I have a small obsession with the Tudor dynasty. Well, specifically, Henry VIII and all his wives. I watched all 4 seasons of The Tudors practically without taking a break. (I may be slightly obsessive-compulsive.) I can't even begin to tell you how excited I was about visiting Henry's palace, Hampton Court Palace in East Molesey.
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| Breakfast on the go - organic porridge (oatmeal) with stewed fruits from Le Pain Quotidien. Holy crap was this good! |
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| Hampton Court Palace, main entrance. |
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| Base Court - imagine it full of people, drinking wine from that fountain. That's right, a wine fountain. |
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| Courtyard outside Master Carpenter's Court. |
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| Doorway in Henry VIII's kitchens. |
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| One of the spits used to roast meat. |
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| Ornate ceiling of the Great Hall. |
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| Great Hall. |
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| Board game. |
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| Lunch from The Privy Kitchen - Traditional Cornish Pasty. It was just a meat pie with gravy on it. |
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| Orange & raspberry juice. Yum! |
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| Fountain Court. Interesting juxtaposition of (old) Tudor chimneys vs (new) Baroque facade. King William III and Queen Mary II had planned to renovate the entire palace in the baroque style, but they ran out of money. |
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| Great Fountain at the far end. How crazy are those trees? |
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| New meets new: Baroque architecture of King William III vs Tudor style of King Henry VIII. |
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| Left or right? Hampton Court Maze. |
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| The Privy Garden. |
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| Iconic red phone booth outside Hampton Court Palace. |
While we spent most of the day exploring Hampton Court, it was too early to just call it a day. J and I decided to see what all the hub-bub of Herrods was about. We ended up taking a 3 hour walk. It was completely unintentional. And completely organic. It wasn't until the very end that we were both like "HUNGRY", "TIRED". But after all that walking and searching for food that sounded good, we just ended going skipping dinner and going home.
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| Harrods Department store. We got there after closing. |
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| Crowd waiting for Lady Gaga. We later read in the paper that her Little Monsters weren't too happy that she was over an hour late. |
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| We passed a McLaren showroom and proceeded to drool through the thick glass. |
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| Sunset over Hyde Park from the east end of the Serpentine. |
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| 3 miles! |
Previously:
Day 5: London/Greenwich
Day 4: London
Day 3: London
Day 2: Cambridge/London
Day 1: London
Day 1: London - prefunc
*All photos taken by me with Nikon D7000 unless noted.
Aww! Harrods is fun, but not for your wallet, so maybe better off :)
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