Hampton Court Palace

Hampton Court Palace

So after the Tower of London, my next priority was Hampton Court Palace, home to so much Tudor History. I taught this subject a few years ago and was intrigued by it, so watched the entire series of "The Tudors" and loved every minute of it... So I had to go to Hampton Court Palace..

Caught the train on the District line to Wimbledon Station

Wimbledon Station

Then changed trains to the British National Rail and caught the train directly to Hampton Court Palace (all part of my travel card)

Hampton Court Station

Then just a quick 10 minute walk over the  bridge over the River Thames, and I'm there..

River Thames at Hampton Court

My London Pass got  me straight in and there I was... in the midst of history. it's a weird feeling to walk on the same land that Henry VIII and his lovely wives would've  walked...

I took heaps of pics today but I won't upload them all, I'll just try to give a flavour of the day...

 The Entrance..

Entrance to Hampton Court Palace

As you enter, you are given an audio guide, and that was fantastic... it really fleshed out all the things you were seeing in front of you. Because I had taught the Tudors, I had a reasonable idea of the sequence of events, but it was unbelievable to be actually in the buildings where many of these things happened. Just like yesterday, being where Anne Boleyn was be-headed.

I chose to stick with the Tudor tours, and I didn't get to the Georgian and Baroque stuff, but by the time I had done 3 separate Tudor tours, my head was full of history and it was mid afternoon, so I thought I would just leave it at the Tudors and maybe if I come back another time I might do the Georgian era then.

For those of you may not be aware of the Tudor History, here is a good link to find out some basic information
http://tudorhistory.org/places/hcp/

So, the first tour I went on with my audio guide was Henry VIII's apartments, and the first place it took us too was the Great Hall  - this was a real "wow" moment for me. To stand in the place where Tudor feasts would've actually happened was outstanding. I spent quite a bit of time here just looking around and soaking it all in...

The Great Hall - not my greatest pic!

They had the tapestries all around the walls to make the room warmer, and I found out they were made in Brussels - I knew there was something nice about Brussels...!!!!

Tapestries  in the Great Hall

Tapestries  in the Great Hall

They had a lot of information here too... thought some of these were classic...

 Some of the stained glass windows were outstanding too... unfortunately my camera couldn't really capture too many of them...

Stained Glass window in Great Hall - notice Henry VIII in the middle

They also had a lot of actors in period costume roaming around...

Henry VIII and Cardinal Wolsey and an assistant

This was the "waiting room" where courtiers would hope the King might walk through so they could plead their cause....

Waiting Room

I remember seeing all these places in the series "The Tudors". Have to watch it all again now!

Privy Council chamber - had a multimedia enactment of a discussion about the wedding to Catherine Parr

Henrys family portrait showing Edward and Jane Seymour who had died years before. Two princesses waiting in the wings!

Explanation of portrait above

Staircase with "Cardinal Wolsey" walking down

The second tour I went on was called "Young Henry VIII's story" and focused on the changing balance of power between Henry, Cardinal Wolsey and Catherine of Aragon - his first wife. Her main problem was that she failed to  produce a son and heir, so that's why he got rid of her. Wolsey's main problem was that he couldn't convince Rome to give Henry a divorce, so that's why he fell out of  favour - and he also was fiddling the books and taking a lot of state wealth for himself. Wolsey was the original owner of Hampton Court palace and gifted it to the King to try and remain in his favour...

Apparently he died of dysentery before he was executed - although there was also a  tale that he may have taken his own life.... Always something intriguing in this era...

They used these chairs in interesting ways to show how the power shifted around...

I love this painting of the Field of the Cloth of Gold where Henry took his whole court to France for a peace treaty and built his own palace there for a  2 week stay...

The final tour I did was Henry VIII's kitchens...

 

They had set up some great displays of how it was all done so I'll just add a few photos to give you the "flavour" so to speak!!

 

Meat preparation

This lane was carefully devised to keep the sun out and the damp in- a kind of fridge for the food

Giant open fire for roasting food

Some of Henry's wine in the wine cellar

Last thing I did was have a quick look around the gardens...

 

 



And just a few more views to  finish off...

So that was some of my day at Hampton Court Palace. There's so much more I could've put in but it would just be too long... even this lot is a mini-saga!

And to top off a lovely day, tonight I went out for tea with a friend's niece (Hi Kerry and Shelley!) called Karys who is currently living over here. It was so lovely to actually sit and have a conversation with someone - something I don't think I've really done since I had dinner with that lovely American couple in Bayeux.

We met up at Bond St station and found a nice pub and we both had a good steak and some NZ wine!

What a lovely way to finish a very pleasant day.