The Royals with Roya and Kate - How the Royal household is preparing for President Trump’s visit

Episode Date: August 28, 2025

Welcome to The Royals where this week Kate Mansey is exploring State Visits past and present. Pomp, pageantry and sumptuous banquets await Donald Trump, but what really goes on behind the scenes to ensure a successful State Visit? And what can the politically astute King Charles learn from his late mother’s achievements? Kate talks to royal historian and author Robert Hardman to explain the political machinations fuelling the public spectacle. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

They're Britain's most theatrical displays of diplomacy, part ceremonial setpiece, part geopolitical chess move. But the state visits are not throwing together with just a few emails and phone calls. The planning often takes months, sometimes even years, and they involve what the palace refers to as stakeholders. That's a complex operation involving the golden triangle of the palace, the foreign office and number 10. To outsiders, the patentry looms large. We see horses, castles, glittering state banquets, palaces. But make no mistake, these visits are deeply political. They send out a message that says, this country matters.

And even more than that, this leader matters. And in mid-September, one of the most talked about people in global politics, US President Donald Trump, will be returning to the UK for what's been described as an unprecedented. second state visit. But before the trumpet sound again, we're taking a moment to pull back the curtain and find out what goes in to making a state visit a success. To help us unravel that,

I'm delighted to be joined by the man who's chronicled more royal moments than most of us have had cups of tea, royal historian and author Robert Hardman, who's new edition of his book, Charles III, the inside story, is actually out today. So it's great timing to have you here. Robert. Very pleased to be here. Well, it's a very special day to have this discussion as we're in London

and it won't be long before. Shortly, we're going to be welcoming Donald Trump in Windsor. Let's talk a bit about state visit protocol, the formalities and the machinery that's probably already been going on for a long time. What are the key ingredients do you think, Robert, that make a visit like this such a success? You hit the nail on the head at the start. Okay, you know, they are the ultimate sort of diplomatic tool. It's the ultimate diplomatic accolade, really one country pays another. And there are various sort of levels of visit in the palace, official Downing Street, foreign office rankings. You've got official visits, private visits, but the state visit is the big one because it does follow a sort of a template. In royal terms, it is the one occasion when absolutely

every part of the royal household gets involved, the whole lot from obviously the master of the household is in charge of laying on the gold plate and the food and making it all look great. The Lord Chamberlain's office are doing all the ceremonial stuff. The Royal Collection, I've got to get all the treasures ready. I mean, it's a real team effort. And although they have been doing this, you know, since for longer than I've been alive, you've been alive. I mean, the kind of modern state visit really started, I suppose, back in the late Victorian era.

But each one is taken as though, you know, let's start from scratch. nothing's taken for granted. It's got to be done perfectly. And there are always little sort of tweaks here and there. But this is a huge one because it's the president of the United States. They are our biggest and one of our oldest allies. There's a lot of talk about it being unprecedented second state visit. And actually, it's not quite the case because there had been one or two other world leaders who have had two state visits.

First for a US president. Exactly. Previous US presidents have obviously come over more than once. They've had the state visit. And then they've come back, but it's more of a kind of cup of tea at Windsor with the monarch. Yeah, I mean, state visits actually for US presidents are relatively recent. I mean, previous US presidents didn't tend to, because they have such tight schedules and they got so much to do, they preferred official visits.

So actually, the very first US state visit wasn't until George W. Bush just over 20 years ago. So when one thinks to those great visits, like the most famous one probably is the Ronald Reagan visit, when there he is on horseback with the queen at Windsor. One of the great sort of defining post-war images, actually that wasn't a state visit. It was an official visit. I mean, looking at it, he looked just like a state visit. I had a white-tie banquet. I mean, it had all the trimmings.

But officially, it wasn't a state visit because there wasn't time to do a full state visit. It does take a few days to kind of cram in a state visit. And most people won't be aware of the distinction between what makes an official visit, an informal visit is a bit more obvious. But the difference between an official visit and a state visit, how would you describe that distinction? Well, an official visit can just be, you know, last a few hours. I mean, President Trump's first visit to Windsor Castle was actually an official visit in 2018. He came for a cup of tea with the Queen. And you still lay on a guard of honour.

I mean, there's still a lot of sort of protocol and pageantry and what have you involved. Well, he was still inspecting the guards, wasn't he, in that 2018 visit? Famously inspecting the guards. And that comes with an official visit. But what, you don't get, you don't get the state banquet, the processions, the exchange of gifts, the exchange of decorations. a lot of the sort of tangential stuff that goes with the...

The full bells and whistles. Absolutely. I mean, I think what it boils down to is, you know, do you put on white tie and does the George Vourth dinner service come out and you get all that amazing gold plate on the table? By the way, the table at Windsor, although it's not Buckingham Palace,

I think Windsor's actually the best setting of all. We were both there for the Emmanuel Macron visit, weren't we, in July? And they said that they'd spent a week laying the table. Well, it takes about a week to put the table together. It's actually, you know, it's the longest table in Britain, And they put it all together. I've seen them do it.

Yeah, we would, when I was doing a documentary down there some years ago for a previous French president, President Sherat was coming to celebrate the centenary of the Ententec Cordial. And we watched them put the table together. And it's, I can't remember how many leaves as they say it is. But, I mean, it's lots of sections. And when you put them all together, it is the longest single table in Britain and it seats. To my head, I think it's 134 people. And it takes up the full length of St. George's Hall. And it's absolutely magnificent.

Whereas in Buckingham Palace, you get a U.S. shaped table, which is obviously very dramatic. But I don't think a you is quite as impressive as this vast sort of... It's funny, isn't it? It's not as impressive. Obviously, it's taken in place in Windsor because they've got the reservicing work going on the Buckingham Palace. But yeah, there are those lovely touches at St George's Hall and you have

the little, you know, the candle lights with the lamp, their own little lamp shades on and all that sort of detail. It feels much more royal. Yeah, well, it's in a castle, it's got, you know, it's got all this got suits of armour everywhere. I mean, literally, for more suits of armour in Windsor castle, actually, than any museum. And it's got, you know, cannon and guns and all the shields of all the knights of the garter going back to 1343 on the ceiling. So, I mean, it really is.

It's proper, proper knights in shining armour, dandals in distress. I mean, all you need is a dragon, frankly. Well, maybe they'll arrange that, especially for Trump. It's interesting you talk about George H.W. Bush, going back all those years to their first kind of official state visit, because a lot of people might remember having seen if they didn't live through it, Eisenhower visit, when Dwight Eisenhower came over in 1959 to Balmoral, and that really sort of, in my mind, sort of started that kind of special relationship between the palace and the US presidents. I'm told that a young Prince Charles was told to call him Uncle Ike, which was Eisenhower's not. That's sweet. Yeah, and I think, you know, that kind of informality as

well, that sort of special relationship. How do you think the role of the royal family helps seal that, well, we often hear being the special relationship between the US and the UK. Well, I think it's a very good point. I mean, you hear about the special relationship and it sort of goes in and out of fashion. So, for example, when Ron Reagan came on that trip in 1982, and I dug out, actually did a freedom of information request to get the files out on that visit and got some of the documents out. And at the time, the foreign office, everyone was under strict orders not to say the word special

relationship. It was seen to be a bit presumptuous. back in the 80s, don't just don't say special relationship. And yet, in more recent times, I mean, when Barack Obama was here in 2011, I mean, you couldn't stop him talking about the special relationship. Donald Trump talks about it. But I think that the real relationship as such is not so much between the prime minister and the president, but it is between the royal family and the president.

Because, I mean, they're the two heads of state. And you mentioned the Eisenhower visit. And that was, I don't even think that was an official one. I think it was a sort of semi-official. Yes, it wasn't a kind of state visit as such. which is a private residence. And then you had visits like the famous John F. Kennedy and Jackie O coming in for dinner in 1961.

And that was, you know, it was a black tie dinner. It was certainly official, but it certainly was not a state visit. And don't forget you had these sort of these problem areas, because although overall it's been a very harmonious, they're our greatest ally. But there's been a couple of big bumps in the road. I mean, there was Suez for starters, which was a disaster for UK-U.S. politics. And then there was the Vietnam War when Lyndonby Johnson was determined

to try and get some sort of British presence there. Then the only president not to have met the late Queen during her own. Yeah, he was almost, he would have met her, actually. He was meant to come over for Churchill's funeral, but he was very ill and his doctors advised him against it. So yeah, he was the one who didn't get to meet her. But throughout the Vietnam War, and Britain and America were at sort of loggerheads then,

and Johnson was furious at Harold Wilson just wouldn't send any troops, nothing. But keeping the kind of flame alive, if you like, was the fact that, I mean, the Queen did have a dog in the fight because she's Queen of Australia. And Australia did send troops to Vietnam. And one of the Queen's favourite veterans, Keith Payne v.C, got a East Victoria Cross for incredible bravery, save dozens of young Australian troops from an ambush single-handedly. And he got the Victoria Cross. So there was a sort of royal element to things like Vietnam, even if Britain itself was standing away from it.

That kind of again goes to this point that it just moves at a different level. The ups and downs in the road. I remember there being some kind of government documents that were on earth at one point, which said that Bill Clinton on one visit had been offered tea with the Queen and had declined it because he had plans to go for a curry with the Blairs with Tony and Sherey. But Obama seemed to be, in recent history, Obama did seem to have a very genuinely warm relationship with the Queen. There was no question that the Obama.

It was the Obama's, not just Obama. I mean, Michelle, as much as Barrack, who really did forge a, I think you can say it's a genuine friendship, as he said earlier. I mean, often world leaders would come on these official visits, but they would often sort of then hit it off the royals, particularly the Lake Queen personally, and would then come back. So, I mean, Nelson Mandela, it was always dropping in fatigue whenever he was in London. So the Obama's, early on in the administration, Obama came here. I think it was either for a G7 or a NATO summit, and that was the time when,

Michelle Obama got criticised by some people in the press were being seen to put an arm. Do you remember she was touching the Queen? Yes, well, I was going to get onto Protocol. Yeah, and it caused all sorts of... It did at the time. What was your view of that? Oh, I mean...

Because people talk about Protocol, but, you know, in our job, we sort of think it's not quite as formal as people... It's not. And also, it's when you find out the backstory. So I did them find out the backstory, actually, for one of Obama's senior age, that the Queen and Michelle Obama were having a discussion about heel sizes, and they wanted to compare each other's heels.

And the Queen was saying, well, I have these square heels that helped me sort of stand for long periods of time. And she wanted to sort of, you know, basically show her. And if you're standing in, you're trying to lift up a heel to show someone else, you've got to put your arm around them for your balance, otherwise you're going to fall over. So the two of them were doing a sort of, well, here's my heel, here's your heel. So that's what it was. They were having a very girly chair. They were talking about heels.

You know, I mean, it's probably no different to the, you know, the Prince Philip and, I don't know, the president of some swapping regimental tie anecdotes. So I understand, yeah, there's no difference. It wasn't a faux par that some in the media had it. And that was a strong relationship. And on a subsequent trip to London, the Queen heard that Mrs. Obama was just going to be in town, or totally privately, with her daughters, who were then school age. She said, well, see if they'd like to come around for tea.

And this, well, that'd be lovely. We'd love to come bring the girls around for tea. And she said, well, would they like maybe a little carriage ride around the Palace Garden? I was like, yes, that'd be lovely. So that Mrs. Obama and the Obama daughters had tea with the Queen. and then went on a little ride in one of the landowners around the, you know, they were just taking a little guided tour. And that's not part of the official.

It's nothing, it's not official. It's a very warm, personal invitation. You know, talk about soft power. I mean, you know, how does that get down? Well, when we talk about soft power and the nitty gritty of it, what happens with the actual state banquet? Because that's, for me, the pinnacle of any state visit. You know, we talked about the table being laid out.

But the meal itself is really interesting, isn't it? Because often that incorporates. the best of each country. You can tell us a bit about what they get to eat. There's a lot of planning about the food beforehand, and there'll be a lot of traffic between the palace and the visitors' embassy, the US embassy, the White House, the Foreign Office, Downing Street.

Everyone will be talking, and you've got to get the food right. And one of the things that McKinia is very keen on is sort of locally sourced ingredients, so that's really important. So they've got to make sure it sort of ticks those boxes, but you've got to make sure it's something that the visitor likes. So when, for example, when Nelson Mandela came, they established that, you know,

he didn't like eating beef. Another thing actually about his visit, they established it because of his many, many years in prison, he liked to eat much earlier. So they actually move the state banquet for it by a couple of hours. I mean, normally these things start at, you're expected to turn up at sort of 7.30 and then people tend to sort of sit down around 8, 45, 9 o'clock. With Nelson Mandela, it was all done at, I think, about 5.30, yeah, yeah, yeah, because you want to make the guests feel comfortable.

And so with Donald Trump, they'll certainly have, you know, been through likes and dislikes. I mean, he loved when he came on his state visit in 2019. He loved that banquet. And, I mean, they do bring out the best wines. Now, Donald Trump doesn't drink. But, I mean, that's not going to mean that they're going to screen on that. I'm not going to shortchange the other guests on the, on the claret that we'll be seeing

at the banquet on the 17th of September. You know, it'll be great wine. So the master of the cellars will be already be sort of planning right. What goes with walks? until you know what the food is, you don't know what wine to serve. And there's a sort of fabulous process of laying the table. They do have a tape, it's like a wooden ruler, and they will make sure it's exactly in,

I cough, the top of my head, a couple of what is like, so like 23 inches between each chair, or they measure the exact gap between the chairs and between the table settings. And every table setting, you've got to have sort of two or three glasses. You've got to have a glass of the toes. You've got to have five or six glasses. It's surprised anybody can stand up and walk away after they've had all those.

I know it's over a thousand glasses on the table, and I know that the washing up is done that night, because I've actually seen them do it. They go on into the early hours, and they wash it all up by hand. Very precious, you know, China. And I think you've written about this, in fact, they actually sped up a little bit over the years. I think the king's cut down on the soup course, which always used to be there. Why has he done that, do you think? Yeah, it's really gone down considerably because it was, there used to be a five-course affair, and it was the late Queen, actually, who was trying to shorten. She liked to have fairly short dinners, you know, she felt that, you know, they just don't want to sit there going on and on.

Particularly, you know, if you've got a guest who doesn't speak English, she doesn't got much to say, it can get quite hard work. So you, I mean, that certainly won't be a problem with somebody like Donald Trump. But it used to be five courses starting with soup. It was in the early noughties, I think, was the Queen of Denmark, I think it was coming. And both she and the Queen of Denmark agreed that, you know, it'd be quite nice of the dinner. It was a little shorter, so I think she suggested maybe we could dispense with the soup. The soup went and then the king has got rid of the fruit or what's actually called dessert. It's a sort of plate of fruit and everyone gets presented with a hollowed out pineapple,

which has been sort of pre-cut into chunks. So you sort of lift off the leaf bit and it's like a lid and inside of this beautifully cut. Maybe one for Megamarkle's show. Exactly, yes. Yeah, with love from the Royal House. But that, again, that adds to the time sitting at the table. So they've removed that now. So it's really, it's down to an ordinary three-course dinner.

Except there's nothing ordinary about it at all. And some speeches as well, in which you praise your guest or your host, depending on who's speaking. You both praise each praises the other's nation and there's the national anthem. You get a hint of the deals that have been done behind the scenes through the speeches as well, don't you? Because before this has all happened, this has been used to kind of leverage any kind of political trade deal between the two countries. Yeah, you try and, it's a bit of, there's always a bit of humor in there, there's a bit of history, and, you know, sometimes it can get a bit delicate if it's a country that you've fought a very vicious war with, but, you know, you just sort of get around it, you skirt around the embarrassing bits. That's clearly not going to be the case with the USA. There are so many things to touch on. You always try and do a bit of history, but also the sort of the crucial, you know, what's going on in the present, celebrate whatever trade deals, defense deals, that sort of thing. And, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, look to the future and then the anthem at the end. You know, you talked about going back to kind of Queen Victoria's Day

and that kind of diplomacy that was used. I mean, in medieval Europe, they're a bit more risky. I mean, it reminds me with Henry VIII and King Francis I first of France and the famous The Field of the Cloth of Gold in 1520 near Calais. It was so many riches, kind of temporary palaces sprung up. Talk about a banquet. I mean, there were many, and this idea that you could show your wealth and you could show off your prowess in that way. And then Queen Victoria kind of extended, in her own way, extended that kind of level of diplomacy started, I suppose, what we see as the template for the modern state visit today.

How do you think the history kind of plays into it? I think, as you say, Henry VIII and the Field of the Cloth of God, that probably was, that was the original great kind of bilateral. celebration. Big summit. And then you have to remember, I mean, monarchs didn't really go abroad much. I mean, prior to Queen Victoria, our longest reigning monarch, George III, never left. He didn't just never left Britain. He never left England. I mean, the furthest he went from London was, I think, on a trip to Worcester. And yet, you know, he's the guy who really was sort of built up what we would then go on to consider the British Empire, India, Australia, all these sort of places. I mean, it was an extraordinary reach that Britain had, led.

by a monarch who regarded the Isle of Wight as fairly treacherous. So, you know, monarchs didn't go away. And then the idea of a reigning monarch actually travelling, he'd sort of bounced back. Queen Victoria liked to travel a bit, not so much. And Edward I was a great traveller. Georgia 5th, of course, travelled to India. And the idea of roving heads of state became a thing, I suppose,

in the early 20th century. But I mean, the first US president had come to Buckingham Palace, and it wasn't a state visit, but he came to Britain was one. Woodrow Wilson, who came, and I think it was 1919 after the First World War. But it was an occasional thing because it took so long to get across the Atlantic. You know, you didn't really have the time to do it. But the late Queen was clearly the maestro, yeah.

I mean, she travelled further than any monarch in here. In fact, she travelled further than all other monarchs put together. I'm talking about the US as well. You know, obviously she travelled over to the US quite a lot. She went there as a princess. She went there on behalf of her father as a princess in 1951. And she went. The famous pictures of her dancing with Gerald Ford.

Oh, then, yeah. That was the great trip when she went over for the bicentennial in 200 years of the USA in 76. Which begs the question, of course. Next year, will a member of the Royal Family go over to the States, do you think? Because that's historically what we've done to celebrate U.S. independence. That will be a big moment. It's a huge moment for America. The 250th anniversary.

Yeah. I mean, it's going to be enormous. Yeah, it's going to be empty enormous and... Do you think we see the king go? Well, I would imagine it would either be the king or the Prince of Wales. I mean, it's got to be absolute top, top level, because it's a huge moment for America. And there are any sort of, you know, two teams involved, really?

It's the Americans who won and the Brits who lost. That's it. There's no escape, you can't, there's absolutely no escape for getting the Macros over or, you know, the Chancellor of Germany. I mean, there's nothing to do with them. It was America kicking out the Brits. And it was quite sweet in 1976 because there was a lot of diplomatic towing and praying

on how should we pitch this because, you know, even 200 years on, it's got to hit the right note. And the Queen and the Pannas felt that America should have its sort of big celebration and kicking out the Brits. And then she'd come just afterwards. They felt that, you know, actually having her there

on the 4th of July on the day with all the sort of fireworks going off, that would sort of hit slightly the wrong notes. So they had all the big events. And then just a few days later, you know, it's Royal Yacht Britannia, sails in with the queen on board. And I mean, it was fabulous. Everyone went completely tontoe. And she was sort of toasted up and down the East Coast.

And as he said, culminating in this great banquet on the White House lawn with Gerald Ford. And there she is, you know, dancing away. Goodness. Won't be any dancing this time. The echoes of history, I think, will be, yeah, will be with us, won't they? Especially in this visit and next year, if one of the members of the Royal Family goes. It's one of those key moments in the sort of transatlantic relationship where, and there were a lot of jokes last time about Georgia 3rd, both Gerald Ford and the Queen, constant references in speeches to the fact that, yeah, it was a little bit awkward about them, but, you know, it's turned out well. And I always remember when Barack Obama came on that 2011 state visit, and they'd laid out all the various, sort of key pieces of UK, US memorabilia.

I love this, but you talk about getting the treasures out. from the Royal Collection because they bring out stuff stuff from the archives. And, you know, the stores must be amazing to go and have a, you know, a look through there. I mean, on the US relationship, I mean, there's just so much to choose from. But there's this famous note in the archives, written by George III, which the way he says, it's in his hand. He goes, America is lost, exclamation by, exclamation by, exclamation, mark. You know, what will befall us? You know, it's the end of the world.

The queen showed that to Barack Obama. Didn't age well, that note. Well, no, Barry from my character, Jake, he went, just a temporary blip in the special relationship, which I thought was very, very quick-witted, and everybody laughed at that. It was a good line. There has been a lot of humour, hasn't there, I think, over the years. It'd be interesting to see what treasures they bring out for the Trump visit. We talked, before we started recording, actually, about some of the celebrity elements involved.

Do you think we're going to have lots of stars at that banquet? Well, yeah. Is that something they're going to be looking to wheel out, that guest list for the state banquet? Yeah, if you're... And two banquets, perhaps. Yeah, we don't yet know. Yes, there always used to be a tradition that you had, if there was time, you would have the, obviously, on the first night, the monarch hosts the state banquet, which obviously the king will have it at Windsor Castle. But traditionally on these states, on the second night, the visitor then returns the compliment by having what they call the return banquet.

And so with George W. Bush, he had one for the queen at a Winfield House, which is the U.S. ambassador's residence. And I talked to him about that. I interviewed him for my biography of the Queen, and he was very keen. He knew that the Queen liked musicals, so he wanted to have a sort of musical element. So he'd arranged an evening of musical hits, and he got Andrew Lloyd Weber in to do it,

which is what you can do when you're the president of the US, and you're entertaining the Queen to dinner, and you ring up Lord Lloyd Webber, and he goes, yes, I'd be delighted to help. And that will be something that they arrange. They will arrange, yeah. And Barack Obama did the same thing in 2011. So he had a return banquet

and he knew as well that the Queen loved loved musicals, loved Hollywood and that she arranged for her to sit next to Tom Hanks at dinner that night. So she had the brother on one side, Tom Hanks on the other, so it was, you know, Potus and Forrest Gump. She was delighted.

Absolutely. And Magrod did it. So when the king went over to Versailles on that state visit which you were on Kate, I mean, I remind me, but I think somewhere on the table, there was Mick Jagger was there. I think Hugh Grant. So, I mean, you know, there's always a bit of that, you know.

So I'm sure we'll see some fairly major league celebs. There was a big problem when the Regans came in 1982. And again, I found this while I was writing my book by digging around in the archives. And the Regans turned out, there were big fans of Brideshead Revisited, which was a big show on ITV at the time, and it was on TV in America.

And the British Amherst was saying, it really would be wonderful if we could get one of the stars of Brideshead Revisited to the banquet. And so the sort of hump was on for, you know, who can we get? And they were all busy filming other staff. And, you know, Jeremy Irons was, I don't know, somewhere else. And in the end, they managed to get Anthony Andrews along.

So the Regan's had their Brideshead fix at dinner. That's brilliant. I love all the preparation that goes into it, the kind of scurrying around behind the scenes that you never see the swan with a flapping feet. Oh, yeah, absolutely. And the gifts as well. I can't wait to see the gifts. Apparently in 2009, I think it was.

Obama gave the late Queen an iPod. Oh, yes. Which speaks to the moment of the time, doesn't it? Yeah. Sometimes you see that some of these gifts sort of slowly sort of disappear, but some always just sort of hit the spot. I know the Queen was always using the silver samovar that Boris Yeltsin gave her to make tea.

So it actually came out and she was used for... Get Mr. Yeltsin's samovar. We're going to have tea with someone. It was a great talking point. Yeah, exactly. Breaking the eyes as you pour the tea. Something to say? Yes, rather more used to.

in the earliest of her reign, when there was a phaser and everyone would give her animals, which was slightly problematic. I think she went to somewhere in Africa, some president gave her an elephant. It was quite expensive getting the elephant home. And yeah, she got two Jaguars, I remember from her state visit to Brazil and was on a visit years before that, 1961, she was on a visit to Gambia. And just as the Royal Yacht was about to leave, this little boy sort of ran up the jetty. And where the sort of a Query was standing with this biscuit tin and said, this is for her majesty. And that's very kind.

So I aimed to see what it was. It was a baby crocodile. What do we do with that? Cheers for that. So the query took it to Martin Charteris, the deputy private secretary. The Queen said, that's very kind. What do we do? And Martin Charterer said, oh, put it in my bath.

So the baby crocodile sat in this bath in the Royal Yacht all the way back to Britain and lived out of its days happily at London Zoo. Did it really? Yeah. But anyway, we don't do animals anymore after a while. No, in Samoa last year, I think we had, at Chogam, we had the king and queen were presented with a butchered pig, so a dead pig as a gift. And it was sort of thanks that's so kind, we're leaving tomorrow. Obviously, it went to the local village to feed the local village and a big feast was had in sort of in their honour.

So it was fine, but that immediate kind of, oh, thank you. I'll do with this. I have happened with the Lake Queen on her famous tour after the coronation. And as she was leaving Tonga, Queen Saloti of Tonga brought out this huge, it was a sort of roasted pea, had been roasted on a spit. But it was already quite being, it's getting a little sort of high in the sun. And it was, it was ferried out to the raw yacht. And it was like, what earth do we do with that?

And the answer was, well, just wait till we're out of view and it's going over the side. And so the sharks had a big lunch that day. Oh, my goodness. Oh, well, at least somebody benefited from it, I suppose. I feel like I could talk to you for ages, Robert, because it's just. There's so much to say. They're great fun, Kate. They are great fun, aren't they?

There's so much, home and away. There's always a few dramas. A few dramas, you never know what's going to happen. There could be the odd protest, as we've seen in previous. Yes. The US presidents don't tend to have the carriage processions because of security reasons, but we'll see, Keistama recently mentioned there might be something extra special for Trump. Yeah.

Well, you could always sort of tailor things a little bit. I mean, so that time when, and again, it was not a state visit. It was just an official visit by President Obama right at the end of his presidency. He wanted to be the first world leader to congratulate the Queen on her 90th birthday. So she was 90, this is back in 2016. And the very next day, he was on that sort of round the world farewell, wind down tour. But he timed it so that he came to Windsor that day. And there'd been this huge debate between the Foreign Office and the White House and the Secret Service and the police and everybody.

Because when the Queen heard he was flying in to Windsor, She said, well, that's great. Tell him to land in the park, and Philip and I will come and pick him up. And the Secret Service sort of was saying, this cannot happen. The president can only be driven by the Secret Service. And the palace and dining street were going, well, I think the Queen is really is quite determined to come and pick up the President and the First Lady herself at the Duke. And it was the only time in his entire presidency.

And his staff told me this, this row went right the way up to the top, to the President. He said, look, you know, frankly, I'm pretty safe in the Queen's car. with her. So they turn up, fly in. And there is Prince Philip and the Queen with a rangerover to pick him up. That's it. It's like mum, dad and the kids in the back. And they drive off up to the castle. It was the only time that he did not have a Secret Service chauffeur in his entire eight years in the White House. He had Prince Philip instead. And when Trump landed his Air Force, one helicopter in the grounds of Buckingham Palace, he scorched the lawns, all the taking off and landing.

Yeah, the gardener was not happy. It was Marine one, I think, the helicopter. Well, the problem is he's not just marine one, but whenever he flies, it's always three helicopters, minimum, because you've got all the staff and then there's a decoy one as well. So there was actually three of these things all came in and made fairly big holes in the palace lawn. But Windsor, that's not a problem. You've got the whole Windsor estate. It's all sealed off. Anything you're worried about is Heathrow air traffic, but I suspect they might stop that for a few minutes. Do you think? I think they can do what they like. You know, I mean, if POTUS is flying in and the King's entertaining, I think Heathrow will do what it's told. Well, let's see. It'd be brilliant. Whatever happens, I think it's going to be a spectacle, a fest, as I think Trump has described it himself. It's going to be beautiful. Well, I could talk to you all day, Robert. It's so nice to have you on and hear your insight about state visits, past and present, particularly on the day that the latest edition of your new book is out, Charles III, the inside story, which I do recommend. Thank you very much, Kate. It's very kind of you. You have thoroughly enjoyed looking back and looking forward.

Yeah, and I'll see you in Windsor. I'll see you in Windsor in September. See you in the quarter angle. Okay.