Friday, Sept 25, Hampton Court Palace, near London

Sally and I were on our way by 9:30 AM, by car, to Hampton Court Palace, where King Henry VIII lived at one time.  I appreciated that Sally was brave enough to drive.  It involved looking at a couple of different maps, and planning the route, and then, having to make adjustments along the way.  Normally it's about an hour's drive, but we took almost 2 hours.  Fine with me, but frustrating at times for Sally.  We arrived at the palace at 11:45 AM. Parked in the palace grounds for UK1.60 an hour. Restaurant was near by, and, of course, I'm always open to having food.  Cafeteria - had bangars and mash.  This time the sausages were pork, unfortunately, and I'm not all that keen on pork breakfast sausages.  I remember those boar sausages I had previously.  Delicious.

After lunch we walked around several of the gardens.  Hampton Court Palace is the link. Got the concession price of UK14, a good price considering all there is to see.  The young man selling tickets told me I had lovely soft hands.  Sally thought this was highly inappropriate.  Then speculated that he must have thought it was ok to say this "to an American".

park of formal gardens

were many places to sit while walking through the gardens 

 The palace is huge.

the Tudor portion of the palace where Henry VIII lived; built 1400s; palace is beside the Thames River

The Baroque section - William III, built in 1700s

-

fascinating chimneys - are many of them with different designs

 Queen Caroline'sbedroom

rooms were fairly dark; can imagine how cold the palace would have been in the winter; are tables placed here which represents activities that would have been held in this room

uniform of the guards; rooms were mostly empty in the palace

were two large inner courtyards

fascinating kitchen areas where meals were cooked for about 600 people every day

Did not see all the gardens, including the maze, nor all of the palace, but we did manage to see a good portion.  Need to spend a whole day to see everything. 

Got back to Sally's at 8:00.  Terribly slow traffic on M25 for some miles. Enjoyed more of Sally's Moroccan vegetarian food.