Hampton Court Palace # 1

Welcome to ye olde Hampton Court Palace! Or at least the 'first courtyard' thing of it. Those English...even 'back in the day' they loved their brick!

(Tangent: the English kind of make fun of houses in the States; 'they look like doll houses'...but then I point out to them that whenever I see brick I think insane asylum, prison or dirty, sleazy industrial center...sorry, I mean, centre. Hmm....oh those cultural differences that keep us apart...)




And now a 'turn-around' view and that's what you see...MORE BRICK!!

Anyway, we went inside and the coolest thing happened: Henry XIII, Catherine or Aragon, and their peeps were roaming around, talking to us and letting us know what was going on as far as Court/country gossip was concerned. It was so fun! The whole 'history coming to life' things.








And here they are! Thomas Moore on the left, is talking to Henry VIII (with his back to you) with Cardinal Wolsey in the red. We had met them earlier in the Great Hall and one of our group had to testify to Queen Catherine of Jane Seymour's virtue, etc. I started to laugh when Anne Boleyn started to speak and she yelled at me! And then Catherine started to say 'my dear sir, I do not know why you laugh! I assure you that all the ladies in my care virtuous' and and and....