 cast-iron casts of Gormley's own body, sunk to various depths in the sand and
appearing to stare out to the horizon in silent expectation. The work is generally read as
a response to the ambivalence of emigration—sadness at leaving tempered by hope for
a better future. The nearby
Crosby Lakeside Adventure Centre
(
&
0151/966-
6868;
www.crosbylakeside.co.uk) offers watersports and other activities.
Next up as you follow the coast north is
Formby
, an affluent town on the
Irish Sea. In summer, its population—which includes (or has included) several
famous local footballers—swells considerably as visitors flock to its beach, backed by
sand dunes and pine woods that contain a National Trust reserve for some of Britain's
dwindling red squirrels. Formby is also a rare breeding spot for natterjack toads,
which can be heard “singing” in the late evening. On some parts of the beach, sand
erosion has revealed Neolithic/early Bronze Age footprints of humans and animals,
including red deer, while the sand dunes are famous for their asparagus, which used
