Speaking of Royal Weddings
This weekend I got an email from a friend of mine who is studying abroad in Wales this year. Evidently he had the distinct pleasure of actually being in London during all the hulabaloo. I emailed him back and asked if I could share his experience with all of you. He graciously said yes.
So, here's Drew's excellent experience watching the wedding of Catherine and William.
"I'm a bit tired today on account of being at the royal wedding yesterday in London, but I'll do my best to write with enthusiasm.
When I say I was at the royal wedding, I unfortunately don't mean inside Westminster Abbey Church, or crashing the Buckingham Palace reception. That's how people get shot. I do however mean standing just outside the Palace gates during the whole event, which is still a wonderful opportunity.
The journey started that morning (April 29th) at 5:00am in Cardiff with a friend from a history class, and almost ended there on account of a mix up with the buses! To sum up the confusion, we realized that we had the wrong bus stop, and had 12min to run to another bus stop a little over a mile away. Luckily enough not having a car has kept me in shape this year, and we arrived just in time to get our seats.
[We] arrived ahead of schedule at 9:00AM to Victoria station (about a mile from the Palace), and we spent the next hour navigating the literal 'sea' of people to find a good view of the Palace balcony -- the official count estimates just over 1-million people within the event parameters.
For the royal wedding, there [were] three primary spots people [were] trying to get: a view of the Westminster church where the couple is getting married, a view of the Mall (pronounced m'Al) which is the primary parade route, or a view of the Buckingham Palace Balcony where the procession will all [ended].
For the View of the church people had been camping in their spots for over 5 days, for a view of the Mall people were camping for about 2 days, [so] after [a quick] process of elimination the balcony was looking pretty good for us. We searched about and found a small spot of grass about 2'X2' in a crowd adjacent the right courtyard corner, and stood strong for about 3-4 hours chatting with our fellow royalty fanatics. The up side of our spot was the news coverage, and on two different occasion I found the camera crew for CNN news zoomed in on my face! The down side of our spot was a poor view of the ceremonial procession, but at 1:25pm that all became irrelevant. With the roar of a million people strong (greater than the population of all of South Dakota) the new Duke and Duchess of Cambridge (Kate and Wills new official title) stepped onto the balcony of the palace to appear before all nations with their official title as the future King and Queen of England, and I was there. Shortly after them came Queen Elizabeth and the rest of the family, followed by the first public kiss...
As the crowd reluctantly thinned we ventured to the nearby Green park, to watch the wedding highlights on a Jumbo Tron with 300,000 others. [Then] it was announced Kate and Will were going to make a second appearance. We scrambled back over to the palace where the people had just left, and got the worlds final view of the couple driving off to meet with Kate's family in a vintage blue Aston Martin.
A long day, but what an experience."
So, here's Drew's excellent experience watching the wedding of Catherine and William.
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| My friend Drew... we used to work at a hotel together |
When I say I was at the royal wedding, I unfortunately don't mean inside Westminster Abbey Church, or crashing the Buckingham Palace reception. That's how people get shot. I do however mean standing just outside the Palace gates during the whole event, which is still a wonderful opportunity.
The journey started that morning (April 29th) at 5:00am in Cardiff with a friend from a history class, and almost ended there on account of a mix up with the buses! To sum up the confusion, we realized that we had the wrong bus stop, and had 12min to run to another bus stop a little over a mile away. Luckily enough not having a car has kept me in shape this year, and we arrived just in time to get our seats.
[We] arrived ahead of schedule at 9:00AM to Victoria station (about a mile from the Palace), and we spent the next hour navigating the literal 'sea' of people to find a good view of the Palace balcony -- the official count estimates just over 1-million people within the event parameters.
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| Drew's View of the couple... I think I had the better angle. |
For the royal wedding, there [were] three primary spots people [were] trying to get: a view of the Westminster church where the couple is getting married, a view of the Mall (pronounced m'Al) which is the primary parade route, or a view of the Buckingham Palace Balcony where the procession will all [ended].
For the View of the church people had been camping in their spots for over 5 days, for a view of the Mall people were camping for about 2 days, [so] after [a quick] process of elimination the balcony was looking pretty good for us. We searched about and found a small spot of grass about 2'X2' in a crowd adjacent the right courtyard corner, and stood strong for about 3-4 hours chatting with our fellow royalty fanatics. The up side of our spot was the news coverage, and on two different occasion I found the camera crew for CNN news zoomed in on my face! The down side of our spot was a poor view of the ceremonial procession, but at 1:25pm that all became irrelevant. With the roar of a million people strong (greater than the population of all of South Dakota) the new Duke and Duchess of Cambridge (Kate and Wills new official title) stepped onto the balcony of the palace to appear before all nations with their official title as the future King and Queen of England, and I was there. Shortly after them came Queen Elizabeth and the rest of the family, followed by the first public kiss...
As the crowd reluctantly thinned we ventured to the nearby Green park, to watch the wedding highlights on a Jumbo Tron with 300,000 others. [Then] it was announced Kate and Will were going to make a second appearance. We scrambled back over to the palace where the people had just left, and got the worlds final view of the couple driving off to meet with Kate's family in a vintage blue Aston Martin.
A long day, but what an experience."
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| Impressive. |
When I read Drew's email I had the chills. I can only imagine how exciting it would have been to be in the middle of such a gathering. There's a certain energy that comes only with large crowds... it's probably the same addictive energy that makes those very crowds so dangerous... I have never been in such a huge group, but I've been in large groups and it always seems as if everyone is, for a moment, connected to each other by the very act of being. It would have been an absolute thrill.
Anyway, I thought you guys would enjoy reading that.
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