It’s almost a shame that I have to tell you about this place because it’s much better left as a surprise. People should definitely find this place by accident and not be led there by a guidebook. You can tell who’s not expecting it as they’re walking down the claustrophobic Clink Street, because they’ll suddenly come to a stop and start fiddling in their rucksack for a camera.
Drake’s Tudor galleon
This is the Golden Hinde II – a replica of the ship that carried Sir Francis Drake around the world. This is the ship in which he sacked the Spanish treasure ships, sailed round the tip of Chile, up the west coast of America, and got back home in time to fight off the Spanish Armada.
The original ship became so famous that people used to visit it in the same way that we’re visiting this one now. The hull lasted for about a hundred years before the weather managed to do what the Spanish couldn’t (sink it), and we had to wait another 350 years for this rebuild. And I know exactly what your first thought will be: you’ll be standing there thinking that it’s far too small. There are passenger ferries on the Thames that are bigger than this, and it’s amazing to think that Drake had a crew of 80 blokes onboard for 33 months. Imagine having to live with 80 men for three years on this tiny thing! (Luckily 24 of them died along the way, freeing up some space.)
You can get some idea of what it must have been like if there happens to be a party of school kids onboard. Whenever I walk past this boat during the week it always seems to have been hijacked by a rowdy outing of primary school teachers and their charges (the kind of charges who charge and barge around the deck like pirates). If that’s what it resembles when you arrive then trust me: it’s a very small boat, and you’ll be better off coming back later.
Stepping onboard the ship
When you step onboard they give you a little piece of paper telling you a few bits and bobs about the boat, but you’re better off just having a wander around and exploring. Poke your nose into all the cabins and galleys and pretend in your head that you’re a 16th-century pirate. This is where men have a distinct advantage over women, I think, because women are basically too mature to pretend they’re a pirate. They fantasise about serious stuff whilst we dream of sailing the seven seas and getting our legs and heads blown off by a cannonball.
We are a lot like children, in fact. Girls evolve into women when they grow older but men are basically just taller children – taller children with more money and more responsibilities and probably a lot less sense. Which is why I am currently peering out of a porthole deciding which tourist to shoot.
The gun deck and cannons
It’s when you go below that the ship really comes alive. The gun decks are five feet high – even your kids will have to duck. You literally have to walk around like an upside down ‘L’ or you’ll crack your head on the oak beams above. Believe me when I say it’s cramped. You practically have to crawl. And it’s dark. It smells of wood. You can hear people’s feet creaking the timbers above your head and it’s full of barrels and cannons, caskets, baskets and lanterns… heaven knows what it must have been like with all the cannonball cracks and bangs and gunsmoke going off.
Drake’s dining room and quarters
Whenever you see an old pirate movie they always have a very ornate dining room where the captain sits with his crew and it’s all here, complete with a hanging lantern and big-backed chair where Drake would have sat. Obviously I sat in it.
After that I turned the big steering wheel and said Yo Ho Ho a few times. I would have climbed up the rigging as well but the guy behind the till expressly prohibits you from climbing up the mast. (As if anyone is daft enough to do that!)
That is probably why we don’t have pirate ships these days, because they’d never get the crow’s nest past health and safety. They wouldn’t allow cannonballs onboard either in case you dropped one on your foot and sued them.
If you enjoy this then try Cutty Sark (travel from London Bridge to Cutty Sark by tube) and National Maritime Museum (travel from London Bridge to Cutty Sark by tube). You might also like to take a day-trip to Chatham Dockyards, or how about seeing the Mary Rose in Portsmouth?
