From student to King: 60 years of visits to Australia and another return of Carlos to the antipodes

It is worth listing exhaustively, year by year: 1966, 1967, 1970, 1974, 1977, 1978, 1979, 1981, 1983, 1985, 1988, 1994, 2005, 2012, 2015 and 2018. From the 60s to today, Alone, accompanied by his mother, representing the previous monarch, and now in the role of sovereign, Australia will be among the most visited destinations by Charles III. First, as the young heir to the throne, then alongside Diana, who captured and competed for all attention, much later married to Camilla, with whom she returns this Friday to the antipodes, this time for a trip that promises to be everything. but consensual and peaceful, not to mention the particular context of the monarch himself.

The fight against cancer that Carlos III has been waging at the age of 75 is public, as is the desire to keep the official agenda active. Two years after ascending the throne, and as heads of the Commonwealth, which reigns over 14 nations, including Australia, Charles and Camilla must confront a particularly lively anti-monarchy movement. On the other side of the world, the royal couple’s agenda includes a visit to Canberra Parliament House, the Australian War Memorial and the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Memorial. The King will also meet with academics to learn about work being carried out on melanoma, one of the most common cancers on Australian soil, while the Queen’s program will include a debate on domestic violence. We will see what this reaction will be like on the streets, and what more or less unexpected moments may shake the next few days, which also include a stopover in Samoa.

Just before the start of the trip, which will last until October 23, it is inevitable to remember some memorable moments from previous trips. Firstly, the return to 1966, when Carlos, then only 17 years old, spent six months studying in Timbertop, in Victoria, at Geelong Grammar School, a decisive phase in his training for the mission he carries out today, which allowed him still enjoy a brief breath of normality and anonymity, given the exposure in the United Kingdom. Refugee from the media in this rural area, the young student lived a very different routine from the one he followed in the rigorous and austere school of Gordonstoun, Scotland.

The young prince in February 1966 at Geelong Grammar School, Victoria, where he spent two school terms. © GettyImages

The following year, Elizabeth II’s eldest son would return to Australia, this time representing the queen, for the funeral of Prime Minister Harold Holt. The most recent visit dates back to 2018, while the former sovereign was still alive. On that occasion he had the honor of opening the Commonwealth Games on behalf of the monarch. At his side was Camilla, who in 2012, as Duchess of Cornwall, headed to Australia as part of the Diamond Jubilee celebrations of Elizabeth II. The couple would return in 2015 for a 12-day trip, extending to New Zealand.

Charles III received the New Zealand rugby players in Buckingham and they responded with a “warm” and “healing” hug.

In 1977, the visit was made under the pretext of the monarch’s silver anniversary. Two years later, Prince Charles would return to celebrate Victoria’s 150th birthday, exploring mainly the western region of the island. But it is from the 80s of the last century that some of the most famous visits to that territory come from; Just think of Diana’s time, with the princess drawing crowds. In March 1983, Charles, Diana and a young Prince William, who was only nine months old, embarked on a six-week trip not only to Australia but also to New Zealand, the first trip of this magnitude for a royal baby. The fourth season of the crown shows the fascination for the couple, on what was their first official tour abroad.

Diana and Charles in 1983 © Getty Images

The princess’s star aura, the magnetism generated by her wardrobe and the rise of the Commonwealth’s emancipation movement resulted in an effect less desired by Charles, with the royal tour being remembered and cited to this day. Two years later, in 1985, another trip occurred, in which the Australian public once again succumbed to “Diana mania.” In 1988, they also joined the celebration of Australia’s bicentennial.

But for neither of them, Australia was the first time in ’83. Just a week after Charles proposed marriage, in February 1981, the young Diana Spencer flew with her mother and stepfather to the property they owned in Yass , in the north of Canberra. Charles was also in Australia shortly before the announcement of their engagement and on the eve of the royal wedding in July 1981.

After the divorce in 1996, Diana, who would die the following year, would still return to Australia.

An image of the royal luggage heading to Australia, during the Diana era. Blue and pink label © Getty Images

The 90s brought with them some turbulence. On the one hand, with the hasty end of his marriage to Diana, on the other with the shock that the heir to the throne experienced during his trip in 1994. It is true that the moment earned him the label of “his royal coldness.” , due to the typical phlegmy British expression expressed by Carlos, but the entourage He still held his breath when he saw a young man try to shoot the Prince of Wales.

Charles III returns to Australia 30 years after the attack that earned him the label “His royal coldness”

Back in 2024, the monarch will pause the treatments he has been undergoing in recent months, with the medical team accompanying him ensuring that he will resume this routine as soon as he returns to the United Kingdom. It was July when Buckingham Palace confirmed that the royal couple would stick with their plan to fly to Australia, in what was announced as their first international trip after their accession to the throne.

Since 1867, the British royal family has set foot on Australian soil more than fifty times, but Elizabeth II was the first reigning sovereign to visit that country, on February 3, 1954. It is worth remembering that two years before the queen was on her way from this destiny when she was surprised by the death of her father, during a private visit in Kenya, news that brought her back home. One of the most popular tours of the royal clan took place in 1970, when Elizabeth II, Duke of Edinburgh, Charles and Princess Anne undertook an intensive tour, which included a tour on the royal yacht, the Britannia, to celebrate the explorer’s bicentenary. British James. Cook.

Swimming at Bondi Beach (or even surfing), petting koalas, posing with the iconic Sydney Opera House behind you, at gala events or in close contact with the public, the archive images that illustrate 58 years of great proximity to Australia, to see in the photo gallery above.