The Beatles in Liverpool: which sites are free, which need a ticket, and how to reach them

On Saturday 6 July 1957 the parish church of St Peter, in the Liverpool suburb of Woolton, held its summer fete. Among the attractions was a skiffle group of schoolboys called the Quarrymen, who played from the back of a lorry and then in a field behind the church. Their singer was sixteen and his name was John Lennon.

That evening, while the group set up for a dance in the church hall across the road, a friend brought over a boy of fifteen who could tune a guitar and knew all the words to the songs. Paul McCartney joined the group a few weeks later. The hall and the church are still there, and they show the difficulty of a Beatles day in Liverpool: the places where the story happened are ordinary streets, eight or nine kilometres from the city centre, while the museums that tell it are by the waterfront. You need a plan for each half.

In the city centre, on foot

Free

• Mathew Street. A narrow lane of old fruit warehouses. The Beatles played the Cavern Club here 292 times between February 1961 and August 1963. The original cellar was closed in 1973 and filled in during work on the underground railway. The club you enter today was rebuilt in 1984 on part of the same site, reusing bricks from the old one. It charges a small entry fee at some hours.
• The statue at the Pier Head. The four of them, larger than life, walking towards the river. It was put up in 2015, fifty years after their last concert in the city.
• Eleanor Rigby. A bronze figure on a bench in Stanley Street, round the corner from Mathew Street.
• The Museum of Liverpool. The city's own museum at the Pier Head, free, with a section on its music.

Mathew Street, where the Cavern Club was and is. Photo: Stephen McKay, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0.

With a ticket

• The Beatles Story, at the Royal Albert Dock. The large one: a walk through rebuilt scenes, from Hamburg to Abbey Road, with an audio guide.
• The Liverpool Beatles Museum, on Mathew Street. Several floors of original objects, instruments, clothes and letters, collected by the family of Pete Best, the drummer before Ringo Starr.
• The British Music Experience, in the Cunard Building at the Pier Head. British pop music since 1945 as a whole. The Beatles are one chapter of it, not the subject.

In the suburbs

Free

• Penny Lane. A real street, and the name of the district around the junction at its top end, where the bus shelter in the middle of the roundabout and the barber's shop of the song still stand. The street signs were stolen so often that the council took to painting the name on the walls.
• The gates of Strawberry Field. On Beaconsfield Road, in Woolton. Strawberry Field was a Salvation Army children's home whose wooded grounds Lennon climbed into as a boy. The red gates on the road are copies, and you can stand in front of them without paying.
• St Peter's churchyard. A gravestone here carries the name Eleanor Rigby. McCartney has said he made the name up, and may have seen it here without remembering.
• The two houses, from the pavement. Mendips, at 251 Menlove Avenue, where Lennon lived with his aunt Mimi from 1945 to 1963, is five minutes on foot from Strawberry Field. McCartney's family home, 20 Forthlin Road, is about a mile away.

One of the Penny Lane signs, painted on the wall because the metal ones kept being taken. Photo: Rept0n1x, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0.

The red gates of Strawberry Field, on Beaconsfield Road. Photo: Rodhullandemu, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.

With a ticket

• Strawberry Field. Behind the gates the Salvation Army opened a visitor centre in 2019, with an exhibition about the home and the song, and the garden.
• Inside the two houses. Both belong to the National Trust and are furnished as they were in the 1950s. They are seen only on the Trust's own guided tour, by minibus, in small groups. Places are few and go weeks ahead. You cannot knock on the door, and people live in the neighbouring houses.

Mendips, 251 Menlove Avenue, John Lennon's home from 1945 to 1963. Photo: Rodhullandemu, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.

How to reach the suburbs

• By bus. Frequent city buses run from the centre along Smithdown Road to the Penny Lane junction in about twenty minutes. From there to Strawberry Field is three kilometres, a pleasant walk across Calderstones Park, or another short bus ride.
• By tour coach. The Magical Mystery Tour, a two-hour coach trip, leaves from the Royal Albert Dock, stops for photographs at Penny Lane, Strawberry Field and outside the houses, and ends at the Cavern.
• By taxi. Several firms run Beatles tours in black cabs, which can stop where a coach cannot. Agree the route and the length first.

None of these takes you inside the houses. Only the National Trust tour does.

Reading the partner's listings

• Liverpool Beatles Museum entry ticket. Entry to the museum on Mathew Street.
• Strawberry Field entry ticket. Entry to the visitor centre and garden in Woolton. Getting there is up to you.
• British Music Experience entry ticket. Entry to the museum at the Pier Head.
• Two audio walks of the centre, one on the maritime city and one on the waterfront. Both pass the Pier Head and the Cavern Club, with commentary in the partner's app. No entry tickets are part of them.
• A listing that pairs Anfield stadium with a city audio tour is about football, and its list of inclusions mentions only the audio tour. Read what is written before you pay.

These are the tickets and audio walks our partner sells in Liverpool, with today's prices:

• on WeGoTrip Museum & Attraction Tickets British Music Experience: Entry Ticket 4.7 (104) Book on WeGoTripfrom263 kr
• on WeGoTrip Museum & Attraction Tickets Strawberry Field: Entry Ticket 4.8 (39) Book on WeGoTripfrom175 kr
• on WeGoTrip Museum & Attraction Tickets Liverpool Beatles Museum: Entry Ticket 4.5 (93) Book on WeGoTripfrom270 kr
• on WeGoTrip Cultural Tours Liverpool: Maritime Heritage Audio Tour 1 hours Book on WeGoTripfrom72 kr
• on WeGoTrip Sightseeing Tickets Liverpool: Self-Guided Audio Walk Through the Waterfront and Heart 1.5 hours Book on WeGoTripfrom103 kr
• on WeGoTrip Walking Tours Liverpool: Anfield Stadium Ticket & City Landmarks Audio Tour 2 hours4.8 (194) Book on WeGoTripfrom423 kr

Sold and delivered by WeGoTrip. You book on their site at their price; Viaqui may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you.

How much time

One day covers both halves. Spend the morning in the suburbs, when the pavements at Penny Lane and the gates are empty, and come back to the centre for a museum and Mathew Street in the afternoon. With half a day, stay in the centre and choose one museum: The Beatles Story for the whole tale told in order, the museum on Mathew Street for real objects.

Liverpool is a little over two hours from London by direct train and under an hour from Manchester. Lime Street station is ten minutes on foot from Mathew Street.

From here

The Beatles Story sits among the brick and iron warehouses of the Royal Albert Dock, opened in 1846. The Museum of Liverpool is next to them on the waterfront, and the ferry across the Mersey leaves from the landing stage in front of it. Hours for the Liverpool Beatles Museum are on its page. For the rest of Liverpool, or a route through the north of England, open the trip planner for the United Kingdom.

Cover photo: NH53, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0.