Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
longitude marked in the courtyard, with one foot in the Earth's eastern hemisphere
and one foot in the western. At lunch you can set your watch precisely by watching
the red
“time
ball”
atop the roof, which has dropped at exactly 1pm since 1833, to
enable passing shipmasters to set their chronometers accurately.
Blackheath Ave., SE10.
&
020/8858-4422.
www.nmm.ac.uk/places/royal-observatory. Free admis-
sion to observatory; planetarium £6.50 adults, £5.20 children, £18.70 family. Daily 10am-5pm. Train:
Greenwich/DLR: Cutty Sark.
Outlying Attractions
Dulwich Picture Gallery
GALLERY Just 12 minutes by train from Victoria
Station, this houses one of the country's most significant collections of European Old
Masters from the 17th and 18th centuries. The core of the collection was assembled
by a pair of London art dealers in the 1790s on behalf of King Stanislaus Augustus of
Poland, who thought a royal art collection would be just the thing to enhance his pres-
tige. Unfortunately, he'd rather overestimated his standing and his kingdom was parti-
tioned out of existence before the shipment could be made, and the paintings remained
in London. The dealers bequeathed the collection to the independent school, Dulwich
College, which commissioned the great
Sir John Soane
(p. 93) to create the world's
first public art gallery to display them; it opened in 1817. Soane's cunningly positioned
skylights beautifully illuminate the pieces from such figures as Rembrandt, Rubens,
Canaletto, Gainsborough, Watteau, and Pousin. Indeed, the
Sunday Telegraph
hailed
Dulwich as “the most beautiful small art gallery in the world.” Free guided tours of the
collection are given at 3pm on Saturdays and Sundays.
Gallery Rd., SE21.
&
020/8693-5254.
www.dulwichpicturegallery.org.uk. Admission £5 adults, £4
seniors, free for students, the unemployed, and children 17 and under. Tues-Fri 10am-5pm; Sat-Sun
11am-5pm. Train: W. Dulwich.
Hampton Court Palace
HISTORIC SITE The 16th-century palace of
Cardinal Wolsey can teach us a lesson: Don't try to outdo your boss, particularly if he
happens to be Henry VIII. The rich cardinal did just that, and he eventually lost his
fortune, power, and prestige, and ended up giving his lavish palace to the Tudor
monarch. Henry's additions include the Anne Boleyn gateway, and the aptly named
Great Hall, with its hammerbeam ceiling, as well as a Tiltyard (where jousting com-
petitions were held) and a “real tennis” court.
Although the palace enjoyed prestige in Elizabethan days, it owes much of its pres-
ent look to William and Mary—or rather, to Sir Christopher Wren. You can parade
through the apartments today, filled with porcelain, furniture, paintings, and tapes-
tries. The
King's Dressing Room
is graced with some of the best art, mainly paint-
ings by Old Masters on loan from Queen Elizabeth II. Also, be sure to inspect the
Royal Chapel
(Wolsey wouldn't recognize it), and the
kitchens
where great Tudor
feasts are regularly prepared.
The 24-hectare (59-acre)
gardens
—including Tudor and Elizabethan Knot Gar-
dens—are open daily year-round. The most popular section is the serpentine shrub-
bery
Maze,
also the work of Wren, and accounting for countless lost children every
year. A garden
cafe
and restaurant are located in the Tiltyard.
Insider tip:
Tickets
are considerably cheaper if bought online.
East Molesey, Surrey.
&
0844/482-7777.
www.hrp.org.uk/HamptonCourtPalace. Palace admission
£15.95 adults, £13.20 students and seniors, £8 children 5-15, £43.45 family ticket, free for children 4 and
under; gardens admission £5.30 adults, £4.60 students and seniors, free children without palace ticket
during summer. Maze: £3.85 adults, £2.75 children 5-15, free children 4 and under. Cloisters, courtyards,
4
