Visitor Centre Café

I would highly recommend joining one of the tours here. The staff are so passionate and have an incredible amount of information about all the of the details of the buildings and the history of the people who have passed through here

Good public exhibits, though there seems to be more of an emphasis now on trying to sell you stuff, with a small cafe in-house. The signs at the entrance say the WCs are only for paying customers, but in practice that doesn't seem to be the case.

Visited during Easter and plenty to do with the children inside and to look around for free. There was plenty of other activities to do for money. Open and clean space to explore Available to purchase drinks from here

It is too humble for it to be called a visitor centre. It is basically a museum. Very educative and interactive/experienceable. It is a nice place to take young children for a couple hours stay. Then move to other museums around it.

It’s more than a visitor centre, more of a mini museum in its own right and well worth a visit. Also oddly attached to a pub! You can learn about how the painted hall was constructed - oddly more than when you visit the painted hall; the palace that used to be on the grounds; background of the naval college and pensioners; lift a lance, check out armour, see what has been dug up and more. There are also several exhibits for kids, from building with faux-stone to re-arranging the college buildings to improve on Wren’s design (adults might also like this) to ‘feel and guess’. We ended up spending an hour here with no trouble at all. The only bit that feels odd is the mezzanine level which suggests you can experience a battle but then the signs suggest it’s gory, only for kids over 10 and an extra charge. Despite the centre being busy, no-one went up there. It also seems only accessible by stairs with the lift being reserved for staff use. It also has toilets, a school room and multiple entrances (pub, the west) but come from the river and see a grand frontage with a ‘don’t sit or climb’ cannon.