Local History

If your idea of a Saturday night is getting out of the house and doing something then you could try something which doesn't involve a pub or a club!

Five museums in Great Yarmouth are taking part in a late-night opening on Saturday, 17 May, 2008, with admission changes scrapped for the evening.

Over the years, the town has become known as a bucket-and-spade holiday resort but it boasts a remarkable and industrious past, with a heritage quarter opening up around South Quay, where most of the town's museums are clustered.

The Elizabethan House, English Heritage's Great Yarmouth Row Houses, the Norfolk Nelson Museum, the Tolhouse and Time And Tide - just a short walk away on Blackfriars Road - will throw open their doors between 6 and 10pm.

You're bound to uncover something you didn't know, like the fact that Nelson docked his battleship in the town after the Battle Of Copenhagen or that mammoth bones have been dredged up from the seabed off the coast.

Taste the heritage

It's the third time that the museums' night has been held and this year's event promises to be more tasty than usual.

The Norfolk Nelson Museum will be dishing out dashes of rum and morsels of ships' food.

Great Yarmouth's herring history will be marked with some fishy servings at the Time And Tide Museum, while the row houses will be holding traditional jam and preserve tastings.

Talks and events

A range of talks and activities are being staged, including a short talk, Man The Guns, by Norfolk Nelson Museum curator Faith Carpenter, a tour of the weapons in the Tolhouse dungeons by historian Nigel Amies and a chance to tie some complicated knots at Time And Tide.

There will also be an opportunity to see a historic collection of police uniforms through the ages in a display by Norfolk police.

Those who make it around all five venues in the one evening will be entered into a competition to win a Heritage Quarter family pass - just pick up your entry form at the first museum you visit and get it stamped at each building for a chance to claim the prize.