My Experience Riding in the London New Year’s Day Parade!
EC Blog by: Lindsay Robinson
In 2015, I had my very own horse riding bucket list. Some of the items included: riding at Windsor Great Park, Blenheim Palace, Burghley House, Thetford Forest and riding through the center of London as part of the New Year’s Day Parade. I did all of these and more, and my horse Luke and I will be revisiting all of them in 2016 with some additional ones thrown in.
On January 1st, 2016, AQHA UK Members Mary Larcom, Fiona Powley, and myself along with our American Quarter Horses, Iced Tee (Fonz), Zippin n Chippin (Zippy), and LJ Classic Luke (Luke), and foot team members Michael and Jane Roberts, Kelvyn Powley and Phillip Robinson were incredibly lucky to be invited back to the LNYDP 2016 as part of the All The Queen’s Horses contingent. The equine portion of the parade consisted of 64 horses under the leadership of Caroline Marsh.
In 2016, LNYDP was celebrating their 30th anniversary with the theme of “30 Magical Years.” The parade attracts a worldwide TV audience approaching three hundred million and boasts twice as many participants as a similar parade offered by Macy’s in New York City on Thanksgiving Day! In 2016, it was estimated that over 500,000 spectators lined the route, which starts in Piccadilly by the Ritz and goes through Piccadilly Circus, down Regents Street, along Pall Mall and Trafalgar Square, on to Whitehall, and then finishes at Parliament Square.
The other ladies, foot team members, and myself were a very small part of the All The Queen’s Horses, the organizing team of which work incredibly hard during the year to put everything together. ATQH are in turn a small part of the parade as a whole, which throws up some interesting questions for the organizers and specifically the ATQH team who were looking after 200 people plus 64 horses coming from all over the country! The logistics are mind boggling, not least the parking arrangements in the center of London!
The parade itself went by all too quickly. There was a lot of noise, a blur of faces and cheering, and suddenly we found ourselves at Parliament Square and it was all over! As we left Parliament Square to go back to the horseboxes, we paused to get a photo with the iconic Big Ben behind us and were able to meet up with supporters at the Horse Guard’s Parade ground. Then, we turned to make our way up The Mall. There is something really quite surreal riding up The Mall. Behind you is Admiralty Arch and in front of you Buckingham Palace, the Victoria, and Albert Monument. You can hear the parade still going on as well as the TV helicopters buzzing overhead. Perhaps they were security helicopters; there were definitely more policemen on the route and they were very friendly too- just as well as they were armed- and there were thousands of tourists walking up the road, which is closed to traffic.
This year, we managed to get photos in front of the gates at Buckingham Palace aided by one of the All The Queen’s Horses ground crew, who moved us into place through the tourists and then worked with the tourists who wanted photos taken with us. We then moved over to the Canada Gate leading into Green Park. Luke is from Canada and I remember posing in front of these gates with the parents of his breeder when they came to visit him many years ago. Again, we ended up being props for tourists who were thrilled to have their photos taken with cowgirls in London (I would love to see their photo albums when they get home and how they explain that!)
Then, the final stretch is on the sand track up Constitution Hill. At the Junction of Piccadilly and Hyde Park Corner there is the Bomber Command Memorial; it’s an incredible monument and we were able to carefully walk into the monument for photos and to pay homage.
Then, it was just a short hack back up Piccadilly to the horseboxes. The parade was still going on, so we had to wait for a while for the final performers to move off so we could get to the horseboxes, but the horses were just so relaxed by this time that we had grandstand seats!
What memories! What sights we saw! How incredible our horses were! The LNYDP and All The Queen’s Horses team really looked after us. The invitation we received with our rosettes and sashes said, “Congratulations on being invited to participate in the Greatest Event Of Its Kind In the World- LNDP 2016,” with All The Queens Horses, and I for one wouldn’t argue with that!
