St Edward's Junior, Cheltenham & Museum of Somerset

Good King Hal indicating where a large UFO carrying Bigfoot, The Loch Ness Monster, Lord Lucan, Father Christmas and Cardinal Richeleu has just flown past very slowly behind the cameraman. Again.

Back up at the crack of dawn again. Yes, it's time for Good King Hal to hit the road and head up to Gloucestershire. I hadn't visited St Edward's Junior in Cheltenham before, but my crappy sat nav had by some miracle managed to find the address for the school, so it seemed to be a relatively easy hour and half drive up the M5 to find it. What I wasn't expecting was that the school was located somewhere up a very posh private lane that half way up it was a road block. Yup, a big barrier in the road for no adequately explained reason. Perhaps it was one of those ones that if you drove up to it slowly it would just raise for you. Wrong. I tried re-programming the sat nav, but it wouldn't have it - as far as she was concerned this was the way to get to the school and tough bitties if you wanted to go another way. I sat in the quiet leafy posh road scratching my head and wondering how the hell I was going to get past this. I drove back down to the main road, but my sat nav was screaming about doing a u-turn. So I turned round and went back up the posh road, and it was as I was slowly driving up this paean to capitalism that I noticed a very small worn road sign. It suggested if you wanted to get past the road barrier it was best to go in through an alternatively named road (the name escapes me at present). As my sat nav has not the best grasp on finding obscure rural roads I did wonder if it would work, but it did! I followed the directions and lo! There was the school! St Edward's Junior is a lovely school and I was very warmly welcomed by Lin Davis, the lady who booked me, and not the similarly named Olympic Long Jump champion from 1964 who also just happens to be my cousin. As is Lily Cole. But I am getting distracted. We had the main school sports hall for the entire day and it was great - a nice big hall, great acoustics and a good lively group of about 40 children. We had a fine morning, lots of laughs and good fun. Lunch was spent in the school hall being cross questioned by various children as to whether I really was the REAL Henry VIII. The afternoon was a short session, as they usually are at private schools and culminated in a very loud and enthusiastic jousting tournament. This was won by a mile by a very good ladies team. Our score for the year is now:

GENTLEMEN 3 - 4 LADIES

More intrigue. My next Henry day is on Monday with a return visit to St Paul's Junior in Shepton Mallet. Watch out for the score at the end of that.

On the Saturday I was invited back to the Museum of Somerset for their grand re-opening. As I stated in the last blog entry this re-launch of the Museum has taken about three years and millions of pounds, but it looks brilliant. Loads of interactive stuff for the kids, large airy rooms full of interesting nuggets to search out and packed with great local finds, from pre-history to the second world war. I was there as Henry, generally meeting and greeting, and then doing three half hour talks, one at 11am, one at 1pm and one at 2pm. Well over a thousand people came in during the day on this unseasonably hot 1st October. I absolutely sweltered, but it was great fun and nice to see the old place so packed full of excited new visitors. The Museum of Somerset is a big hit and well worth a visit - so get yourself to Taunton! Tomorrow I am back at Barrington Court for the Sunday of the Chut Fest 2011. See you there.

BBC Somerset, Yetminster, Somerset Museum and TIGHTS!

Good King Hal attempting to hide his four and a half ton body behind a painfully thin quintaine pole. It didn't work.

YETMINSTER! Home to Yeti's. It is! Honest. Well, the Yetties actually, who if you're not entirely sure who they are, they're actually a sort of Happy Shopper version of The Wurzels, which is no great recommendation if you're a music lover. Well I was back at St Andrew's Junior School in this delightful little town/big village just over the border from Somerset into Dorset. I was last here back in September 2008 (see this blog for my rave review of the place!) and it was good to be back and welcomed by such lovely kind and friendly teachers. It was a biggish group - years 3, 4 and 5 combined for a total of about 90 kids, and they were fantastic! All but one of them had dressed up in brilliant Tudor costumes, some of which you could tell had been lovingly made by a member of their family. Great stuff. We had a fine morning, but stiflingly hot! This is supposed to be September for heaven's sake! I suppose it is God's way of letting us know that the cricket season is over. I was very grateful for a fan being supplied for me for the day which I constantly had running trying to stop me spontaneously combusting. I had a school dinner, and whilst waiting for this one of the dinner ladies came up and said "'Ere, is that padding or all you?" pointing at my stomach. Without waiting for an answer she poked me. I pretended to grab for her ample bosom saying "My turn!" I was talking to some of the other dinner ladies about my recent gall bladder health problems and my low fat diet, when they brought my dinner out - a burger, salad... and chips. Oh well. The original dinner lady who wanted to poke my midriff snorted at the sight of my dinner. "I spose you're gonna tell us them chips is low fat, eh?" Now I don't mind ultra skinny people making derogatory remarks about my ample size, but this woman could easily have worked as a body-double for the R101, so she was on no moral high ground I can tell you. "Probably not" I said, looked her up and down and said "So what's your excuse?"

The afternoon was great fun - but even hotter, and we then had the wee ones from year 2 come and join us for the final joust. It was another rollicking affair with some very closely fought contests, but finished with a win for... the Gentlemen again! This year it seems they're inseparable. Current score is:

GENTLEMEN 3 - 3 LADIES

Next Henry show in a school is on Friday at St Edward's Junior in Cheltenham. Watch this blog for the latest score and results.

Today I was in Taunton bright and early for an appearance on the BBC Somerset Emma Britton Show, except that Emma is currently off on holiday, so it was actually the Vernon Harfield Show. Vernon is a very professional presenter, but like a lot of BBC presenters seems to think that he is actually the natural heir apparent to Jeremy Paxman. Anyone he interviews he plays the Devil's Advocate and keeps asking them probing annoying questions. We were doing an interview about new electricity pylons being build across Somerset and what people felt about them, and a couple of times Vernon kept asking protesters questions like "how much extra would you be prepared to pay for no pylons and all the electrical work done in tunnels?" to which the protester would begin to answer and Vernon would leap back with "You're dodging the question - HOW MUCH??" as though he was trying to skewer a slippery Michael Howard. Chill, Vernon! After the show I walked round to Taunton Castle and the new Museum of Somerset which is reopening this week after a multi-million pound three year re-fit. I met Steve Minnitt, County Head of Museums outside, it was good to see him. And Carrie Blogg, the project manager for the whole thing was there too - hadn't seen them in ages. Inside - wow. The Museum is STUNNING. The money has been well spent and it is breath taking. I shall give a proper report of it on Saturday when I am appearing there for a couple of shows. Great stuff. It was nice to see the original scroll that I signed at the launch of the project there on display with all it's signatures. It was partially unrolled at the top so that all you could really see was the signatures of Mick Aston, Tony Robinson and Helen Geake from Time Team - and ME! Fame at last. In the afternoon I nipped over to Yeovil for some new tights - a King's outfit is not complete without fresh tights!

Even now this evening it is still sweltering here. After Cheltenham, I am at the Museum of Somerset on Saturday, and then at Barrington Court for the Chut Fest 2011 on Sunday. Hope to see lots of people there, especially if this weather continues.