Easter Hols: Duke of Edinburgh Gold

For those of you who don't know about the Duke of Edinburgh Award and want to know more, or those who want to read about my experiences with that award, see my Web-page here on my experiences during the Gold section.

This morning dawned at 7:30am, half an hour to late according to my Dad later on. I got showered, and dressed up into my suit, complete with red tie and my Gold DofE Pin. Then, my Dad and I set off to the train station. We caught the 8:57 to London Bridge, and then got to Charing Cross by 9:50am.

After a delightful breakfast of a ham and cheese croissant, which we were happy to have had afterwards, we headed for St James's Palace at a relaxed place, walking down the road "The Mall" (said The Mal, as in Malware, not maul, is in what a bear does, as I found out!)

On arrival at the Palace we were sorted into groups and gradually let into the palace, showing our identification to the police on hand. We then took our seats and, with minor interruptions here and there, sat there waiting for an hour. Trust me, the wait was worth it!

Around 12:00, we were told to marshal into the groups we were put in, and then His Royal Highness (HRH) The Duke of Edinburgh (ie Prince Phillip) himself walked through the door. He asked a couple of us questions, congratulated all of us and made the occasional joke as he walked through the room. It was a real honour to have met him.

After that the official presentation took place, with a special guest, the Chief Councillor of West Sussex, giving out the certificates. We assembled in our groups and were called up one by one to receive our certificate. A couple of speeches later, and it was all over.

We then walked through the remainder of the rooms of the palace, and I will do my best to describe them. All the rooms were covered in a rich, royal red carpet, that really spoke the word "regal" out of the colour. The wall in the presentation room was also the same colour red, and had large paintings on the walls.

The next room we walked into had red, gold and white walls, and similarly large pictures hanging on the walls. It had a high ceiling, also white and gold rimmed. The lights on the walls were gold-coloured electric candle lights, and they really brought an antique feel to the room. It was truly spectacular.

Which made the next room even more so. The red carpet was removed for a more grey carpet, and was the only room to have this in it. The walls were covered with paintings. And I mean that in a wallpaper sense, the entire wall was a painting! It was almost one continuous painting around the entire room, with some weird events going on in the paintings! It was quite interesting compared to the previous room's regal feel.

The next and final room returned to it's red carpet and red walls. But hanging on the walls was the largest stash of weapons I have ever seen hanging on a wall!! They swords, and guns, and more swords, and more guns! On every face of every wall in that room were weapons. There was even two rows of guns arranged in a nice circle and all pointing inwards towards a hat. It was quite spectacular!

We left the palace, and then went to the pub, followed by a walk around London (which was very interesting as I got to see the more touristy parts of London!), finally followed by a trip to a restaurant called Maxwell. After a final half-hour trip to Waterstones (where I bought 3 books, one of them being 3 books in 1) we took a train home.

And now I have an evening ahead of me which looks to be quite relaxing. So, I'll end my blog here. Feel free to comment!