Monday, November 5, 2018

Coaches

I'm in front of, you guessed it, Buckingham Palace!
Mr Wonderful (hubby!) and I enjoyed a day in the life of being a royal. I could get used to it. Easily.

First stop...the Royal Mews
Pick a coach, any coach.
Hands down, I'd pick the Glass Coach. Why?

Diana, of course. This was her famous ride to St Paul's Cathedral. A Cinderella story if there ever was. But, we all know how the fairy tale ended. SIGH.

 A little too much gold, perhaps? My thoughts exactly! This is the Diamond jubilee coach used in 2012 for the Queen's jubilee. Such detail. Check out the lanterns. They are made of Edinburgh crystal. I stood in awe for many minutes eyeing all the tiny detailed work that went into making this carriage.
Recognize this one?
HINT: The top wasn't up while the occupants rode in this carriage.
The Ascot Landau. All purchased during the reign of Queen Victoria.
Did you guess right?

Next stop...Buckingham Palace.
Mr Wonderful couldn't get the Queen to look his way!
So many people. It was very difficult to get a view of the Changing of the Guard, but they're hard to miss!
No photos allowed inside the palace, so here I am on the steps in the "backyard."
A few notes I took while wandering around inside...

Queen Victoria was the first royal to move in, but you probably already knew that from watching Victoria.

The palace has 450 workers and the Queen entertains 50,000 guests a year.
775 rooms and 78 bathrooms. I would not want to clean all of them, thank you very much!

Lets talk about that flagpole.
If the Queen is present, the Sovereign Standard is raised.
The Union flag is when she is not present.

I got to see the Throne Room. The room where all the photography for royal weddings is taken.

You haven't seen London until you've been to the Palace.
Next stop...Clarence House. The official residence of the Prince of Wales.
Again, no photos.

The Queen Mother once lived here.
She loved Afternoon Tea. We would have gotten along just great! She had her tea in the library where I noticed copies of the works of the Bronte sisters, Jane Austen, Shakespeare. There was even a first edition copy of Peter Pan.

Did you know tea used to be an aristocratic drink? During the 17th century, tea came from China and was stored under lock and key. Wow...all the tea I have, I would have been said to be rich!

We ended a lovely day spending it with our lovely England friends, Marion and Alan.
We had so much fun catching up and breaking bread together. So very wonderful to see them.
This Pimms was the very best drink I had during our entire holiday. Yep. It was that good.




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