The Anonymous Widower

The Queen Goes Walkabout

The Times indicates today that the Queen on her visit to Cork, broke away from her carefully scripted itinerary and actually met the Irish people.

I suppose at her age, after a life in which she lived through the Blitz and still rides regularly, she knows a threat when she sees it and sensed that in Cork, her biggest danger was from obsessive secutrity, so she did what she does best and just met and talked to the people.

The Times describes it like this.

In the closing hours of the tour – in, of all places, the rebel county of Cork – she broke off from her carefully choreographed itinerary to meet the cheering crowds gathered outside the city’s English Market.

And there’s this from the Irish Times! She even ended up on the Gaelic Football pages of the Irish Independent. That must be a real first, as usual the only sports pages she graces these days are the racing ones.

I think that in a few weeks time after Barack Obama’s visit, the vast majority of the Irish will remember her visit much more than that of the US President, as I suspect the number of ordinary Irish men and women he meets will be counted on the fingers of one hand.

I suspect bookmakers will be offering very short odds on the return of the Queen to Eire. Especially, after this piece in the Irish Independent.

I think we should all be prepared for a flood of adverts extolling the sites and virtues of Cork.

May 21, 2011 - Posted by AnonW | News, Sport | Barack Obama, Horse Racing, Queen Elizabeth, Republic Of Ireland