In the War Rooms (just to bring the tone down) keep an eye out for Winston's "gazunder". I think this might be a handy hint for anyone taking children around, in particular.

I visited and enjoyed both. But if your wife isn't much into military history, I'm pretty sure that the Cabinet War rooms will be more to her liking.

As a museum groupie, I've always found the IWM just another museum. Far too much military hardware for my taste, and the "daily life under wartime conditions" features - well, Britain is swamped by similar displays. Fine if you like military hardware or haven't seen too many "daily life in.." displays lately, but...

The Cabinet War Rooms, OTOH, I found rivetting. You really do get the feeling you're seeing one very specific slice of WW2 life neat, as it was, and without any curator selecting or editorialising. That hackneyed old phrase about "you feel as if you'd stepped back in time": usually you don't and that's just what a museum's PR people are putting out. At the War Rooms, I really did feel like that

I appreciate everyone's rsponses. We ended up visiting only the IWM. We were on a tight schedule and it wasn't realistic to see both museums. That being said, I came away very satisfied. The fact that the IWM is housed in the former Bethlem ('Bedlam') psychiatric hospital made the trip even more interesting. The main viewing room of the museum blew me away. I'm very interested in war machinary, esp WWII, and there was plenty to be seen. Well preserved WWII planes and tanks reprsenting UK, US, Germany, and USSR were fascinating. I'm not sure where else I would ever see intact German V1 and V2 rockets either and where else would it be more fitting to view these than in London?
A tour of the main room was give nwhen we arrived which provided a good deal of insight. There were a lot of other displays including WWI, WWI (especially), and a variety of other wars and war topics. I liked the fact that the museum seemed to have a perspective and interest beyond We did not view the post WWII sections of the museum. Next time we'll see the War Rooms.

thanks for reporting back, buckley11.

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