King William Walk, Greenwich, SE10 9HT

Phone:

020-8858 3445

Website:

www.rmg.co.uk/cuttysark

Opening times:

Daily 10:00–17:00

How to get there:

Station: Cutty Sark on DLR

Entry fee:

13.50 (Adults), 7 (children), 11.50 (concession), children under 5 go free

Additional information:

Disabled access to tween deck. Caffé and shop, ship is accessible

The Cutty Sark is the most famous and fastest of the great tea clippers, which raced each other annually to bring back the lucrative new-season China tea crop from the Far East. Now the only tea clipper to survive, she was built by the firm Scott & Linton at their shipyard at Dumbarton, on the Clyde, and launched in 1869. Her name comes from the short shirt of Paisley linen worn by the witch Nannie in Robert Burns’ poem ‘Tam O’Shanter’, who serves as the ship’s figurehead, grasping the tail of Tam’s grey mare in her hand. Elegant and sleek, with a great expanse of sail, the Cutty Sark cost £16,150, is 280ft long, weighs 938 tons and had a maximum crew of 28. At her fastest she covered 368 miles in a day. She worked in the China tea trade between 1870 and 1877, then carried coal from Shanghai to Sydney, wool between Melbourne and New York and, from 1885–95, wool between Australia and London. In 1924 she was restored as a tea clipper by Captain Dowman, and on his death was presented to the Thames Nautical Training College. Exhibited at Greenwich in 1951 as part of the Festival of Britain, she has been in dry dock there ever since, but recent survey work has revealed serious corrosion of her ironwork and an extensive programme of restoration is necessary, funds permitting.