Royal Progress day 3

Hatfield Old Palace, Houses of Parliament and Banquet. Hatifield Old Palace, the home of Elizabeth I and where she held her first Privy council meeting after being informed that she was now finally queen. The great Hall is magnificent, It is all that remains of the old palace and is still in great demand today for weddings and banquets, it is silent today as we were the only people in there and our footsteps echoed on the bare oak floor. We were very lucky to be allowed to go into the knot garden and see intricate designs layout of the garden. Just outside the gates of the old place is St Ethereda’s church, quite an odd church that holds one of the most strangest tombs I have seen. It’s Robert Cecil Elizabeth’s chief minister otherwise known as the elf because he was so small. It’s a white marble tomb with four angels holding a canopy over a bare skeleton, really very odd indeed. After we got back to London we had an hour in the national portrait gallery, and just lost ourselves in the Tudor room, nothing but Tudor portraits and I love going there as the exhibition changes often so you never know what you are going to see which I think id great. Today we saw Anne Boleyn, Robert Dudley several of Elizabeth and of course Henry VIII. We had a special guided tour of the Houses of Parliament, courtesy of our local MP and it’s a great sensation to stand in places where history took place. The House of Lords is all red coloured and the House of Commons is all Green and where the sovereign is allowed to go, has blue carpet. The chambers themselves are much smaller than they look on TV or the movies and to go ‘backstage’ was a real, privilege. The day was rounded off by a medieval banquet held in crypt near top the tower of London, it was great entertainment, with jugglers dancers, singers, acrobats and of course some very good sword fighting, well almost a brawl really. Henry VIII himself presided over the festivities, a larger than life character in more ways than one.