Trip Report- Liverpool and the Beatles (Part 3)

Queue Jumper- in England????

We arrived at Liverpool Lime street station at 13:43 pm, where we encountered our first queue jumper. The there was a long line for a taxi. But as three taxis pulled up, the last people in the queue, a group of young men, stepped off the sidewalk queue line, intercepted the taxi and got in. My wife pointed accusingly at the taxi driver and then pointed at the front of the long line, but the driver gave a shrug and drove off with the queue scofflaws.

After the three taxis left, no more appeared for some time, so I hailed an uber and we took that to our hotel….

The Hard Day’s Night hotel.

Our reason for visiting Liverpool was the Beatles. It would be non-stop Beatles for three days and we knew we had to stay at the Hard Day’s Night hotel, which is a Beatles-themed hotel with memorabilia, photos, posters, old newspaper articles and videos about the Beatles in the lobby and restaurants. We thought we were in 7th heaven.

The hotel was very nice. We had a large corner room with high ceilings and four drafty windows that looked down onto North John street. Fortunately, there was no traffic noise in the evening. Our room had photos of the Beatles, with a giant photo mural of John Lennon over the bed.

The large bathroom actually had its own enclosed shower and separate tub. The bathroom lighting was dim with spot ceiling lights over the sink, tub, toilet, giving it a stage lighting effect, which with my older eyes was annoying.

The hotel was in a prime location, as Mathew Street, where the Cavern Club is located is just around the corner in an alleyway. We were also a fifteen minute walk to Albert Dock, and down the street from a busy pedestrian mall of shops and eateries.

The day before we checked in, we received an email from the hotel offering to upgrade us for and additional £100/night to the John Lennon Suite that had a white grand piano. We declined because it was too expensive to add on top of what we were already paying per night for three nights

The hotel had a strict 3 pm check-in and would not let us check in even at 2:30 pm. They other people the same thing. That was OK with us. It was raining outside, so we walked around the hotel and looked at all the Beatles memorabilia until 3pm. I suspected the rooms were ready because at exactly at 3 pm, they told us our room was ready to check in. We checked in, unpacked, rested for a while, …

Sunday Roast – Hawksmoor Liverpool

and then walked a few blocks away to the Hawksmoor Liverpool for our 4:30 pm reservation for Sunday roast, which was delicious and filling. Even though I am aware of what Yorkshire pudding is, I’m always surprised that it’s a popover, which I love to soak up the gravy. The restaurant was crowded and noisy with families all having Sunday Roast. In fact, they didn’t have an alternate menu, it was Sunday roast or nothing.

Upon hearing our American accents, the waiter spent some time talking to us, telling us he was a Scouser because he was born and lived all his life across the Mersey river.

As we walked back to the hotel, the streets were full of fans dressed in Everton F.C royal blue. Later, both our bus tour guide and our walking tour guide said they were Everton fans.

Day 17

Breakfast was included in our hotel stay. It was an English breakfast buffet- so I could avoid the black pudding and baked beans. This morning we shared the breakfast area with a Gate 1 tour group. Like Rick Steves tours, they had a daily itinerary posted by the elevators for their group, and anyone else, to review. It was a free day for them or they could visit the cathedral.

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At breakfast, we spoke to a couple on that tour at the next table and asked them what they were going to do today. They had blank look on their faces and asked us what we doing today. We told them about the Beatles tours we were taking and they were surprised that Liverpool had anything to do with the Beatles and yes, they liked the Beatles. They hadn’t done any research or planning. Tomorrow they were visiting the lake District for one day before arriving in Glascow the following day. I hope they found something they were interested in seeing on their one day in Liverpool.

Magical Mystery Tour

We left the hotel at 9:30 for the 10:30 Magical Mystery Bus tour that started at Albert Dock. Again, I overestimated how long it would take us to walk to it. it only took 15 minutes to walk the 0.6 mile, via the pedestrian shopping mall to Albert Dock. So we had lots of time to wait in line to board the bus.

This bus tours sells out, so it’s important to buy tickets in advance and early.

The bus tour took us to places outside the Central downtown areas such as Penny Lane and Strawberry Fields, where we all got out for pictures. The bus also pointed out Ringo and George’s childhood homes that were privately owned and not open to the public. Between stops, the bus played Beatles music and we all sang along.

The bus also stopped for us to get pictures from the sidewalk outside of Paul’s and John’s childhood homes. We also had tickets to visit inside the homes on Wednesday.

We enjoyed the bus tour and we felt we would have missed out on Beatles sites if we hadn’t taken the tour. Plus the singing and tour guide’s commentary added to the fun.

As an alternative, we saw private taxis that were offering a Fab4 tour of the same sites the bus visited, so if you don’t like being with enthusiastic, photo-taking, loud singing tourists, that would be another way to go. Of course, the private tours would be more expensive.

Cavern Club

The bus tour ended near Mathew Street, and since the Magical mystery bus tour is part of the same company that owns the Cavern Club and the Cavern Restaurant, we given tickets for a free entry into the Cavern Club and 10% food discount at the Cavern Restaurant across the street, where we did eat lunch.

After lunch, we crossed the alley and ventured down the steps to the underground cavern club. It’s not the real cavern club from the 60’s – that was demolished a long time ago, but a re-creation of the original floor cavern floor plan. Close enough for me.

We visited for 45 minutes down inside the Cavern Club looking at all the memorabilia on the walls and listening to a solo musician play Beatles songs. We bought Cavern souvenirs from the bar staff, who between serving drinks, pulled merchandise from behind glass cabinets for us to examine and buy.

I’m not sure the visit is worth the £6 entry fee, but with a free entry ticket, why not?

Since the hotel was just around the corner, we returned to it to drop off our Cavern Club purchases and we decided to rest for a bit, before visiting the Liverpool Beatles museum, which was 200 feet down the alley from the Cavern Club.

Beatles Museum

The Beatles Museum was created by Roag Best, the half-brother of Pete Best, the original Beatles drummer who was replaced by Ringo Starr. The museum is housed in a five story building with each floor dedicated to a different period in Beatles History.

We spent 2 hours here and could have stayed here longer but the museum closed at 6 pm.

From here, we walked to the next street over for dinner at Turtle Bay, which served Caribbean food and we had pina coladas and strawberry daiquiris with our dinner. It was OK, but at least it was a change of pace from fish and chips.

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Day 18

Hotel breakfast again. As we passed the front desk lobby, there was an older American woman complaining to the clerk that her bathroom didn’t have an outlet for her to use the hair dryer, which was provided.

The clerk explained that for safety reasons no hotel bathroom in England had an outlet. I knew it was part of the British Electrical code. My wife knew this also, but she was miffed that there was no outlet near the mirror in the room.

The hairdryer cord didn’t stretch far enough from the outlet so that she could blow dry in front of the mirror. I had to jury-rig my US extension cord for my CPAP with UK adapter on the outlet end to a US to UK adapter for the hair dryer. I guess I could have asked the front desk for one.

Beatles Walking Tour
After our hotel breakfast, we walked ten minutes through the pedestrian mall to the Bluecoat Building on School Lane to meet our guide for a Beatles Walking tour. Since it’s a walking tour, it didn’t go out to Penny Lane or Strawberry fields, so in that respect, the tour covered new ground as we listened to the guide give excellent and informative commentary about the Beatles and the formation of the Beatles tourist industry.

And yeah, he agrees- Yoko Ono did not break up the Beatles- the Beatles broke up the Beatles.

We stopped at a Statute of a faceless Eleanor Rigby. There was a school tour group there also, and their guide asked someone in their group to sing the lines from “All the Lonely People” that mentions Eleanor Rigby. Can you do it?

Other statues included Brian Epstein, some really ugly Beatles statutes, and a creepy statute of Mother Mary? that honored the Beatles.
We stopped in front of buildings and murals that had a Beatles connection. This walking tour actually walked down Mathew Street and we stopped at several spots in the alley, as the guide pointed out significant details including a statute of Cilla Black, who went from a coat-check girl at the Cavern Club to chart-topping singer. (Cilla is well known in Britain, but unknown to most US visitors).

The guide talked about the Cavern Club and it’s original entrance (now boarded up), but the tour did not enter the cavern. (which was OK, since we had been there yesterday.) And the tour ended at the Waterfront by the Beatles statutes at Pier head. It was a complementary tour to the magical mystery tour and covered different things, so we were glad to have taken both tours.

We did ask our tour guide if we should visit the Beatles Story Museum at Albert Dock, and being the cautious diplomat, he said that the if you know nothing about the Beatles, then this would be an excellent way to learn about it, as there were interactive displays and re-creations of Beatle sites. He said people on the cruise ship stop visited it because it was walking distance from the cruise pier, but he felt that if we enjoyed the Beatles Museum collection and understood the history of what we were seeing, then visiting the Beatles Story would be a Disneyesque experience. So we decided to skip it. Maybe next time.

Mersey Ferry cruise

The end of the walking tour at the Beatles Statute at Pier Head was right next to the Fab4 café, where we had sandwiches and soft drinks for lunch. Other than the name of the café, there’s nothing special or related to the Beatles in any way. And the food was dismal to average.

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In the same building with the café, we bought our tickets at the Mersey ferry ticket office for a 50 minute cruise on the river. Of course, my wife was humming the song “Ferry Across the Mersey” by Gerry and the Pacemakers as we boarded the boat.

The boat ride had a free audio app that we downloaded onto my iPhone. My wife never brings her earbuds, so I gave her my airpod for the right ear, because I know that’s the one she always asks for and I listened to the audio in my left ear.

The app uses the iPhone’s GPS, so each segment plays as we got to specific spots in the river. The app was informative and we felt needed as the boat tour doesn’t do any commentary other than handing us a brochure with a map pointing out the significant buildings on the river banks.

We walked back to the hotel where I received an email stating that our pub quiz in London was cancelled. I love pub quizzes and trivia nights, so I googled pub quizzes in Liverpool on Tuesday nights and found that a nearby bar, the Tempest on TitheBarn had a pub quiz starting at 6:30 pm. I called and made a table reservation.

Pub Quiz Night in Liverpool

We walked from the hotel the short two blocks at 6:00, since I didn’t know how long it would take to get there. But it only took 10 minutes. Early as usual. We talked to the bartender who showed us to our reserved table in front of the trivia host.

At pubs, we ordered our food and drink at the bar, paid for it there, got our drinks. The food would be brought out to our table. The bartender, upon hearing our American Accents, was very chatty and wanted us to visit the Railway pub down the street at 18 Tithebarn for a drink to see its ornate and historic interior. So maybe next time.

As usual, I had a pint of cider, that I learned to love from my last visit to England, and cider from the tap is the way to go. I also ordered the fish and chips and my wife has the salmon burger. It’s typical pub food, so nothing gastronomically special. We’re here for the trivia.

As we found out at pub quizzes we attended this trip, the printed start time is just a suggestion. People were just arriving at 6:30 pm and the actual start time was 7 pm. Every table in the house was filled, mostly with young people, so there were 23 teams playing that evening.

We always introduce ourselves to the trivia host as each trivia is run differently. We downloaded an app called Speed Quizzing and connected to their Wi-Fi. All answers were input in the app. The downside of using an app to play trivia, is that the quickest fingers get the most points and when you’re old….

We had to pick a name for our team, and we chose Quizzy-4-nia, that made it obvious we were from California. Next time, we are going to be “I left my Smarts in San Francisco.” I guess the place doesn’t get many Americans playing trivia, so the host was sure to mention our presence here “all the way from the States.”

Of course, the trivia questions are geared to a young British crowd. So, for example, we had no idea what color Leicester Square is on a Monopoly Board. But in the end, we came in 6th out of 23 teams with our winning answer to the question: number these 5 US states from largest to smallest. Can you do it? Rhode Island, Texas, Florida, Hawaii, California. Go.

Day 19

This was our last day in Liverpool and since the national Trust Beatles Childhood homes tours only run Wednesday- Saturday. We had no choice but to book it today as we were leaving by train to London in the afternoon. I usually leave our travel days open and do not schedule tours or events on those days.

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We checked out of our room and left our bags with the hotel. We walked a few blocks to the Moorfields Merseyrail station and bought 2 return tickets to Liverpool South parkway from the ticket agent. With our senior discount, each return ticket was £3.45. What a deal!

National Trust’s Beatles Childhood Homes tour

The train took 20 minutes and again, we found ourselves at our destination 45 minutes early. So we had a coffee in the café. The NT shuttle bus picked us up from Bus Stand #2 and drove us first to Mendips, John’s childhood home for a 45 minute guided tour and then to Paul’s childhood home on Forthlin Road for a guided tour for the remaining time.

Prior to booking our tour, I knew that there was a piano in Paul’s childhood home and I heard that after the tour of the small house, there was free time to sit in the living room and play the piano or the guitar that was there. The NT bus driver actually encouraged us to play the piano.

So after buying our tickets three months in advance, I brushed up on my piano skills and first learned and memorized, Imagine. But my wife reminded me that song was written by John Lennon. So I switched to Hey Jude, written by McCartney.

Paul’s childhood home is small, so after the guided tour, we were free to go upstairs and see his bedroom. There was also the bathroom where Paul said he practiced a lot here because the acoustics were good but it was blocked off by plexiglass, so you couldn’t go in and test the acoustics for yourself.

We went back downstairs to the living room and I had my wife take a video with her iPhone of me playing (badly) Hey Jude on Paul’s childhood piano.

This was a bucket list item and the highlight of my trip to Liverpool. I got applause from the other visitors.

There was also a guitar in the room also and after checking that it was stringed for a right handed person (Paul is a leftie and his guitars are strung and tuned for a left hand,) my wife I suggested that I play “When I’m Sixty four” – that she knew I could play from memory.

Paul wrote the song in this house when he was 14 and my wife took a video of me singing the first verse and playing the guitar. Again, a bucket list item for me and another highlight of my trip in Liverpool.

The NT shuttle bus took us back to Liverpool South Parkway and we took the train back to Moorfields station.

We walked over to the pedestrian mall to find lunch and decided on a place called “tortilla” that boasted authentic California tacos and burritos. It was set up like a Chipotle restaurant. Unfortunately, it was nothing like a taco or a burrito in California and in fact it wasn’t very good. I sure hope the Liverpudlians who eat here don’t think this food has an authentic taste, because it’s not.

We walked back to the hotel and retrieved our bags from storage. There was a taxi line outside the hotel and there was a taxi parked steps from the front door, but the taxi driver said we couldn’t get in. We had to walk 100 feet or so to the front of the line and take the first taxi in line. Where was he when we had the queue jumpers at the railway station?

The taxi fare was only £4.30 on the meter, but I saw the driver alter the fare up to £5. He didn’t need to do that as I would have upped the fare to £5 as a tip. I paid the driver in cash.

The train from Liverpool Lime Street to London Euston was a 2 hour quiet and pleasant ride. No loud party groups of women on our train.

I’m sure there’s other things to see and do in Liverpool other than the Beatles. But Liverpool has finally realized the cash cow of tourism by focusing on the Beatles.

(To continue the trip report, go here for London)

What a great report, derek. Thank you for so many details, and it sounds like a fabulous visit to Liverpool, taxi experiences notwithstanding.

The Eleanor Rigby statue … I guess her face was still in a jar by the door.

And boy, what a creepy statue in that link you included! Maybe it was a Lady Madonna, and nothing like Paul’s real mother, Mary.

Getting to play Paul’s piano (I understand that it was his father who was the real pianist in the house) was a far better experience than having a white grand piano in the expensive, upgraded Lennon Suite at the hotel. Maybe every reservation gets that “upgrade” offer at the last minute, until somebody takes it? I wonder if they also had a George Harrison Suite, with a sitar?

And pub quizzes … does a good score get you anything, other than the fun times? Sixth place was a pretty good result out of so many other teams - are there prizes? Or just for the best overall score? Maybe most of those other teams were there more for the cider, or had simply downed a lot more. :-)

Thank you again for the enjoyable report, and happy continued travels!

"I stood nonchalantly and walked to the luggage rack" you may as well have worn an Uncle Sam outfit! Did you check for the large bag spaces under the seats? You did well to escape the hen party, they are rowdier than the men! Very odd about the lack of taxis waiting at Lime St station, too many is often a problem! But the taxi back to the station is interesting, it's only half a mile on foot but due to the insane traffic system (which I admit is made worse by the tunnel entrance road slicing through) the journey by taxi would be at least 3 times the distance! The add-on sounds like a baggage fee, but those licenced by Liverpool City Council can't do that, I wonder if you stumbled on an out of town licence, this is becoming something of a political issue and hopefully will be dealt with soon.

Generally at a pub quiz the entry fees are divvied up into prizes. Exactly how varies from quiz to quiz. Sometimes it’s hard cash, sometimes a bar tab. You might also get prizes for bonus rounds and things like that. The pub makes money from selling drinks on a midweek evening.

Great trip report Derek, I enjoy reading your very detailed reports and aporeciate the time you take to write them.

I often wonder what Liverpool would do without the Beatles. It's safe to say that the city has absolutely milked them for all their worth. I've been there, visited a couple of Beatles sites and a few non-Beatles places and I have no reason to return. Outside of the Albert Dock area it's still pretty much run down and symptomatic of the decline in former northern industrial powerhouses. There's still an enthusiastic live music scene however and it's worth seeking out some gigs whilst there.

JC - I think that you are really doing Liverpool a disservice. There is a lot of Beatles stuff which brings in a lot of overseas visitors but I have no particular interest and yet fins a great deal to do on my visits there.

There are two very different cathedrals to see and between them on Hope St, the fine Art Deco Philharmonic Hall, the equally fine Philharmonic pub and particularly its gents toilet and the Everyman Theatre, probably responsible for developing the careers of more iconic actors than anywhere else in the UK. Then there is the Walker Art Gallery, the Museum of Liverpool, the Three Graces, the Western Approaches Museum, the Huskisson Tunnels and Another Place in Crosby. Then there is the Lever Art Gallery and the associated model village at Port Sunlight just across the river. And that's without the current redevelopments of the Tate Gallery and the Maritime and Slavery Museums.

As you say the music scene is also good, although not a patch on Manchester's. But in truth Manchester is currently the best place in the UK for music.

Just to add to the sites of Liverpool, there is also the historic palm house in Sefton Park, Anthony Gormley’s installation ‘Another Place’ on Crosby Beach, the ferry across the Mersey, two successful football teams, and a thriving restaurant and bar scene.

The city has some superb architecture especially Georgian and if you go over the river to Birkenhead there is even more in Hamilton Square which has the most Grade 1 listed buildings outside of London. Birkenhead Park is also Grade 1 listed and apparently was the inspiration for Central Park. If you want to go back further in time there is Birkenhead Priory, founded in the 12th Century.

I do think tourism in the city does focus too much on the Beatles but I can understand why they do it as it is still a massive draw.

I also agree that large areas of the city are very run down especially the inner suburbs, but putting a more positive spin on it there are also some really interestIng regeneration projects taking place looking to repair and preserve buildings whilst supporting the local community. Despite its problems, or maybe because of them, Liverpool still has a strong community spirit with many working together to improve things. Not of much interest to the average tourist but if you have an interest in urban renewal they are worth a look.