//
Photo: Richard Rogerson, CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons
A 46-gun frigate launched in 1824 at Chatham Docks in Kent but immediately mothballed, so she was never fitted with masts, rigging or guns. Her hull was roofed over and her only sea voyage was in 1873 when she was towed north to Dundee to act as a training hulk. This means her original Georgian timbers are in unusually good condition. Her sister ship HMS Trincomalee can be visited in Hartlepool.
HMS Unicorn is a surviving sailing frigate of the successful Leda class, although the original design had been modified by the time that the Unicorn was built, to incorporate a circular stern and "small-timber" system of construction. Listed as part of the National Historic Fleet, Unicorn is now a museum ship in Dundee, Scotland, United Kingdom. She is the oldest ship in Scotland, one of the oldest ships in the world, and one of the last intact warships from the age of sail. As of January 2025, the ship is due to undergo restoration and relocation to a newly restored dry dock.
© OpenStreetMap contributors
Anglican cathedral in Decorated Gothic style by George Gilbert Scott, completed in 1855.
Often hosts concerts, bands and so on: the auditorium has a capacity of 2300. It's home to a grand 1923 Organ.
The Dundee branch of London's Victoria and Albert Museum, with a focus on design in Scotland. Its waterfront building is a striking modern design with an interior of ship's planking, as if Discovery next door had arrived as an Ikea flat-pack.
Small but interesting collection of mainly Scottish marques.
McManus is in three sections: a museum tracing Dundee's story, natural history museum, and art gallery; plus exhibitions. The building, a Gothic construction by George Gilbert Scott, opened in 1867 as a memorial to Prince Albert.
Discovery, launched in 1901, is an Royal Research Ship (RRS) specifically built for Antarctic exploration. She's a 3-masted wooden sailing ship with only auxiliary steam power, built in Dundee because its shipwrights still had expertise in polar sail-powered vessels that was being lost elsewhere. Discovery was commanded by Robert Falcon Scott, and also aboard was Ernest Shackleton. They reached Antarctica in early 1902 (austral summer), intending to spend one winter, but the ship became icebound for the next two years. They were just about to abandon ship in Feb 1904 when the ice broke and they escaped homeward to public acclaim. Both men were to return: Shackleton in 1907-09 didn't quite reach the South Pole, but survived. Scott in 1910-12 did reach it, but behind Amundsen, and all his party perished on the trek back to the coast. The museum has an extensive display of the 1902-04 expedition, then you go aboard the dry-docked ship, which had a later career as a polar merchant vessel.