The Queens Keys!!

This past weekend culminated late last night with an even that epitomizes British tradition and pageantry.  I attended three different ceremonies and 2 different museums that all equally spelled out British history in the best of ways.  In a nutshell, it was awesome.

Saturday morning, I set out to Buckingham Palace for the Changing of The Guard.  A lot of people were telling me they heard it was underwhelming and not worth their time.  Well, it was really cool to see.  I’m a sucker for military history and traditions that go along with it, and probably the best places to go to see that is to any British military ceremony (or onboard any navy ship of the line…but we won’t go there, because I haven’t…yet).  I didn’t get there as early as I would have liked, so I was behind a couple people so the pictures look kinda weird (like shaky and blurry, more than usual I suppose).  I’ll let them do the talking for me:

This is the Life Guard riding to relieve the Blues and Royals

This guard is stationed outside the Royal Barracks

He stopped his walk inches in front of me

Sunday morning, a ceremony much less known is the Changing of the Life Guard, the cavalry detachment that guards the traditional entrance to The Royal Palace.  They’re actually located on Whitehall, the road Downing Street is off of and the road that all the government buildings are pretty much on.  From the road, there are two massive stalls, like the ones the foot soldiers stand  in at Buckingham Palace, but instead big enough for a horse and his rider.  At any given time (24 hrs. a day the gift shop guy tells me) there are two mounted Life Guards and two cavalrymen-a-foot patrolling.  The ceremony required some more moving than the one at Buckingham Palace.  The ceremony takes place in their courtyard and out back on a gravel parade ground (the same one the Queen has her reviewing stand on for military parades).  At 11am every day (not every other day in the winter like Buckingham Palace) the replacement unit rides in from the barracks near The Palace to the parade field.  Elements (those not on guard duty) of the current unit ride out to greet them.  We had to scurry back into the courtyard to see four replacement guards ride in from the new unit (two dismounted to replace the cavalryman-a-foot), then scurry back out to see them officially hand-off  power to the other unit.  At that point, the old unit assembles with the additional four cavalrymen who were on duty and leaves the parade ground for the barracks:

Sargent of the Watch

Blues and Royals

That cop in the foreground, yeah he pretty much ran the whole ceremony

This is the Sargent of the Life Guard inspecting the first 2 horses to go on watch

Back on Saturday though, I went to the TFL museum…again.  This time though I got to see the new Astin Martin Red Bus that will be used next year for the Olympics in London.  It was sooo cool.  Here take a look (we couldn’t go inside because they were still assembling some of the parts…):

They say the new bus is bigger in dimension to the old one

yup, I'm one of the few that got to stand in front of the bus!!

It's got a staircase in the front and back of the bus to increase volume of passengers

On Sunday after the Changing of the Life Guard I went into the Household Cavalry (that’s what the life guard are called I guess) Museum to get a look at the background (like I said, a sucker for history).  When you go in, you see current uniforms and old uniforms and read about their exploits in battle.  Displayed was one (if not the only one I think actually) of the Victoria Crosses awarded to a member of the Household Cavalry.  They made a point of saying all Household Cavalrymen (especially the ones I just saw on guard duty) had served in a theater of combat.  The guard at Buckingham Palace rotates between five different regiments while the Life Guard rotates between just two units, The Blues and Royals and The Life Guard (I know it sounds redundant but that’s what the placard says).  There was also this cool window where you could see into the stable where the horses are kept while their unit was on duty, the horses were just chillin except for two of them that were probably just angry that they had to stand still outside for like a half hour waiting for everyone else to change out:

6 to 8 weeks past a friend of mine managed to procure tickets for the Ceremony of the Keys at the Tower of London.  The event has taken place at 9:53 through 10:05 every evening for the past 700 years.  No pictures are allowed and strict silence must be observed throughout the ceremony.  Essentially there is an outer gate and an inner gate (on either side of the “mote”) that need to be locked every night.  700 years ago, a Yeoman Warder went to lock the gate at that time and was almost overpowered by robbers.  He swore he’d not go back out unless he had an armed escort.  Since then, 3 of the Queens Guard and a lantern bearer meet the Chief Yoeman Warder to lock both gates every night.  Through the 1950’s there was sever smog and severely diminished visibility issues that prompt the next part of the ceremony.  The sentry on duty marches over to the Bloody Tower (the origin of the key-bearing outfit that set-out to lock-up The Tower) and orders the detachment to halt to identify themselves.  In the heavy fog, all the sentry would hear are footsteps and the rattle of keys, he wouldn’t be able to see a thing.  He’d yell “halt, who goes there?”  The Yeoman Warder would reply “The Keys Sir!”  The Guard would shriek back “Who’s Keys?”  The Yeoman Warder would yell back “Queen Elizabeth’s Keys!”  The sentry would then return his weapon from firing position back to parade rest and yell “The Queens keys may pass for all is well.”  The detachment would then march through the Bloody Tower (the inner wall) into the inner ring where they are greeted by the rest (probably not the rest because all guard boxes are filled at all times, so minus 4 guards) of their outfit, including a bugler.  The officer of the watch would ask if the Yeoman Warder has the keys, when he replies with an affirmative everyone (us included) yells “God save The Queen.”  The Yeoman Warder is dismissed, British “taps” are played and we are dismissed.  It was ironic because even though the gates were closed with gigantic steel bars, there were small 4 ft. high doors open in these massive doors for us to go through.  I was great fun, I enjoyed it and thanked this friend of mine profusely for inviting me to see this.  It was great.  Here are some of the pictures I did take before the ceremony:  

Yeah, yeah, yeah it's blurry don't rub it in okay

Tower Bridge all lit up

The Outer Gate, all locked up for the night

There are also some pictures here from my little excursion to Hyde Park:

Hyde Park Green

The Serpentine

This seems like a double standard to me....

The Queens Standard over Buckingham Palace, she must be in residence

Diana, Princess of Wales memorial Fountain / lazy river

The water was cold

The only road bridge over The Serpentine

water of Diana's Fountain

Overall, I had a great weekend and great week.  Things are going very well here in all categories.  The only thing is that since we’re getting close to the end of the semester the workload is heating up a little so there is much more work to do in the coming weeks.  I’ll of course keep you posted as it happens.

UPDATE:  As you know, I'm a huge tennis fan, so I was really pumped to hear this news today: http://blog.timesunion.com/tennis/albany-to-host-davis-cup-tie-against-spain/4847/


If the TU center can host the Davis Cup Tie in July, I'll absolutely be there.  They take place Friday through Sunday so I'll get that Friday off and go back home to see it.  It could be in Texas though, so obviously I wouldn't go that far, but keep your fingers crossed.  And hey, maybe Governor Cuomo will call the USTA about it....

“I have never spent a day in my adult life where I didn't learn something”

~Peter Jennings, former anchor of ABC News

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