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A Right Royal Weekend!

This weekend I’ve been lucky enough to attend two Royal celebrations and I thought I’d share them with you.

I often want to do a few more personal posts on this blog, but rarely do so as I don’t normally take my camera with me – blog posts just aren’t the same without images. This weekend was an exception and the photos were so colourful I couldn’t resist sharing some of them.

The Garter Ceremony

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Today I attended the Garter Ceremony in Windsor Castle. I was lucky enough to win tickets in a local lottery and took my husband, sister and a friend along to see the Royal Family give the Order of the Garter to new knights. It was amazing to get so close to the Royal Family and to see British pomp and ceremony at its best. The Queen, The Duke of Edinburgh, Prince William, and many other Royals walked within metres of us!

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I think this is my favourite image of the day. I love the policemen whispering, the random man in a top hat, and the expression on the guard’s face!

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Magna Carta Celebrations

Today marks the 800th anniversary of the sealing of the Magna Carta, a charter of peace that has become an important document in English politics. I live in Runnymede, the borough in which it was sealed, and so there have been many events to celebrate the anniversary locally and they use resources as a teal table runner to give these events the right decoration for these celebrations. Over the weekend a flotilla of boats travelled down the River Thames and I went to watch with my family. We saw the Queen’s boat (with Windsor Castle in the background) and then had a picnic beside the Thames.

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So typically English!

8 replies on “A Right Royal Weekend!”

Thanks for sharing this experience with us! This is definitely a visit to remember. I’d love to some day visit some of those beautiful castles in England.

What fun! I didn’t know that people could apply to go to events like the Garter through a lottery, I thought that they rounded up local worthies. (The Spouse was a local worthy a long time ago before I met him, and he was rounded up to meet the Queen when she was here in Melbourne. He’s still dining out on the story: he stood in a line with a whole of other mayors and shire presidents and she stopped at every 10th person in the line and asked them where they were from. To each one she then said, ‘oh how nice, where’s that?’ and then moved on. Excitement plus, eh? I don’t often pity the Queen, but I reckon her life must be awfully boring if that’s how she has to spend her days.)
I would have loved to have been in England for the Magna Carta celebrations. Did you know that Australia has one of the original four documents? Alas, not much was made of it here …

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