I've been to London to visit the Queen.

Well, not the Queen but one of the Queen's palaces... Buckingham Palace. Every summer when the Queen is on hols in Scotland, they open up the state rooms in Buckingham Palace to the public. Unfortunately, they don't let you take photos inside. So all my photos are of the gardens outside the palace.


The visit was organised really well. With 50,000 visitors every summer, I guess they had to fine tune the process so it runs with clockwork precision. You're allotted a time slot for your visit. When you arrive, you're herded into a special shaded area before you have to pass through a security check. Then you're handed an audio guide and sent on your way.

One of my favourite bits of the tour was at the very beginning. They play Handel's Zadok the Priest - the Coronation Anthem on the audio guide as you walk up the grand staircase. It made me feel a little bit queenly. Here it is for you to listen to so that you can feel a bit queenly as well. Just imagine that you're walking up the grand staircase at Buckingham Palace while you listen to it.





You also get to see the Queen's secret door in the White Drawing Room. She uses this sometimes to make a discreet entrance at a function (she comes from her super secret lair after she's been out fighting crime, I'm sure. That's what secret doors are for right?)

Each Summer, there is also a different exhibition on at the palace. I guess it's a way to draw repeat business. This year it was The Queen and the Commonwealth. It showed all the presents given to the Queen by different nations of the Commonwealth and all the outfits that she wore on her visits to Commonwealth countries.

The dresses are beautiful and could still be worn today. Each dress was designed with the visited country in mind. For example, the one she wore to an Australian event was a golden yellow with a wattle design embroidered on it. You can see some pictures from the exhibition here.

After our visit, we headed out into the gardens to the outdoor tea rooms. We'd been a given a tip that the strawberry cake was the cake to try. It was more like a command. That's right, it was an order! So of course we obligingly stopped in the garden cafe for a spot of afternoon tea. The strawberry cake was definitely a winner. It was fit for a queen.

Tips for visiting Buckingham Palace:

• If possible, visit on a weekday. If that's not possible, maybe pick an early morning time slot. We went on a Saturday afternoon and the place was packed. It was so crowded that we had to queue to the see the special exhibition. There was a real bottleneck in this area. It's possible that a weekday or early morning time slot might be less crowded (untested of course).
  
  
• The no photos ban starts from when you enter the palace grounds. This means even no photos in the waiting area. It's up to you though if you want to wait to be told that you aren't allowed to take photos. Andrew and I often wait until we're explicitly told by a sign or a person because it means we might be able to sneak a few naughty shots off (bad Wilsons!)
  
  
• Fill in the Unlimited Admission form at the back of the brochure they give you when enter the palace. Get it stamped by the official at the end of your visit (just before you leave the gardens). Then you can go into the palace as much as you like for a 12 month period.
  
  Great for those of you who live in London. If you go at the end of the season, the next year you can go at the beginning of the season. This way you can see the next year's Summer exhibition for free.
  
  For those of you who don't live in London, technically there is nothing to stop you from filling out another person's name on the form and getting them free entry to the palace. You have to show your ID and the form when you go back to the palace and the information on the ID must match the information on the form. However, you don't have to show your ID when you get the form stamped. But you wouldn't do that would you, because that's fraud! (wink wink, nudge nudge, say no more.)

More photos on Flickr.