ITS HOT, HOT, HOT. Also Felicity visits, a girls night out, we go to Kensington palace, an afternoon celebration with neighbours.

In case you missed it, here is the link for our recent post on our Easter trip to Scotland. It is back in the May folder of the blog. You can also use the search box in the top left hand corner of the page

The Istanbul post is almost ready. We promise there is no outline of the rise & fall of the Ottoman Empire!!

At the time of publishing this post, on the day Andy Murray ascended the Wimbledon throne, the weather was astounding. We had the hottest day this year with temperatures officially reaching 29 at Heathrow. On the way back from dropping Will at a paint ball party the car told Mark that it was 30 outside. What's more, the good forecast is set to continue right the way through for another week.  Amazing and long overdue!

The forecast to Tuesday 9th.

Recently we have had a visitor from Malaysia. Felicity is a former colleague of Sally's who became a good friend to both of us. She came out to replace Sally in Jakarta while she took mat leave back in Tasmania in 1999 to have baby Aisha. Felicity not only sat in Sally's chair, she slept in our house and, most importantly, she looked after our cat 'ThingedyBob'. 

Bob was a bit special. When baby Aisha came home Bob ran away for 10 days and we feared she was lost for good. She came back though and eventually accepted Aisha into the family. Sadly, she was run over and killed a few weeks before we were to leave Jakarta.

Mark, Aisha and Thingedybob in Jakarta. 

It was great to catch up with Felicity and hear more about her life in Kuala Lumpur.  We reminisced  a bit and had a lovely lazy weekend.  Felicity stayed a couple nights with us and made Mark very happy by sharing oysters and stout with him...... and red wine..... as well as white wine too.

Mark had a significant birthday recently and some of our wonderful neighbours decided to deceive him by having a get together one afternoon under the pretext of just getting together. Mark, who is usually acutely aware of any attempts at deception, was totally fooled. He was rendered speechless as he walked into Helen & James' place next door to find people raising glasses to him. Sally had a hand in it apparently. We are VERY, VERY lucky with the neighbours we have here. Although it was a cool summer's afternoon, we had a lovely time.

Aisha went to a birthday party recently. It was held a the Bulgari Hotel in Knightsbridge. It was a bit fancy and there was much preparation beforehand. Aisha went with two of her friends, Ella and Victoria who stayed the night, after they were collected at midnight by Mark. They were lucky with the weather, which was a 'HOT' 25 degrees.

Victoria had come early that day for a visit  to Kensington Palace. Originally a 1605 Jacobean mansion, Nottingham House as it was then, was bought in 1689 for £20,000 by co-regents William III and Mary as a 'country' alternative to Whitehall Palace. William was asthmatic and the pollution of London aggravated his condition. The house was all but gutted and remodelled by none other than Sir Christopher Wren.

William III was the Dutch Prince of Orange. His links to English royalty were through his mother, Mary. She was the eldest daughter of King Charles I and sister of King Charles II and King James II. 

William was the protestant nephew and would become the  son-in-law of the last Catholic King of England, James II. James had two adult daughters from his first marriage to Anne Hyde, who died in 1671. She bore James 8 children but only 2 survived, both Protestants and future queens, Princess Mary, the heir presumptive, and Princess Anne.

While James was initially a popular king and seen as more hard-working than his brother King Charles II, he soon faced rebellions. Although they were unsuccessful, they led James to establish an enlarged standing army. This alarmed the general population, not only because of the trouble soldiers caused in towns, but because it was against the English tradition to keep a professional army in peacetime. James also extended greater power to Catholics within the army leadership. 

Members of Britain's political and religious elite increasingly suspected James of being pro-French and pro-Catholic as well as having designs on becoming an absolute monarch. While his protestant daughter Mary was next in line to the throne, the nobles were not overly concerned and presumed all would be well when the throne eventually passed to her. 

After the marriage of King James to his second wife, Catholic Mary of Modena, in 1673, it was feared she would produce a Catholic son and heir. A movement therefore grew to replace the king with his elder daughter Princess Mary and his son-in-law/nephew, William of Orange. 

When Mary did give birth to Prince James Francis Edward Stuart rumours immediately began to spread that the baby was in fact an impostor, smuggled into the royal birth chamber in a warming pan. The true child of James and Mary was said to have been still born. Irrespective of whether it was true, this Catholic son changed the existing line of succession by displacing the heir presumptive, Protestant Princess Mary. 

Princess Mary married her first cousin, Prince William of Orange, in November 1677. Mary became pregnant soon after the marriage, but miscarried. After further illnesses she never conceived again. As well as being the husband of the heir apparent, William, through his wars against the powerful Catholic king of France, Louis XIV, was seen as a champion of Protestantism. Fearing the revival of a Catholic dynasty and a possible alliance with France, leading English nobles called on Prince William of Orange to land an invasion army from the Netherlands. 

In what became known as The Glorious revolution of 1688, William obliged and a large Dutch fleet landed near Torbay on the coast of Devon. James dithered and then fled England for France, therefore effectively abdicating. 

Groups loyal to James formed, calling themselves Jacobites (the name is from Jacobus, the Latinised form of James). James made only one serious attempt to recover his crown, however, when he landed in Ireland in 1689. His forces were defeated by the Williamites at the Battle of the Boyne in July 1690,  a victory that is still commemorated by the men of the Protestant Orange Order who annually march through predominantly Catholic areas in Northern Ireland. In 2007 the order unveiled a superhero character named Diamond Dan.

Back in 1690, the defeated James returned to France. He lived out the rest of his life as a pretender at a court sponsored by his cousin and ally, King Louis XIV. Jacobite risings continued however between 1688 and 1746. James' son Charles, whose birth caused such concern and led to William's invasion, led one of the final Jacobite uprisings in 1745. It too failed and he fled to France by way of Skye. It was through his flight that he become known as 'Bonnie Prince Charlie' and it was about him, of course, that The Skye Boat Song was written. The history behind it all makes the song very provocative. In part the words are:

Speed, bonnie boat, like a bird on the wing,
Onward! the sailors cry;
Carry the lad that's born to be King
Over the sea to Skye.

Loud the winds howl, loud the waves roar,
Thunderclouds rend the air;
Baffled, our foes stand by the shore,
Follow they will not dare.

Burned are their homes, exile and death
Scatter the loyal men;
Yet ere the sword cool in the sheath
Charlie will come again.

The last pretenders to the throne of James II were the sons of Bonnie Prince Charlie, the last of whom was Henry Benedict Stuart who became a priest and ultimately Cardinal Duke of York. Unlike his father and brother, Henry made no effort to seize the throne. He died in Rome in 1807 having had a long and distinguished church career. At the time of his death he was and still is, one of the longest serving cardinals in the church's history.

William and Mary both ascended the throne as co-regents in 1672 and their reign marked the beginning of the transition from the personal rule of the Stuarts to the more Parliament-centred rule of the House of Hanover. Their childless reign and the presence of Catholic Stuart claimants to the throne in living France resulted in the Act of Settlement of 1701. This Act essentially gave us the Monarchy we have today. It disqualified any Catholics or spouses of Catholics from taking the throne. It also limited the role of foreigners in the British government as well as limiting the powers of the monarch to actually influence government. 

Kensington Palace was where Queen Victoria was born. A lot of her memorabilia is on display. Aisha was pleased to have now seen where Victoria was born and died (Osborne House on the Isle of Wight. See our post on that here.)

  

The Queen's Parliamentary red boxes

A bible she gave to Albert on their wedding day. 

The Palace was of course home to Charles and Diana in the 80s. It will become the new home to their son Prince William and Kate.

There are numerous bits and pieces of royal regalia on display. This is one of three coronation robes made for George III. The robes were silk velvet with gold lace and an ermine lined cape. Underneath, the King wore a suit of gold damask.

Makes some of today's fashion look sensible.

Well done to the Scotsman Andy Murray and to the Brits in general. Their sporting prowess has strengthened while Australia's has......relaxed somewhat.

The day after Wimbledon and the HOT weekend, Mark noticed an awful lot of shiny bright pink poms about the place.