Coronation crowds do not let weather rain on their parade
Crowds gathered to celebrate the Coronation in London have had to shelter beneath umbrellas as rain started to fall over the capital but they have not let the prospect of poor weather deter them from coming along to mark the King’s crowning.
Dame Joanna Lumley told Sky News that guests had their umbrellas taken off them earlier in the morning at Westminster Abbey, describing, “those splendid people who’ve been gathering in the collecting ring having made sure we’ve got through security, having all our umbrellas taken away from us because we’d all brought them humbly thinking it would rain”.
Mark Cann, Director of the British Forces Foundation, said the poor weather was unlikely to disturb the chief participant of the day - the King.
“The one person I have met in my life who does not notice weather whatsoever is the King - he’ll just say ‘it’s just a little bit of rain,” he told Sky News.
“I promise you, he will be the one person here today who won’t be in the slightest bit bothered by it,” he added.
“I remember we were playing polo and the heavens opened and everyone scattered for cover and I said, ‘Don’t you think we should take to a tree or something?’ and he said, ‘No it’s only a bit of rain,’ and he just stood there as if nothing was happening.”
The poor weather and difficulties accessing the procession route has led some spectators to make alternative arrangements.
Danny, from Dunstable in Bedfordshire, arrived in London at 8am to find the procession route already closed.
He decided to watch the proceedings in the Theodore Bullfrog pub on the Embankment instead.
Wearing a union flag tie and waistcoat and nursing a pint of Guinness while waiting for the ceremony to start, he did not seem too displeased at how things had turned out. “I have got refreshments, I have got a toilet and a telly,” he told the Telegraph.
