Dinah Hatch - Frommers Royal Wedding: How to See the Sights on the Big Day and Happily Ever Afterwards

Frommer's The Royal Wedding: How to See the Sights on the Big Day and Happily Ever Afterwards

by Dinah Hatch

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ISBN 978-1-118-09195-1; 978-1-118-09196-8; 978-1-118-09197-5

Editors: Jason Clampet, Mark Henshall, Andrea Kahn

Photo Editor: Christy Havranek

Cover Photo Credit: Kirsty Wigglesworth / AP Images

Photo Credits: Kimee, AshleyS, Smitty615, Inka, wolson40, Ewebber, Dakota16, KimWFPhoto, Jenmarie33, Shanwink, Marcius Fabiani, Akwgymnast, RooBunky, Rob Flynn, Rob Flynn, Bill Wynn, love2traveltheworld, Courtesy Westminster Abbey, Stevea

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dinah Hatch is a major Royal fan and drinks her morning tea from a 1977 Silver Jubilee mug. She is the author of Frommers England With Your Family and Frommers Britain for Free and has been writing travel journalism since 1998 when she joined Travel Weekly. Dinah then worked on Business Traveller before going into freelance journalism.

She has written travel features for publications including ABTA Magazine, Timesonline, The Observer, Trip Magazine, Travel Trade Gazette, and Cruise Magazine. Dinah has also been a freelance sub for Travel Weekly, The Guardian, The Sunday Times, The Express, and The People.

Introduction

From the moment Prince William revealed he had proposed to Kate Middleton with the oval blue 18-carat sapphire and diamond ring that his mother Princess Diana had worn when dazzling the world with her own marriage news, Brits have been gearing up for the Big Days celebrations. And they are pretty good at those by now.

After all, there have been many royal weddings to celebrate since William the Conqueror kicked off the modern British royal lineage (lots of them King Henry VIIIs, we might add). But the public taste for general partying in tandem with a regal coupling really came into its own in 1960 with the screening of the first royal wedding on TV, when the Queens daughter Princess Anne got married to Anthony Armstrong Jones back at Westminster Abbey. A whopping 20 million people enjoyed the pomp and ceremony from the comfort of their sofas and thousands lined the streets of the royal procession to wave their flags, shout good wishes and then flood the pubs afterwards for a right royal knees-up.

Westminster Abbey

But it wasnt until Prince Charles, who was in direct line for the throne, pledged his love (Whatever love is, as he so portentously put it when interviewed on TV) to Lady Diana that the British public went completely nuts for a royal wedding. And boy, was that a big day. Thousands of spectators camped out overnight in central London to secure the best vantage points for the procession and two million people thronged the streets as Diana wowed the crowds with her vast wedding train draped over the red-carpeted steps of awesome St. Pauls Cathedral. She travelled through the streets of the capital in a Cinderella-like carriage that had every seven-year-old girl in the country staring open-mouthed and stood with her new husband on the balcony of Buckingham Palace looking, for all the world, like a newly-minted character from a Disney fairytale. This time, 750 million people enjoyed the televised event.

No wonder, then, that their sons nuptials are causing such a build up of hysteria in Britain and around the world.

Royal watchersand, if you believe the press, Kate herself (rather meanly nicknamed Waity-Kaity)have been building up to this event since they got whiff of the princes keenness on a certain fellow student who caught his eye as she paraded the catwalk at a charity fashion show.

It was 2001, the pair were studying at St. Andrews University in Scotland, and within a year they had become inseparable, sharing digs and enjoying the privacy of the press ban that had been agreed upon by the royal family and Fleet Street hacks until William reached 21. Since that date, the pair has been under constant scrutiny, their romance blossoming (with only a small break-up blip) and middle-class Kate being groomed by Clarence House for future royal superstardom.

St. Andrews University

Within a matter of days of the wedding announcement last November, online travel agents began reporting massive spikes in booking patterns from travelers around the world coming to London when Kate and Wills seal the deal on April 29. The capitals hotel rates have gone through the roof and, to the delight of each and every working man, woman and schoolchild in Britain, the country has been given the day off. In these times of economic austerity, time away from the grind couldnt have come at a better moment. Time to P-A-R-T-ay-Y.

Thousands of Brits will leave the comfort of their homes for a day out of celebrations, be it lining the procession route or taking part in any number of events laid on to mark the occasion (or simply getting out of town to avoid the whole thing). Read on to find out where to go to make the most of Londons big moment on April 29.

Westminster Abbey

Whats Going to Happen

OK, so whats the days schedule? If you thought your own mother-in-law was meticulous about keeping your wedding on track, have a thought for Kate who has a whole army (literally) of people making sure nothing goes wrong.

Wedding guestsall 1,900 of themare expected to have taken their seats at Westminster Abbey at least an hour before the ceremony begins at 11am. After the non-dignitary portion of the guest list is seated (such as David and Victoria Beckham, Joanna Lumley and Elton Johnsome of the lucky ones to receive a gold-embossed invitation on their doormat, with a dress code of uniform, morning coat or lounge suit), the dignitaries will enter the Abbey. These individuals include members of other royal families, leading British politicians and ambassadors and representatives from other countries. Around 80 representatives of the Princes charities will also attend. After the dignitaries find their seats, the royals will file into the Abbey, in a strict order of precedence.