Liverpool

A dock basin ringed by warehouses, and by its own account the most-visited free tourist destination in North West England. Museums, galleries, bars and the Beatles Story all sit inside it.

The big Beatles museum, on the waterfront at the Royal Albert Dock. Open from 09.00 with last entry at 17.00; book a dated slot online rather than turning up.

10 Mathew Street, live music daily from 11am. It is a 1984 rebuild on the original site rather than the 1957 cellar, and it does not pretend otherwise.

The Royal Liver Building, the Cunard Building and the Port of Liverpool Building in a row facing the river. Free to look at, and best from the ferry or from Woodside on the far bank.

Hope Street and the grid around it: the finest Georgian terraces in England outside Bath, with a Gothic revival cathedral at one end of the street and a 1967 concrete one at the other.

Avanti West Coast to Liverpool Lime Street, averaging 2 hours 21 minutes. Lime Street opens straight onto the top of the city centre, ten minutes' walk downhill to the waterfront.

Frequent trains link the two cities in about the time it takes to cross either of them, so it is easy to base yourself in one and day-trip the other.

The underground loop covers the centre and runs out to the coast. The Mersey Ferry from Pier Head is a tourist cruise as much as a crossing now.

May to September for the waterfront, when the light on the Mersey in the evening is the reason people take the photograph.

January to March. The city is cheap, the free museums are warm, and the Georgian quarter is at its most severe.

Big match weekends at Anfield or Goodison, and any weekend with a stadium concert, when hotel prices double.

Pier Head and the Three Graces, then the ferry across the Mersey and back for the skyline.

Walk into the Royal Albert Dock and give the Beatles Story a couple of hours.

Eat in the dock warehouses, or walk up to Bold Street, which has the better independent kitchens.

Up Hope Street between the two cathedrals, through the Georgian terraces in between.

Mathew Street and the Cavern early, then the Baltic Triangle for bars in converted warehouses.

Both clubs run stadium tours and museums on non-matchdays. Tours sell out around fixtures, so book before you arrive rather than after.

Antony Gormley's Another Place: a hundred cast-iron figures standing along two miles of tidal sand, half of them under water at high tide. Merseyrail to Blundellsands.