EDEN CONFIDENTIAL: Hanbury’s fury at flight fiasco at Stansted
With her son a page of honour at the Coronation, and her husband a Lord in Waiting to King Charles, the Marchioness of Cholmondeley is used to palace doors being swung open for her.
Yet, I hear that the former model’s father, Tim Hanbury, has suffered the indignity of having gates closed to him at the airport.
The web designer, 70, is said to have arrived at Stansted Airport, in Essex, at the weekend to board a Ryanair flight for a few days at a friend’s home abroad.
But staff at the low-cost airline’s check-in desk refused to let him board the plane, even though his passport did not expire for another nine months.
‘Tim was very upset and frustrated,’ one of his friends tells me. ‘He was fuming about Ryanair because he could not have the weekend away that he was looking forward to.’
Frustrated: Tim with his daughter Rose
What Hanbury appears not to have known is that, since Brexit, British passports cannot be more than ten years old when used to travel to the European Union – which means travellers need to look at the date the passport was issued, rather than the date it expires.
Perhaps he should have seen if his daughter Rose, 39, and her husband, the Marquess of Cholmondeley, aka film maker David Rocksavage, 62, could have used their connections to help out.
The couple are key figures in the royal court, with the Marquess serving as Lord Great Chamberlain under Queen Elizabeth and now Lord in Waiting for the King. Lord Oliver, one of his 13-year-old twin sons with Rose, helped carry the King’s train at Westminster Abbey.
Hanbury declines to shed any more details on the incident when I ring him at his house in South Devon, telling me: ‘Sorry, I am incredibly busy, so I won’t be able to comment.’
It was unlike Hanbury not to use an alternative form of transport. He is said to have once commandeered a bus crammed with Japanese tourists which was parked near Annabel’s club in Mayfair. Greek playboy and sportsman Taki Theodoracopulos once claimed that the driver of the bus stopped to answer a call of nature. Realising this, Hanbury leapt in and drove off, ‘sideswiping’ most of the sleek, expensive cars parked nearby in the process, alleged Taki.
With the Japanese tourists ‘screaming for help’, Hanbury allegedly abandoned the bus and returned to Annabel’s, where the police were seen off by the unhesitating testimony of Sydney the barman.
Hanbury insists that this version is ‘vastly exaggerated’.
A Ryanair spokesman tells me: ‘As this passenger’s passport was issued in May 2013, it does not meet the first entry requirement under EU legislation.’
Sophie glams up her PJs for Eurovision
Ready: Gentleman Jack star Sophie Rundle wears glitter boots with pyjamas as she has to watch Eurovision at home because of the lack of a babysitter
Peaky Blinders star Sophie Rundle refused to abandon the glitter despite being confined to her home for Eurovision.
Rundle, 35, who has a son with actor Matt Stokoe, paired her PJs with pink, diamante-studded platform boots. She explains the look is for when it’s ‘Eurovision night, but you can’t leave the apartment because your two-year-old is asleep in the next room’.
Line Of Duty star Vicky McClure was confused after being upgraded to the presidential suite at a five-star hotel. Past guests in the suite at the Celtic Manor resort, in Newport, South Wales, which costs at least £1,245 per night, include former U.S. President Barack Obama, as well as music stars Beyonce and Bruce Springsteen. ‘They went, “Oh, we’ve done you an upgrade”,’ McClure says.
‘There was a reception room, extra bedrooms, a grand piano. There was a steam room inside the bathroom. I was really confused.
‘So I rang down and just said, “Who are we sharing with?” ’
Former Strictly star Natasha Kaplinsky — who was on the same island in the Maldives as Jamie Oliver when the TV chef renewed his wedding vows with his wife, Jools — is considering following his example.
‘I’d love to renew our vows,’ says the newsreader turned chief film censor, who married banker Justin Bower in 2005. Speaking at the Fragrance Foundation Awards, she tells me: ‘We did go to our local church on our tenth wedding anniversary with renewal in mind, but our children were screeching, so we’ve put it off for a bit.’
While many have seen Bridgewater House’s exterior, as it doubles for the London residence of the Crawley family in Downton Abbey, few have seen inside the St James’s property until now.
The family of the late shipping magnate Yiannis Latsis, who own it, hosted an auction for mental health charity BrainWaves. A game of tennis with David Cameron fetched £3,500, while lunch with Jacob Rees-Mogg went for £720.
It’s one of the few golf courses left in Scotland where Prince Andrew is still welcome, and now Balmoral is seeking members from the local community.
‘Balmoral Golf Club is opening up its membership to permanent residents in the Braemar and Ballater areas,’ confirms a spokesman for the course on the King’s Aberdeenshire estate.
The Duke of York gave up his membership of the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews, was stripped of the title of honorary president of Inverness Golf Club, and his membership of the Royal Dornoch Golf Club was revoked.
