★ Trooping the Colour

01Por qué es relevante

This is the fixed point of the British public calendar in June and the largest ceremonial parade the army mounts in an ordinary year. Its interest is partly historical - the ceremony has marked the sovereign's official birthday since 1748 and settled into its present shape by 1889 - and partly that it is one of the very few events in this calendar where the best free view is genuinely good. The Mall on the morning of the parade is a public street with a crowd several deep and no ticket. In our reading, the ceremony matters less as a social fixture than as the moment the London season becomes visible to everyone: the week that follows takes in Royal Ascot and the high-goal polo, but this is the Saturday the city itself turns out for.

02La semana en torno al evento

The parade closes a large part of central London for the morning. The Mall, Horse Guards Road, Constitution Hill, Birdcage Walk and the roads around Trafalgar Square are shut to traffic from early, bus routes are diverted across the West End, and St James's Park fills from about eight in the morning. Everything reopens through the afternoon. The date sits in the busiest fortnight of the English summer: Royal Ascot opens on the Tuesday following, the Cartier Queen's Cup final at Windsor is usually the Sunday before, and the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition has just opened in Piccadilly. Hotel demand across St James's, Mayfair and Westminster is high but the parade itself is a day event and generates very few overnight stays of its own.

03Cuándo llegar

For the free view on the Mall, be in place by about half past eight for a parade that starts at 10:20, and earlier still if you want the Victoria Memorial steps and the balcony appearance. Ticket holders should be at their designated entrance at least an hour before, since bag searches and the road closures slow everything down. If the Birthday Parade is unobtainable, the Colonel's Review on the previous Saturday is the same parade with a fraction of the crowd, and the Major General's Review the week before that is quieter again.

04Dónde alojarse

St James's and Westminster put you within a short walk of Horse Guards and are the only areas where the road closures work in your favour rather than against you. Mayfair and Piccadilly are ten to fifteen minutes on foot. Anything south of the river around Waterloo and the South Bank is a quick walk across Westminster or Hungerford Bridge and generally has more availability. Avoid basing yourself anywhere that requires crossing the closure line by car on the Saturday morning.

05Acceso y hospitalidad

The Household Division sells seats for all three parades and publishes the arrangements itself. Tickets for the King's Birthday Parade are allocated by ballot, with a maximum of four per applicant, priced at 30 pounds each; the Colonel's Review is 15 pounds and the Major General's Review 10 pounds, both sold rather than balloted. Applications and the ballot are handled through the army's own site at kbp.army.mod.uk. There is no commercial hospitality programme attached to the parade, and no accredited resale. The alternative is free: the Mall, St James's Park and the area in front of Buckingham Palace are open to anyone who arrives early enough.

06Dónde tiene lugar la actividad social

The public occasion happens on the Mall and in St James's Park, where the crowd assembles for the processions and stays for the balcony and flypast. Afterward the day disperses into the pubs and pavements of St James's, Trafalgar Square and Whitehall, and into the private clubs along Pall Mall and St James's Street, which mark the morning in their own way behind closed doors. The Royal Academy's Summer Exhibition in Piccadilly and the parks are the natural afternoon.

07Cómo llegar

08Aspectos prácticos

09Historia

The practice of trooping a regiment's colour through its ranks predates the ceremony and served a plain purpose: soldiers had to recognize their own flag in the confusion of a battlefield. Marking the sovereign's birthday with the parade dates from 1748, and it became annual after George III's accession in 1760. Edward VII moved the observance to early summer because the weather was more reliable than in November, which is why the official birthday and the actual one have not coincided for over a century. Since 1959 the parade has fallen on a Saturday in June. Each year a different battalion of the Grenadier, Coldstream, Scots, Irish or Welsh Guards troops its colour, and the rotation is the detail regimental families follow most closely.

10Quién está ahí

Regimental families and old comrades of the Household Division, who form the core of the ticketed stands; serving and retired military; British families making a day of it; and a very large general and international tourist public along the Mall and in the park. The ballot means the ticketed audience is broader than for almost any other royal occasion.