A royal walk in London

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http://www.heygo.com 14th February - A royal walk in London.



It was 4pm at Horse Guards the official ceremonial entrance to St James's and Buckingham Palace and headquarters to the Household Cavalry Mounted Regiment who provide troops for The Queen's Life Guard.



I thought I would take a video from the screen of the Horseguards whilst multitasking with the postcard option LOL



A royal guard has been kept here since 1660 when the original Guard House of the old Palace of Whitehall was on this site. The Palace of Whitehall, the largest palace in Europe at that time, was destroyed by fire in 1698 and replaced by the present Horse Guards building in 1753.



Horse Guards, design by William Kent in the Palladian style is now a Grade I listed building. Only members of the Royal Family or cavalrymen on duty are allowed to drive or ride through the archway.

We were walking and that’s allowed to freely walk through from Whitehall to Horse Guards Parade and St James's Park.



Behind Horse Guards we could see the London Eye with its 32 pods ( 1 for each of the 32 boroughs in London).



We strolled through St.James Park and crossed over The Mall to get a closer look at two memorials - King George VI and HM The Queen Mother.

Standing next to the bronze statue of her husband, King George VI, this national memorial to The Queen Mother, who died in 2002 aged 101, was unveiled by HM The Queen in February 2009.

The bronze statue by Philip Jackson, shows the Queen Mother at the age of 51, when she was widowed.

At the sides of the monuments are two reliefs showing scenes of the Queen Mother's life.

The left hand frieze illustrates the part played by the King and Queen during the Blitz on London.

The right hand frieze depicts the Queen Mother's later life and her interests.



The Mall was closed to traffic today so we walked with Charley, our guide, down the centre of the road feeling quite regal.



A quick peek at St. James’s Palace and then back to the Mall to finally reach the magnificent Queen Victoria Memorial in front of Buckingham Palace.

The Memorial comprises the Dominion Gates (Canada Gate, Australia Gate and South and West Africa Gates)

The monument is 25 metres high and uses 2,300 tonnes of white Carrara marble. As well as Victoria, there are statues representing courage, constancy, victory, charity, truth and motherhood.

The central monument, created between 1906 and 1924, is by Sir Thomas Brock, but the whole design, including the Memorial Gardens, was conceived by Sir Aston Webb. The Memorial was formally unveiled by King George V in 1911.

Looking forward to more interesting tours on London.

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