Liverpool owes its looks to the sea. The three great buildings on the waterfront, the Royal Liver Building with its two bronze Liver birds, the Cunard Building and the Port of Liverpool Building, are known as the Three Graces, and they were built in the early twentieth century when the city was one of the richest ports in the world. The Albert Dock, with its brick warehouses, is now a place to eat and visit museums, but it also tells the story of the trade that made Liverpool, including the dark chapter of its role in the slave trade, which the International Slavery Museum examines frankly. The city lost its UNESCO listing in 2021, after arguments over new development along the waterfront.
Music is the other pillar. The Beatles came from here, and the Cavern Club in Mathew Street, rebuilt on the original site, is still a pilgrimage. The city has two cathedrals, the Anglican one, the largest in Britain, built of red sandstone through most of the twentieth century, and the modern Catholic one, a round tent-like building from the 1960s, at opposite ends of Hope Street.
The ride that starts here crosses the Mersey through the Queensway Tunnel to Wirral, then heads west along the North Wales coast and into Snowdonia, to Blaenau Ffestiniog, where slate was quarried on a vast scale. The mountains of Wales rise ahead, and the weather changes quickly: sun on the coast, rain in the hills. The A470 over the Crimea Pass is a fine road, climbing through bleak moorland with views of slate tips, and it can be misty and wet even in summer.
Liverpool has fuel in abundance, and the city is famous for scouse, a stew of lamb or beef and potatoes, which is a hearty meal after a cold ride. Parking a bike near the docks is easy, though you should always use a good lock. Be careful on the wet setts around the old warehouses, which are slippery, and leave early so that the Welsh hills fill the afternoon.