HMY Britannia, Edinburgh

HMY Britannia once served as a yacht for Britain’s royal household and is now maintained as a museum ship at Ocean Terminal in Leith. She served the Royal Family from 1954 to 1997, carrying them on journeys across the world. During that career, Britannia covered more than one million nautical miles and reached more than 600 ports in 135 countries.

Her working life lasted 43 years, making this long, quiet vessel a remarkably far-travelled piece of British history. Look along the ship’s hull and superstructure: this is a functioning yacht preserved as a visitor attraction, not a replica built for display. Britannia was launched in 1953 at John Brown & Co.

in Clydebank and entered service in 1954. Her design placed unusual emphasis on comfort, with stabilisers intended to soften the ship’s movement and propellers modified after trials found that they produced an unwanted singing sound. During her career, she also carried out an extraordinary rescue mission: in 1986, she evacuated more than 1,000 refugees from the civil war in Aden.

Britannia made her final royal voyage in 1997 and was decommissioned that December. She now remains permanently berthed here, drawing over 300,000 visits each year.