Where's Henry?

Right: A door behind which ghosts have been seen

After a whirlwind bus tour of London with Michael Watson on Saturday, Sunday was reserved for a more targeted outing to Hampton Court Palace, home of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I, among other notable Englishmen and women, most of the latter having been married to Henry at one time or another. Here Elizabeth was kept under house arrest by her sister, after whom a famous drink is named (hint: it's not the Martini). Here royal children were born, christened, and died. Here yeoman guards stood watch in the Watching Room, and tilted in the tiltyard, where I munched an egg and cress sandwich. History's layers run deep around here: from Cardinal Wolsey to my sandwich, a distance of five hundred years.

Thomas Cardinal Wolsey built Hampton Court Palace - not with his own hands, you may be sure - and was wont to say it belonged to Henry when people complimented him on its grandeur, as it was widely held to be more beautiful, and its visitors more influential, than the royal court. So when Wolsey failed to obtain the divorce Henry needed from Catherine of Aragon in order to produce a male heir to inherit his throne, Henry took him at his word, booted him out, and took residence. There he lived with Ann Boleyn and his subsequent wives. The one who outlived him, Catherine Parr, he married there in the Chapel Royal with its fantastic golden-starred blue ceiling.

The house goes on for acres, and when that's through there are even more acres of garden and "wilderness" - actually another garden. It would require a couple of days to thoroughly tour it all, and though we were there most of a day, a look at the map shows a lot we didn't see.

One thing we didn't see was ghosts, but members of the staff claim to have seen someone on the other side of the door above (one of the staff entrances) who then faded away. Spooky...

Now Hinckley sings its siren call once more, and tomorrow I'm away on that Nottingham train for Jedi Master School, Part Deux. More adventures as they happen.