Hampton Court is a grand palace. Part of the building was constructed for Henry VIII, and he lived much of his life there. Later, Christopher Wren directed the expansion of the palace during the reign of William and Mary. Thus, it is an interesting combination of Tudor and Baroque architecture.
Getting to Hampton Court from London is quite a journey, about two hours on public transit, first all the way out to Kew Gardens on the Underground and then an hour on a bus. So, this trip is an investment in time.
Eyewitness Travel's London tells us that construction of Hampton Court was begun in 1514 for Cardinal Wolsey, Henry VIII's Archbishop of York. It was originally intended not as a royal palace but as a country house. Wolsey decided to give it to the king in 1528. Henry expanded the palace a great deal.
The Court has audio tours on hand-held devices. You have a choice of tracks of tour, with different tours for children and adults. The tours walk you through the various rooms of the palace. There is one for Henry VIII's rooms and one for William and Mary's rooms.
The audio tour told us that the tapestries, made with gold and silver thread, were enormously expensive even for their day.
Henry and Anne Boleyn had designed the Great Hall together, and it had been originally inlaid not only with H's for Henry, but also with A's for Anne. After her infamous execution, however, workers tried to carve out her initial everywhere it had been placed.
These were all public rooms, where people came to petition the king. The audio tour told us that having a bathroom in a place like this was part of what made Hampton Court so luxurious, they made it so easy to go to the bathroom. Given that I had needed to use a bathroom badly when we arrived after two hours' travel from London, and had to wait in a long line and then walk several hundred meters before I could use one, I found this frustrating.
The yeoman warder at the Tower of London told us that, before Howard was executed, she said that she wished she were Culpeper's wife. Culpeper of course was executed not long after she was.
The audio track told us that Howard had been one of Henry's favorite wives, and that he was quite hurt by her betrayal. It said that he cried in court when he found out.
I quite liked the audio tour of Henry VIII's apartments. It made me feel like I got to know him as a person as much as as a king. For instance, the recording told us that Henry had bad headaches from jousting injuries, as well as sores on his legs that would never heal. This made him seem more human.
Each room was more private than the next. Each would have a guard at the door, who would judge prospective entrants on the basis of their worthiness. William was very private and did not like to meet the public. By the time you got to the most inner rooms, it was like trying to get into Studio 54.
Further along, we got into the more intimate of William's apartments, where only his closest associates were allowed.
Mary died of smallpox in 1694. Devastated, William turned to overindulgence in food and drink. He was abandoned by his adolescent friend, Hans Willem Bentinck, because of his newfound favoritism toward Arnold Joost van Keppel. Many speculated that he was having homosexual relationships with one or the other of these men, but he and Bentinck were only reconciled on William's deathbed. It was a sad ending to his reign. [Names supplemented by Wikipedia.]
Sometimes, a light overhead would project colors and details onto the costume. Each one had a name and a description of whom he or she had been. From the number of female figures whose descriptions said "mistress of George I," or "alleged mistress of George I," etc., it seems George really got around. I guess he wanted to be sure no one started any of those gay rumors about him.
Poor Queen Carolyn. A sign said that she had a bad hernia, and that eventually her bowels began to protrude from it. Sounds extremely painful and disgusting! She eventually died of it.
On the whole, I very much enjoyed Hampton Court. The audio tours were excellent, and brought history to life for me. It was a long trip, though, such a long ride on the bus that we decided to take the boat on the Thames back. It would take 1:45, but it would be a lot more fun than a bus. Later, one of my friends told me that there is a train from south London that gets to Hampton Court in only 40 minutes. I don't know how often it runs, and it wasn't mentioned in the guidebook, but maybe you can benefit from this knowledge on a future trip to London.
Our Ottawa friends were still in town, so we met them for dinner in Covent Garden. The Underground station at Covent Garden is 15 stories deep! The escalators were under construction, so you had to wait for a lift. How annoying! Why are the stations so deep?
We had the traditional pub dinner. Eric had the fish 'n' chips and I had a chicken pie. This was something I had wanted to do, so it was good to check it off the list. It was quite an enjoyable day in spite of all the travel.
On to the British Museum and Bits of Westminster.