Explore Bristol's biggest public Air Raid Shelter by joining the city’s only subterranean walking tour! Join us for an adventure through 1000 years of Bristol’s history. Your local guide will take you on a unique journey from the height of Bristol's trading past to the 1940’s Blitz before passing the swinging 60s to emerge in the city's vibrant present!
Enjoy privileged access to subterranean passageways, WW2 air raid shelters and rooms which once rocked to the best bands in the world!
This 2hr walking tour is focused on the heart of the Old Town and crammed with humour and history. The first half of the 1.5-mile route is above ground and explores the heart of the old town, fascinating back streets and St. Nicholas Market.
For the second half of the tour you’ll head beneath the streets for Bristol’s only subterranean experience. You’ll enjoy privileged access to parts of the city not usually open to the public.
Your guide will get into character to take you back to WW2 as you discover the city's biggest public air raid shelter and hear about the building’s role in the 1960s as a popular music venue.
Once you've been fascinated and amazed, you'll be spoilt for choice with places to eat, drink, and pick up the best local gifts in the nation's no.1 covered market!
Are you particularly interested in seeing the Air Raid Shelter and would you prefer focusing on that? See the host's Air Raid Shelter tour and Blitz Experience here.
Please note your booking is only confirmed once the host has accepted it and the status is showing as 'confirmed'.
Minimum fitness level required.
Adult | £14 |
Child (under 16) | £7 |
A very interesting tour. Really enjoyed it.
Very nice and interesting tour, highly recommendable if you would like to learn about Bristol his...
Fascinating tour through the history of Bristol. Would recommend for both Bristolians and visito...
So much hidden Bristol history brought to life by our enthusiastic and knowledgeable guide. Reall...
A very interesting tour. Really enjoyed it.
Very nice and interesting tour, highly recommendable if you would like to learn about Bristol history
Fascinating tour through the history of Bristol. Would recommend for both Bristolians and visitors to Bristol alike
So much hidden Bristol history brought to life by our enthusiastic and knowledgeable guide. Really needs to be preserved as a permanent museum.
I actually got this for my dad and mum for my dad's birthday. They absolutely loved it!
After they chatted about all the cool and interesting stuff they'd learnt, how the guide was super lovely and had a passion, how the overall experience was a passion project of the tour guide and mentioned the ghost that then appeared in the group photo!
M + themselves loads and the meeting point was in a hidden gem of Bristol so they got a lovely coffee and shopped after which was great.
This was a fantastic insight into a bit of Bristol's history.
Duncan was both informative and fun.
I would definitely recommend to friends.
Really enjoyed it, lots of information creatively delivered.
A very enjoyable and interesting tour made all the better by our guide Duncan who is extremely knowledgeable and amusing.
Such a special experience! Great tour guide, learnt a lot of very interesting facts about Bristol and very cool to go down the raid shelter. Would want to do it again in the future to be fair!
Absolutely brilliant! Duncan is an excellent tour guide, so informative with touches of humour. Lived in Bristol all my life and learnt so much, highly recommended, something you must do if living or visiting Bristol.
Duncan is an excellent guide. His enthusiasm and knowledge of the site, both above and below ground is wonderful. He has a good rapport with his audience and you could hear every word, even when a loud trolley passed. I'm pleased to see seats in the air raid shelter as when my sister went last year, she felt a little dizzy and there was nowhere to sit. Duncan injects humour with references to Margaret the ghost. We could see her clearly in the group photo that was sent to us. A brilliant time.
Really interesting and fun experience, well worth it
Really interesting.
Fascinating tour of an area I thought I knew. Excellent tour guide
Excellent way to spend a couple of hours and learn more about Bristol and the Corn Exchange building especially. Duncan was a great host (as was Margaret :-) )
I bought this tour as a gift and was impressed with Duncan’s knowledge and enthusiasm of the history of Bristol. I will be recommending to friend and family :)
I’d recommend this experience. I was born in Bristol and only recently came across it. A real gem. Great host. Great value too. Give it a go you won’t be disappointed
Host is brilliant!
Very informative and well put together.
Duncan is a great tour guide. His passion is infectious.
Duncan was so passionate and knowledge and we learnt so much about the city I've always called home seeing it from a totally different angle. Some interesting stories and facts not just about the air raid shelters but Bristol itself and it's history. Really enjoyed the experience.
This is a fascinating tour with a very enthusiastic guide who is a wealth of information. The tour is really wide ranging in content and my 11 year old has not stopped revisiting the facts shared since. The old air-raid rooms under The Corn Exchange should be a museum and are a triumph for local history. I would warmly recommend to any group across the ages.
Absolutely fascinating, I could have stayed another two hours. The tour starts above ground, with a quick historical guide to the area - really interesting to adults but the kids weren’t so into this part. However its not for long and both said it was worth the wait to then go down into the shelter! So much effort and research has gone into it, and you can really imagine being there with bombs falling above. Also, great to see ‘behind the scenes’ at St Nicks Market. Highly recommend
Very good tour and very well presented
Duncan was a brilliant guide, a very informative historian and had a vast amount of the war and generally of Bristol. He also had a good sense of humour. Thoroughly recommend this tour.
Excellent tour great informative host
Bought as a gift for my dad. He had a great time and would highly recommend!
This visit was given to us as a gift and whilst anticipating an interesting couple of hours the trip exceeded our expectations in every way.
For anyone who wants to know about the recent (WW2) and not so recent history of Bristol, this is a no-brainer. I have lived in Bristol all my life and I had no idea about the preserved underground air-raid shelter in the centre of Bristol. Guide (Duncan) was excellent.
An excellent tour for locals and visitors alike. The tour is very informative and eye-opening, and the Air Raid shelter is very thought provoking. Highly recommended.
A brilliant, absorbing, engrossing tour, sooo fascinating, Duncan the awesome guide oozed passion and enthusiasm…..The outstanding reviews say it all….. I could GO on and on ..so just GO!!
An excellent tour with a very knowledgeable guide. Thoroughly enjoyed it and would recommend it to people interested in Bristol, the blitz and the war
Very informative - a fascinating hidden world and a real glimpse back into the everyday experience of people in World War 2. An engaging and well-informed guide who worked well with all on the tour.
A fascinating insight into the history of a building and area in Bristol I knew little about. Duncan was both enlightening and entertaining with an obvious passion for his subject
Knowledgeable and friendly host with a good delivery, balancing facts with humour. Very enjoyable and informative whether you are familiar with Bristol or not.
Wonderful experience of historic Bristol
An excellent and entertaining tour taking us to locations that we wouldn’t have otherwise have access to.
Duncan was fab. Amusing and knowledgeable. And the tour was fascinating and something that should become a better known attraction.
A great guide who talks about various points of history. Great even if you've lived in Bristol for many years
Duncan was a Brillient tour guide very friendly and interesting the your was amazing that I’m buying tickets for members of my family
I found it all interesting. Duncan knows all about St Nicks. I will be recommending 👍
This was a really interesting tour. We live in Bristol but didn’t know about the air raid shelters or a lot of the history about the area. Duncan was a great tour guide and I have recommended friends to book a tour!
I bought this as a Christmas present for my dad and as a Bristolian and a history buff he loved it. I found the tour really interesting and thought that the host Duncan was fantastic. He was funny and really engaging. I would highly recommend this tour.
A great tour - interesting, fun and thought-provoking. Duncan is an excellent guide - passionate about his subject.
A very special tour
Loved it, anyone who likes history will love this
Absolutely amazing! Not too short, not too long! Diverse information about the history of Bristol as well as the unique attraction of the air raid shelters! Will absolutely be promoting the great work that Duncan does! This tour was absolutely amazing!
Such an interesting tour, lived in Bristol my whole life and didn’t know any of the facts told so was really amazing to learn. The bunker was super cool and not what I was expecting, Duncan was so funny and kept me entertained throughout but he knew his facts and could tell he loves what he does! Couldn’t recommend it more!!
A great couple of hours great fun and well worth the money, I have told friends who have already booked for a couple of weeks time
Great experience and lovely tour guide. Bring a brolly if it rains as first hour is outside. Shelter was fascinating and a unique adventure
new things to learn although have lived in Bristol for 50+years
Duncan is a great tour guide. The basement air raid shelter is something else!
Loved this tour of my home town. So interesting to hear the history and see what has been there all along unseen by most Bristolians. Your guide was great and really engaging. Would highly recommend
Excellent knowledge form the guide and fascinating history
A great tour with an excellent & knowledgeable guide
Duncan and Ross were fantastic, very informative throughout and helped me and my partner to discover things about an area of Bristol we regularly commute through! Would recommend to anyone
Excellent & unique tour. Have lived in Bristol for over 70 years but learnt many new facts about Bristol whilst on the tour. A great new attraction for the city made even better by the excellent guide Duncan. Have already recommended this tour to our friends.
Learnt so much history on this tour. A great solo activity!
Wonderful tour guide…very knowledgeable, interesting… he could not have been better!
My friend fancied the tour guide. Congratulations!
This was a great tour, knowledgeable guide with boundless enthusiasm for the subject. We saw lots of things that were interesting and I didn't know about. Thoroughly recommend and finished off with lunch in the market.
This tour very interesting, the host engaged and engaging. I learnt lots of interesting things about Bristol that I’d never previously known despite living here for over 40 years. I’d highly recommend this tour.
I thoroughly enjoyed the tour.
The first half was around the market, looking up and listening to lots of interesting facts about things I’ve never noticed before. Then we went down into the basement and the air raid shelter. Fascinating to see.
A very interesting tour led by a very knowledgeable guide. Excellent!
Great experience, have learned things about Bristol even though I am a Bristolian
We weren’t sure what to expect, but it was a thoroughly enjoyable and enlightening experience ! And look forward to paying another visit in the fullness of time when it becomes a museum ! Great experience
Fantastic tour, the host was brilliant. Really interesting subject matter, taught me many things about Bristol that I didn't previously know. Very good value for money too. Would recommend.
We loved this walk. Duncan is a great host, knowledgeable and well delivered. We don't live in Bristol but know the city reasonably well from uni years and learnt so much about both visible history at street level and the amazing air raid shelter. Felt it was really good value for money, have recommended to friends and family and I know one is about to book already!
This was a great tour. Genuinely enlightening and entertaining and the 2 hours flew by.
A privilege to be able to go 'behind the scenes' and into the depths (and heights!) of the Corn Exchange building. Very interesting and fun to see unknown territory.
Excellent and fun afternoon
Wholesome & fun day out. Me and my friend went together but this would be perfect for a date, family outing or solo trip! Duncan was a very kind guide and kept the energy going throughout which we were very impressed with! Interesting insights throughout so now I have loads of facts to tell my friends who visit Bristol :) the shelter was a highlight! So fascinating it's like a massive time capsule!!
Enjoyed it
Really enjoyed our trip
A great experience!
Excellent! Highly recommend. Tour guide was knowledgeable and entertaining. Fascinating getting to see parts of St Nics that aren’t usually accessible.
Really enjoyed the experience. Duncan was a great host. Funny and informative.
Guide very knowledgeable, informative and good interaction with group.
The tour was excellent. Our guide Duncan was very knowledgeable and enthusiastic with a lovely sense of humour. The tour was very interesting especially the air raid shelter. I have already recommended the tour to friends. It was amazing
The tour was informative and fun
Duncan is a fantastic host and we learnt a huge amount in two hours whilst having a great time. Despite living in Bristol for my whole life I definitely found out new facts and stories. The subterranean experience is amazing and very atmospheric, the tour of the exterior and roof is equally fascinating. This tour takes you from Anglo Saxon times all the way to the present day. A lovely way to spend a couple of hours if you’re new to the city, just visiting or a lifelong Bristolian. Thanks Duncan
Fantastic tour, great access to hidden parts of the city and a very enthusiastic and knowledgeable guide
I really enjoyed the tour on Saturday. Duncan was fantastic, overall I found it to be a very engaging session and as a result I still remember all the things explained on the day! I loved to know more about Bristol and learned a lot of stuff that I did not know was taking place in Bristol before WWII and back in time during the slave trade. Duncan really showed some amazing perks of St Nicks Market! I would really recommend to anyone to go and take the tour themselves as it's a great experience.
Learnt a lot about Bristol's history - great to be able to see the air raid shelter which otherwise wouldn't have been accessible
We absolutely loved this tour!! Having lived in Bristol for over 10 years I thought I knew a fair bit about the market and the area - but I was very wrong! Learnt so much on this tour and the energy and enthusiasm of the host was infectious! Would highly recommend to anyone, you will not be disappointed!
Fab experience learning about the history of the corn market & the unknown air raid shelter - recommended
Very interesting tour with an enthusiastic and knowledgeable host. We were privileged to look round the air raid shelter beneath the corn exchange that is not normally opened to the public. It would make a fascinating museum. Overall I learned a lot and would highly recommend the experience
Such an interesting tour with an excellent guide. Have lived in Bristol for 30 years yet learnt so much about this familiar area. The guide really bought history to life.
Very informative and great to see the air raid shelter. Duncan brought history to life.
This was a great tour, so interesting and Duncan the host was cool, funny and very informative. Altogether fantastic.
Initially I thought the group was too big to be comfortable but Duncan had a good loud and clear voice and made the whole experience very enjoyable. I would certainly recommend his tour.
Brilliant tour guide. Very knowledgeable, interesting & fun. Thoroughly enjoyed it . Learnt loads
Our host had done research to make the tour informative. I used to work in the area but had never looked up it was good to hear the history of the buildings and see the decorative facades. It was interesting to see the air raid shelter and learn the history of the corn exchange.
Highly knowledgeable guide, taking us to areas normally closed to the public. Highly recommended for Bristol residents and tourists alike!
A very enjoyable Tour with a very good host.
A very interesting insight into a part of Bristol I did not know existed.
Has inspired me to look up more and appreciate the architecture around us
this was brilliant - so informative and great fun - exploring part of the city which can go overlooked and to be able to access the air raid shelter was fabulous - would highly recomend
The St Nicholas Market and Air Raid Shelter Tour was a most informative yet entertaining history lesson of Bristol from Saxon times to present day. We finished the tour feeling well grounded in how the city developed and the activities and customs of the city forefathers, many which still impact our lives today. Well worth the ticket price. Thank you!
It was fun and packed with historic facts. I recommend it to everybody who wants to know a bit more about Bristol. Duncan is an excellent host.
Excellent tour. Very knowledgable host. Would recommend and even go myself again.
Great tour by Duncan
Duncan was very knowledgeable and had a sense of humour. I would definitely recommend👍👍👍👍👍👍
Extremely interesting.
Brilliant. Duncan was great and really engaged my war mad 11 year old. I’ve lived in Bristol for 14 years and learnt loads of stuff I didn’t know.
If you don’t know Bristol, this is a great place to start, & if you think you do, you’ll find out some things you didn’t. Highlights are access to the usually closed air raid shelter in the basement and the glories to be seen from the roof of the Corn Exchange, but there’s a lot more that you may have noticed before but didn’t know the stories behind. Duncan is a very knowledgeable and entertaining guide – recommended!
The Tour coincided with my (Senior) birthday and was a very appropriate event for me, as I used to frequent this part of Bristol in my younger days, but now live in N.Ireland. Our guide (Duncan), was excellent and provided both a witty and lively commentary of all the interesting features to be seen . I am a retired Military Sea-Captain, so there was a special interest for me here.
Thank you and Highly recommend the tour.
Really good tour. Duncan, the tour guide was extremely knowledgeable and engaging which made the whole tour very enjoyable, we learnt so much about the area and would highly recommend the tour to anyone else.
Duncan was an excellent tour guide
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