Hampton Court Palace

Hi,

I thought I would share some of the photos from our recent visit to Hampton Court Palace.  When we were staying in our caravan at Henley on Thames we made a trip over to Hampton to visit the palace.
We went quite late in the morning and this was a mistake due to the parking once we arrived!  We managed to park on a side road and walked up to the palace but I would definitely recommend an early arrival if you are driving.

I have always been interested in the Tudor period and have read widely in this area particularly historical novels by one of my favourite authors Phillippa Gregory.  Therefore, I was very excited about this visit.  One of the key parts of the visit that really struck me was the extent of the kitchens.  I had never really thought about the mechanics of feeding a Tudor court before and I must say I was overwhelmed by the extent of the these rooms within the palace.

The photos really do not do justice to all the organisation and facilities that were evident at the palace to feed Henry VIII and his court.  I found the audio guide for this section of the palace extremely informative and interesting.

The Great Hall was another highlight and the tapestries in there were absolutely amazing and it was easy to imagine how magnificent they would have been in their original colours in the Tudor era.

Loving my crafts as I do, I stood for ages just looking at these and imagining the hours of work that had been put into these.  You can most certainly see glimpses of what the original colours must have looked like but they must have been exceptional.  My family were very patient with me in the Great Hall whilst I was desperately trying to find one of the sets of initials of H and A that had been carved in the wood work during Henry VIII's relationship with Anne Boleyn.  I did have to admit defeat in the end and ask a guide to help me.

The stained glass windows in the Great Hall were another highlight and were beautiful to look at. Again, I don't think photos can do these justice.
We then went on to look at the newer part of the Palace which had been renovated during the reign of

The wall and ceiling painting were very extravagant and captured a lot of interest as we were walking through this area of the Palace.

The Palace was much larger than I had imagined and it took us ages to get around the whole of the building(especially with my time in the Great Hall).  It was definitely worth the money and I would happily visit again.  We managed to spend some time in the gardens but did not explore these as much as I would have liked.

During our visit we had our lunch in the cafe, which was quite reasonable.  I would definitely recommend a visit to Hampton Court Palace especially if you are intrigued by the Tudor period of history.  I will definitely be returning there in the future.

Bye for now

Von xxx