What to see around Portsmouth, Hampshire, south England

Spyderman

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Dear frineds,

I'm going there for about a week to visit a friend in Portsmouth in south England, and will probably have a car avilable.

I plan to visit:
- historic battleships and fotress' in Portsmouth,
- historic towns Winchester and Salisbury
- Tangmere military aviation museum
- cliffs and coutryside around Swanage and Wool

please, can you recommend me some more sites worth seeing ?
castles, parks, natural reserves, anything ?
 
Winchester and Salisbury are not far, especially if you have a car. Southampton is somewhere to walk around.

EDIT: Just saw you already have Winchester and Salisbury down.

If you are passing through Basingstoke, let me know and I'll buy you a beer :)
 
There are endless possibilities but your itinerary looks fairly full already.

Swanage and Corfe Castle are quite close. Wareham at back end of poole harbour is quite nice too en route (maybe).

Beualieu national motor museum if you are into old cars.

North of salisbury is stonehenge and north of stone henge is avebury.

Salisbury is very nice. Also Brownsea Island in Poole Harbour.
 
Stonehenge

HMS Victory (Portsmouth) is being rebuilt, I doubt it would be too good right now but the rest of the harbour is fascinating

Horse racing at Goodwood...great spectacle on top of the downs

Bosham and Dell Quay on Chichester Harbour

Winchester and Chichester catherdrals...contrasts in style

I could go on....get googling!
 
Westwards: Beaulieu Motor Museum and house - also museum dedicated to the training of special agents in WW2. Also Bucklers Hard nearby is an interesting place with old cottage/museums. Eastwards: Chichester (cathedral and nice town).

Good luck - and good weather too!
 
About 45 miles east is Brighton and the Royal Pavilion. That's so totally over the top that it's worth the drive.

Regards, David
 
Thank you all for the tips.

I've already returned from the trip, and in case someone else might be looking for tips for places in southern england, here is the itinerary of the trip:
- Dover castle, Bodiam castle, Arundel village, 7 sisters - all on our way from Dover to Portsmouth
- Salisbury - the cathedral is really beautiful
- Corfe castle (instead of Swanage) - I captured some nice views from the opposite hill
- Portsmouth historic dockyard - just stunning
- Canterbury on the way back to Dover

Unfortunately I had to end the trip early and couldn't see Winchester, Southampton, Isle of Wight (which I was most looking forward to) and the aviation museum :(

I would not recommend Hurst castle. Just an old coastal fortress, nothing like a "castle" :)

When I go through the photos, I'll post a link here in case anyone is interested.

PS for the gearheads: I took with me my tiny LX5 and OM-4 with 24-35-50-100-(200). The film camera used mostly only for architecture and things that I would like to enlarge optically and hang on a wall. Thus I shot only 2 rolls of APX100 and 1 of TriX.
 
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