#858 - Tour the State Apartments at Buckingham Palace

Timeout said:

It's 15 years since the Queen started to open her home to the great unwashed during the summer months, and its really worth it just to see Lizzie's bling!

Dave did:

Lets get one thing straight - I'm not much of a royalist.

I don't really see their purpose in today's world other than continuing a legacy thats nice to have. I'm not bitter about their ongoing reign, but neither am I in awe of their day to day activities.

That said, having studied in the same year as Wills (and crossed paths with him on several occassions through my 4 years in St.A), I should say I find the guy very personable, and should he become King then I would feel that little bit more proud about the monarchy than I do now.

Anyway, I just thought I should make my position on that clear before continuing the story on how I ticked this Thing off my list.

So it was the day after the Innocent Village Fete, and its fair to say myself and Joe (my companion over this weekend's Things) were pretty shattered from the start! But the tickets were booked, and we had a date with the Queen...or at least her residences!

First stop was at the Royal Art Collection, where we got to view some nice paintings from Italy in the 17th century (Rennaissance and Baroque) which are owned by the royal family - having been passed down the generations. It was a nice experience, and I especially liked the work depicting the myth of Venus and Cupid's love affair.

Similarly I felt pretty pleased with myself for getting to see a drawing by Leonardo Da Vinci titled "Neptune". It was a sketch of a painting he made for a friend that never survived (or has never been found). It looked unbelievable, and I could only imagine what the final thing looked like!

I should probably point out now that unfortunately we were not permitted to take any photo's of the interiors of the Royal buildings, and only allowed to take memorable shots when in open air. So you'll just have to make do with the following as proof of my being there:





After wandering around the galleries plugged into the free audio guide system for around 40 minutes, we felt it was time to move on.

Next Stop: The Royal Mews (a.k.a. The Stables!)

Because the stables where the royal carriages and horses were in the open air, we were allowed to take more photos here than in the gallery, and so I made full use of this! We got to view all four of the queens royal carriages (off the top of my head there was the Scottish Royal Coach, the Australian Royal Coach, the Crystal Coach,and the Irish Royal Coach). Time for a game of spot the difference I think...






There was also a display of how the horses and carriage worked together. Unfortunately this photo does not so justice to the size of the horses of the carriage, they were both huge! At least 12 feet tall if not more!




Finally (forgive me if thus far its sounded like a list...but as I warned at the start, I'm not particularly interested in royalty or its possessions!), we made it to the State Apartments at Buckingham Palace. These rooms are only opened for a limited time during the summer, and this year there was an extra special exhibition within the Palace to celebrate the Diamond (60) year wedding anniversary of the Queen and Duke of Edinburgh.

The Palace was definitely something I was glad I saw. In some ways it reminded me of some halls at St. Andrews University. But whereas St. Andrews has a more wooden finish to its decor, the Palace was more extravegant (i.e. Gold and antique decorations). The Audio tour guide was brilliant and really gave an insight into each room, explaining how Nash was commissioned to design certain rooms over 200 years ago that still stand today and impress just as much as they were originally built.

At the end of the tour we were allowed to wander through the North side of the Buckingham Palace gardens (where those awarded OBE's and the like meet up after the ceremony). And at last I was allowed to take some sort of photo evidence of the day! This me at the rear of Buckingham Palace (indeed how many people can say they've done that??)





25 down...975 Things to go!