In the early spring, Tyler's school held a lottery to assign 30 tickets for the Queen's birthday parade, otherwise known as Trooping the Colour. Held at Horse Guards in central London, the parade rotates a non-ceremonial combat regiment to join the ceremonial regiments in London for the festivities. In 2017, it was the Irish Guards.
We dropped the children off the night before with a Canadian family we knew whose daughter was babysitting for us. We then left early in the morning to catch a train in Swindon with Reed who was just finishing a week of visiting with us.
We took the tube a few stops and exited at Trafalgar Square and walked the last block to Horse Guards where we queued to enter. It was the hottest day of the year thus far at 82 degrees and sunny and everyone was roasting in their suits. Fortunately, Tyler had his light colored suit and faired well. Laura of course had a fun pink hat to accent her floral dress.
Inside we found our seats mixed amongst some people we knew from school and others. We sat caddy-corner from all the British politicians led by the Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson.
The parade began with several military marching bands arriving in their full ceremonial regalia, complete with the tall bearskin hats. Each unit marched down the road that led from Buckingham Palace and entered the gravel parade grounds and took up position. Finally, the Irish guards arrived and boxed in the open side of the grounds.
Shortly thereafter, members of the Royal family arrived in horse drawn carriages to include Prince Harry and Duchess Catherine. We were just close enough to barely recognize them, but too far away to be sure.
A few minutes later, Queen Elizabeth and Prince Phillip arrived in their own carriage and slowly inspected the troops from the carriage. Everyone stood as she passed and the national anthem was played (..."God save our gracious Queen...")
Over the next hour various songs were played by the multiple bands with bag pipes and several Irish songs as the troops performed different marching maneuvers as they 'trooped' their regimental colours. This procession was designed to educate troops from centuries ago how to identify their regiment in battle and link back together if they were separated.
Then, the horse mounted cavalry completed several parade passes in formation which was very impressive.
Finally, the Queen departed and the troops marched out to follow her towards Buckingham in anticipation of the flyover.
We followed the parade on foot for a while soaking up the Union Jack studded boulevard still inside the cordon keeping the masses back. We then realized we needed to eat lunch and buy tickets to make an afternoon matinee at the West End so we ditched the parade route and wound our way back to Leicester square to buy tickets to Wicked. We ate at a fun and surprisingly affordable Italian place with custom pizzas and salads before hopping on the Tube to Victoria Station.
The show was a lot of fun with a very impressive cast and set design. It lasted for about 2 1/2 hours and we exited at about 5 and caught a train home to arrive at around 8.
It was a very memorable day that gave us a very unique and British experience!
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