My wife and I will be in London on the day of the Trooping of the Colour (Jun 15). We are not interested in standing along the street for 4 or 5 hours so trying to see some part of the parade is out of the questions. We are wondering how this event might impact other sites and services during the day. Would this be a good day to take in Windsor Castle and avoid all the commotion in London?
Trooping The Colour affects nowhere in London except for The Mall and Horse Guards Parade.
>>>"Would this be a good day to take in Windsor Castle and avoid all the commotion in London?"<<<
Yes.
Her Maj and all the other tourists will be in London. You might get lucky and have the place all to yourselves.......now there's a thought! ;-)
Both will be busy - as they are every other day of the year. Away from the main bit around The Mall and Horse Guards, which is a ton of London you wouldn't know it was going on. No need to make serious plans to avoid.
I once went to see the gun salute in the park, and my recollection is that that was not at all crowded. If that is the case, it could be a way of seeing something of the event without having to get in place on a pavement first thing in the morning. In general, I tend towards the view that there is a lot more worth seeing in London that has nothing to do with the monarchy.
There are some restrictions at Windsor that weekend. I copied this from their website:
14-17 June 2013: St George's Chapel closed
16-18 June 2013: State Apartments closed
17 June 2013: CASTLE CLOSED
"it could be a way of seeing something of the event without having to get in place on a pavement first thing in the morning."
Though Trooping the Colour has no impact on London, apart from on traffic in the area immediately surrounding it, it's impossible to be within 100 yds of the processions or the parade ground without being surrounded by huge crowds. The gun salute from Hyde Park is a far-distant sound effect, utterly unconnected (except by radio signals to ensure synchronicity) with the main event.
Crowds elsewhere in London are no greater and no less during Trooping the Colour than on any other day of the year. The whole point of a real city in a benign climate zone and protected by the sea from physical invasion is that no one single event short of full-out aerial bombing raids has ever done more than scratch the surface of daily life since the Great Fire of 1666..
Check out London's road closures
www.tfl.gov.uk/roadusers/events/default.aspx
You will see that Trooping the Colour affects fewer roads that other less publicised events
flanner, the point was that the OP may enjoy seeing the gun salutes. For the Queen's official birthday the salutes are fired in Green Park, rather than Hyde Park, and the Tower of London.
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