Do you have an incorrigible flaw? One of mine is that I tend to be very confident I know the way, no matter how many times in the past I've gotten lost. This came into play on our outing to Hampton Court, which is south of London. The GPS on my phone was having problems, but I assured everyone I knew the way to the M25 and it would surely be easy from there. Ha! I got us lost in the suburbs of London and ensnared in horrible traffic, turning a 2 hour trip into a 4 hour trip. At one point we arrived at Ham House. I started making the case that Ham House was surely as nice. In the end though, we decided we couldn't give up, persevered and finally made it to our destination: Hampton Court Palace (which is never, apparently, abbreviated on signs as Ham House).
HCP has an interesting history. It was built as a bishop's palace for Cardinal Wolsey in the Tudor times. He was a favorite of King Henry VIII, until he wasn't able to procure a church-sanctioned divorce for the king. As a last ditch effort to save himself, he gifted HCP to Henry VIII. It wasn't enough though - he was tried for treason anyway.
Later in the palace's history, King William III desired a palace to rival Versailles. He started remodeling, but ran out of money to finish the project. So half the palace is in the Tudor style, previously shown, and the other half is in this Baroque style.
Apparently, Henry VIII traveled to HCP by punting down the Thames. By which I mean, he sat back in the boat while someone punted for him. This garden leads from the Thames to the palace.
Just another view of the extensive gardens at Hampton Court. I hadn't realized there is a famous maze in the gardens, otherwise I would have liked to have visited that as well.
There are interesting displays inside the palace of Henry VIII's reign. My other favorite part of the castle was the large banquet room used for feasts in Henry VIII's time. It's easy to imagine it populated with the Tudor court. Unfortunately, we didn't get any good photos of the inside of the castle.
Camille and this fellow have been influenced by the intrigues of the court and have become quite suspicious of each other.
So our day out at Hampton Court Palace turned out nice, despite the arduous journey to get there.
I once spent an hour driving around a 10 block radius in Spokane looking for a house - I never underestimate my ability to get lost, haha. Those gardens are beautiful! And the picture of Camille and the wooden man is cracking me up.
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