Coronation of King Charles III and Queen Camilla

On Saturday, May 6, 2023 the United Kingdom crowned it's new king and queen: King Charles III and Queen Camilla. My wife and I had been debating whether we would fight the London crowds to see the coronation procession live or not but at the last minute decided that it was worth it for this once in a lifetime opportunity.

Logistics

The procession route was not that long, starting at Buckingham Palace, along the Mall then through Trafalgar Square to head down Whitehall then through Parliament Square to Westminster Abbey. We could only leave for London after work on the Friday so we knew by the time we got to London the Mall would be full so after parking the car near where we used to live, checking into the hotel, getting on a tube train (the only way to get into the city as all buses in the area, of course, were not running and there were many restrictions for tube stations as well) and walking from Embankment tube station to Trafalgar Square we saw after a few minutes on the Mall that it would be out of the question - It was jammed. We quickly found a spot right against the security fences just south of Trafalgar Square on Whitehall, outside a pub. Even here there were people waiting despite it being 11pm the night before…

I took a walk down the Mall and it was jammed beyond belief with sectioned off areas jammed completely with no possibility of our finding any spots there. We had chosen wisely.

The Wait

We had brought only one camp chair as were not sure whether they would be allowed or not (they were). We took turns to use it while we waited for events to unfold started with the procession at 10:00 am. Luckily, it only rained only later on Saturday, so we were dry all night. I never really slept as there was always something going on in front of us: The (friendly) police lining up along the route, the never ending marching of military groups in front of us as they got themselves into position.

Toilets were difficult to get to where we were waiting. They were on the other side of the road but they prevented us from crossing a few hours before events started. In the spirit of the joyous event the pub we were waiting in front of: Horse & Guardsman opened their doors early in the morning (they were meant to be closed) to first provide us with hot drinks then later they opened the whole place up to allow us to use their toilets and watch events on their big television screens.

The Procession

As you can see in the pictures and videos below, the procession was amazing. We were able to clearly see everyone in the procession including the (future) king and queen. They were all less than 30 feet away from where we were waiting, in fact, even closer than we would have been able to get if we had been on the Mall where people were forced quite some distance away from the road.

There was a long wait between the trip to Westminster Abbey and their return back to Buckingham Palace during which time the service was played on loudspeakers on the street, though we could not hear it so amused ourselves by simply people watching and watching the various groups arranging themselves on the street in front of us.

Buckingham Palace

After the procession we had to wait a very long time before they let us onto the road to walk up to Buckingham Palace. In fact, by the time we made our way there the king and queen had already completed their visit to the balcony…so we missed it, though we certainly did see the (abbreviated) air show above us on the Mall. There was a huge filming stage in front of the palace around the Queen Victoria statue so we could not even see the balcony until we attempted to make our away around the statue…