There have been some stunning pieces of reinvention over the years, but one of the most unlikely must be Liverpool’s emergence as a tourist destination with its docks the star attraction. Once the most run-down part of a city ravaged by unemployment and drug problems, Albert Dock now stands as testimony to what can be done with a bit of imagination and a lot of self-belief. London Midland are doing one of their ‘anywhere for a tenner’ promotions, so it was time to take off to one of the few places in the county whose image is as unfairly maligned as our own.
Jokes about shell suits and hub caps are about original as thick Brummies. But while Liverpool might have improved beyond recognition, getting there hasn’t. London Midlands trains, even when they’re as cheap as this, are still uncomfortable, overcrowded, often dirty and in this case half an hour late. Luckily we’d taken the additional ten pounds upgrade to first class, which at least offers a modicum of comfort.
First of all, off to Crosby beach to see Antony Gormley’s artwork Another Place. 200 iron casts of the sculptor’s own body strung out across a two mile stretch of beach, in varying stages of emerging from the sand. Some close to the shore, others hundreds of yards out to sea, all of them beginning to weather and attract marine life. It’s a strange experience – their life-size makes for a feeling that’s neither overwhelming nor disappointing. They’re just there, facing out across the Mersey Estuary watching over industry, river traffic and wind turbines, to the Wirral and Wales, as though they’ve been in position forever, evidence of a primitive tribe or visitation from space awaiting your own personal discovery.
Back on a (punctual, clean) train and over to the aforementioned Albert Dock, where an over-priced and average lunch was followed by a visit to the National Maritime Museum. Here amongst other things I learned about the Empress of India, a passenger liner which went down in 1914 off the coast of Canada with greater loss of life than either the Titanic or the Lusitania but which has been largely forgotten, overshadowed by those other tragedies. There’s also a slavery museum, in parts disturbing, uplifting and deeply shaming. Much of Albert Dock is a string of chain bars and tacky souvenir shops but it’s been designed well and I’d like to spend more time both here and on the waterfront. When it isn’t February.
With a couple of hours to spare the day ended in one of the great pubs of England, the Philarmonic. Think our own Barton’s in Newtown but more ornate, with friezes around the walls, leather armchairs and the only Grade I listed toilets in the country. There’s a lot more of the city we didn’t manage to see properly – cathedrals, the Liverpool One development, a whole tourist industry devoted to the Beatles, and a choice of river tours. They can wait for the next trip, which is bound to come. Liverpool’s such a good place you have to go back. Who’d have believed it?
