A survivor of Gallipoli the monitor M33 is one of only two British warships to survive from World War 1. Owned by Hampshire County Council Museums Service the ship was built in 1915, as a floating gun platform designed to bombard coastal positions from the sea.

Strike Carrier, HMS Illustrious - In port for maintenance HMS Illustrious is the second of three Invincible Class Aircraft carriers, and the fifth ship to bear her name. Illustrious, or "Lusty" as she is known by all on board, was built at Swan Hunters Ship Builders on the Tyne, and commissioned at her base port of Portsmouth in 1982. When the 22,000 tonne aircraft carrier has her Air Group embarked she has a complement of over 1000 people, and can operate with a range of both rotary and fixed wing aircraft from the Harrier GR9 to troop-carrying Chinooks.

Not the guns from Illustrious but some rusting canons I came across on the dockside.

The memorial to the Portsmouth Naval Field Gun Crew.

A steam powered cutter from the old Royal Yacht Osborne.

A Cormorant alighting on one of the harbour buoy's.

As you might guess there are many buildings in Portsmouth with names associated with the navy, those above are within a few yards of Victory Gate, the entrance into the historic dockyard. The public house HMS Anson was probably named after the seventy-four gun warship of the same name, which in turn was named after George Anson. Admiral of the Fleet Lord Anson was one of the Royal Navy's most highly decorated officers and famous for his spectacular circumnavigation of the world which took four years and was completed in 1744, and his destruction of the French Fleet off Cape Finisterre in 1747. As a Midshipman in 1716 Admiral Anson served on HMS Hampshire in the Baltic.