Émilie

Sadly, the Union Jack was flying here instead of the royal standard, so the Queen was out to lunch at one of her other residences.

Nevertheless, it was a remarkable experience!

The following entry is pieced together from an email I sent on December 24th at 2:00 PM:

It was another cold, gray British day today, but I have a good coat and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves regardless. Today we visited Windsor Castle. It wasn’t as lovely as some of the French residences I’d seen, but seeing as how the Queen still lives in it on the weekends, I could definitely tell it felt more like a home. (A ridiculously lavish and ceremonial home, but a home nonetheless.)

We were lucky that there weren’t any state visitors in the country, so we were able to view the state apartments (where foreign nobles/royals/important people still sleep!). We also got to walk up the red-carpeted entryway where these same important people would enter. It was really wild just to be there.

Windsor is also home to the world’s most famous doll house complete with miniatures that I can scarcely describe. The house has working electricity, plumbing, and miniature works of art recreated by the artists themselves in some cases!

We also got to see the changing of the guard, and the band that led in the new guard was playing Christmas carols, so the crowd sang along, and it was delightfully corny!

It was a delightful trip, but we came home exhausted, so we spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing in front of the telly and working on Robin’s new jigsaw puzzle.