Queen Camilla went to Isle of Man on Wednesday, and then she flew to Belfast and had events throughout Thursday. Did you know that the Windsors are still extremely careful about how they visit Northern Ireland? They rarely announce their visits in advance and they rarely spend the night, although Camilla reportedly did spend Wednesday night in Belfast ahead of her day of engagements. I was sort of surprised to see that some of Camilla’s engagements were so informal too – some of them were just popping into smaller bakeries and delis in Belfast and checking out the local delicacies. She apparently left Belfast with several grocery bags full of food. Which is sort of nice. She also chatted about how King Charles is doing:
Queen Camilla offered a new comment on how King Charles is doing while receiving cancer treatment during her solo trip to Northern Ireland. On Thursday, the Queen, 76, stepped out in Belfast to check out some of the city’s artisan and family-run food shops, where she briefly spoke about her husband’s health at the Arcadia Delicatessen.
“He’s doing very well. He was very disappointed he couldn’t come,” Queen Camilla said after shop assistant Brenda Robb gave her a get-well card for the King, 75, and shared well-wishes, Hello! magazine reported. According to the outlet, the royal had something playful to say when someone cracked a joke about men “not being the best patients.”
“I try to keep him in order,” Queen Camilla replied about her husband of 18 years.
The Queen spoke about King Charles again during a stop at the family-run Coffey’s Butcher, which has been in business since 1929, when she accepted a gift of the store’s specialties including vegetable rolls, beef sausages and Belfast pickle.
“I shall take these back to my husband. He will really make the most of them,” Queen Camilla said of the treats, Hello! Reported.
The Queen also popped into Knotts Bakery, where she made no promises that the fruit loaf and iced madeira they gave her would make it home for the King to sample. “She said she’d eat some of them on the way home,” family bakery co-owner William Corrie the outlet.
Honestly, this is a good way to keep people updated on Charles’s health – not everything needs a press release or formal palace statement. It can just be Camilla, answering questions informally during her events. It begs the question: why couldn’t Prince William do the same for Kate? Also, it helps that Charles has been doing events too and that he’s been photographed clearly and repeatedly since his cancer diagnosis. While Cam was in Belfast, Charles was greeting some diplomats at Buckingham Palace too.
Photos courtesy of Cover Images.
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- Queen Camilla meets the owner of Knotts Bakery, William Corrie with his son Fitz during a visit to Lisburn Road in Belfast to meet shop owners and staff, and learn about their positive contribution to the community, during her two-day official visit to Northern Ireland. Where: Belfast, United Kingdom When: 21 Mar 2024 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- Queen Camilla meets well wishersafter visiting Knotts bakery in Belfast, Northern Ireland Featuring: Queen Camilla Where: Belfast, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom When: 21 Mar 2024 Credit: Cover Images
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- Queen Camilla visits Knotts bakery in Belfast, Northern Ireland Featuring: Queen Camilla Where: Belfast, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom When: 21 Mar 2024 Credit: Cover Images
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- Queen Camilla attends an event hosted by the Queen’s Reading Room to mark World Poetry Day at Hillsborough Castle in Belfast, during her two-day official visit to Northern Ireland Featuring: Queen Camilla Where: Belfast, United Kingdom When: 21 Mar 2024 Credit: Liam McBurney/PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- Queen Camilla smiles as she attends an event hosted by The Queen’s Reading Room to mark World Poetry Day at Hillsborough Castle during day two of her visit to Northern Ireland on March 21, 2024 in Belfast, Northern Ireland Featuring: Queen Camilla Where: Belfast, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom When: 21 Mar 2024 Credit: Cover Images **POOL: REUTERS & AFP**
Not so nice that she left with bags of groceries since it was apparently gifts. Nice would have been insisting on paying since she could well afford to or buying a ton more stuff above the freebies.
I agree. Why do rich people get stuff for free all the time??
Sure, but she’s the Queen. If the President of the United States came into my bakery to eat a muffin, I wouldn’t charge him for it, either. Plus, it would be good advertising – POTUS loved the cinnamon apple crunch!
The English monarch taking free food from Ireland of all places is actually a terrible look considering the history.
That would have caused huge offence – the good people of Nor’n Irn pride themselves on their generous hospitality.
Accepting hospitality doesn’t mean you can’t buy other things in a store, does it?
She grins for those cameras. She probably has time away from keeping him in order. He has courtiers and valets and cooks around catering to his every whim.
We can say what we want about cam and charles but they have a better, human way to do things. The KP Douches are just lazy azz douches and the more I they live rent free in my brain the more triggered I get about them!!!!
She always has kept him in order, hasn’t she?
She even masterminded his first marriage even helping to select the bride.
I was going to say that too. Plus she got rid of his second son and seems to be working on doing the same with the first son.
Can you imagine if Meghan said this about PH and how it would spin that she controls him.
Absolutely. The derangers go on about Meghan controlling harry. Yes I can imagine that if Meghan talked about harry that way
I’m surprised the de-rangers aren’t out in force condemning Camilla for calling Charles her “husband.” I suppose it’s ok for English Queen Consorts to say “my husband” but, it’s against “protocol” for an “Overseas” Duchess to say the same.
Shawna, I will give credit to where credit is due, Camilla has always been the intelligent one as was Wallis Simpson was the intelligent one in her relationship with Edward VIII. Both used their shrewd, cunning, and calculating brains to control, connive, and manipulate less intelligent men to gratify and achieve their self centered goals. Cammie’s true love, Andrew Parker Bowles was handsomely rewarded with military promotions
and finances because of Camilla. As one British magazine reported even though they are divorced, APB and Camilla are still glued to the hips. How many women has the ability to maintain a threesome for over 30 years?
I bet she wanted to outdo her royal mistress ancestor, Alice Kepple. And she did!
Shawna, you are correct, Camilla probably wanted to and out did her ancestor Alice Kepple. What a masterful duplicitous witch she is.
The Windsors don’t seem to be very intelligent in general. I think Meghan is the smartest brf member by far. But after M, I feel the next smartest member is Cowmilla. She masterminded her advancement in a way that would make Dr. Evil jealous.
I think intelligence and the willingness to be a horrible human being are too often confused. What she did did not take a great brain.
@Josephine – more that it doesn’t take a great brain to outwit the royal family
They are running circles around KP and she is loving it. I really really want to know now if Egg and Keen are just idiots or there is a big secret and Cam and the other royals are shamelessly ignoring it.
Sigh. I read that Buzzfeed article that was included in yesterday’s links on this site. Essentially PR people said you get ahead of the messaging (which they didn’t do) to control it or you stick by no response at all and wait it out (which they didn’t do either). The comments had a link to a PR prof at Medium, who believes that they want this chaos on purpose for some reason…they do know by now that there’s a simple solution to mitigate the damage they’ve done and they aren’t taking it. Why they’re choosing this route is beyond me.
Sorry: KP is doing the above. Clearly Camzilla seems to be thriving in the current situation.
The comment I took from that is that they are happy with the chaos because it’s distracting from Charles’s health. But that particular PR person (not sure if it’s the same person you’re referencing) assumes KP is doing something for BP. It would only explain why BP isn’t covering for KP.
So glad you included the pic of the tiny moppet in the tuxedo! He’s so adorable and made my day.
Good for her for trotting around all over and making the air miles worth the effort. I really don’t understand how William hasn’t ever done this type of work. Why does he keep insisting on coming to the US instead of actually visiting the areas where he will eventually be head of state?
Hint: you are never going to “conquer” the US. We are amused by nepo babies but you actually have to produce here to be a real star.
William needs to stay out of the usa
I suspect that after the last month any plans to conquer the US have been shelved.
They’d have people shouting, “Where’s Kate?” to Heuvo while she’s standing right beside him!
You got dat right, Shawna.
We Americans shouldn’t be confused with the sycophantic British press and public. And we don’t feel any need to treat that poser with kid gloves. Pegs ought to think long and hard about what questions he might face here in the US.
Oh for the days of the queen and diana. I remember when William was referred to as someone would be the hope of the monarchy and look how that turned out
I wonder since she is out visiting and chatting people up, if KC3 has to keep her at arms length while he takes his treatment. Also, honestly, Camilla is doing a rather great job being normal and just friendly. What is so hard about this that KP cannot swing it?
Yes, this is how you do it. No need for busloads of school children, marching bands and rafts of paparazzi – just show up. And no need for ponderous jokes, just say something nice – the king will love this, I’ll eat these on the way home – people will remember that.
Camilla is so interesting, a schemer who isn’t an egomaniac. I mean, she clearly cares about herself, but she doesn’t need to be in the spotlight – the most successful villains are like that.
I think in a way imo all senior royals are egomaniacal. None of them are really down to earth. Though some can play at it. William wants to be the center of attention but does not like doing and work just authorizing cloying articles about himself.
Yes, William is desperate for attention and he thinks it’s owed him just because he was born. I think Charles is the same way, especially before Diana died. And Andrew is just plain delusional – you can see his frustration at not being allowed in the spotlight. Camilla is different – she doesn’t waste energy begging for attention, so she can focus on her schemes.
I have reluctant respect for the way a septuagenarian schemer in orthopedic shoes is running circles around the rest.
That’s what stood out to me – how nice and simple her quotes were, about how Charles is going to enjoy the sausage, how the baked goods might not make it back bc she will eat them, etc.
If this was William, he would have made a snarky comment or two that he thought was hilarious and witty (“oh these aren’t day old baked goods are they?!?!?! They look like it!”) but that was actually fairly hurtful to the business owner.
Here, camilla just makes simple comments about how she or Charles will enjoy the food. ITS NOT THAT HARD WILLIAM.
Omg, I can just imagine him saying something like that, with a “har, har, har” guffaw and everyone else with a pained smile on their faces.
It should be easy, but it’s hard if you have no empathy and if you’re so self-conscious that everything becomes about you.
Diana stan until I die here, but I agree with you @Eurydice, Camilla is The Master at the long con, and she’s not letting ego get in the way of her plans.
honestly, zero criticism or complaints on this. I don’t think this is Camilla or BP scheming or trying to show up KP. Really, there’s so much to criticize of Camilla, but here she’s literally just doing and saying absolutely normal, appropriate stuff. Humanizing Charles and making her seem relatable to carers with subtle jokes about him being a bad patient, nice compliments about how he’ll enjoy the food presents- she’s not doing anything special, it’s pretty basic social skills that the RF should be able to do without problem. That she seems to be the only one (besides Charles) who seems able to behave normally is not great for the rest of the RF, but I don’t really see what she should do differently
I agree, she’s doing a good job at what Royalty should be doing: shining a light on normal people who keep the wheels of a country turning, whilst bringing in some glamour via a fabulous brooch game.
Part of me is enjoying how she is showing up William with these little visits. And part of me is truly shocked that she’s so much better than Diana’s own son at this.
And why is that little guy wearing a tuxedo? 😊 He’s super cute.
She’s a very typical army daughter-army wife from the shires. Women of her age and background were basically brought up in the expectation that they would devote their lives to husbands and Good Works. In any other life she’d be a stalwart of the Women’s Institute, Royal Voluntary Service, Regimental Charity and Hospital Visitors, where whinging is a Poor Show, new clothes are regarded with suspicion and seeing the funny side is mandatory. Herding cats and jollying people along are core skills. Good butchers and bakers are regarded as treasures worth more than gold. She’s absolutely in her element at this sort of event.
C and C have done these type of visits when they visit Southern Ireland too. They’re good in these type of situations with people who want to meet them (not me!) so credit where it’s due. You couldn’t trust W and K , they’re likely to put their size nines right in their mouths. Remember their just-before-Covid visit?!?
I like it that x Twitter puts up the video of William trying to joke about covid
To give Cams some credit she is pretty good at these types of events – she is engaged and personable, playing up to the cameras and press. She could teach Cathy a thing or two about how to work these events.
That little boy in the tux – soooo cute.
I think it makes sense because honestly, she’s probably the one who has spent time actually shopping on a regular basis, and actually living in a country town, not just spending weekends in a grand estate surrounded by endless gardens and sycophantic minions. I know she’s aristo adjacent so she was never a “regular person” but she’s certainly closer to that in terms of her background than William or maybe even Kate.
@Digital Unicorn – I’ll give Camilla kudos for smiling naturally in the background and letting the little boy take centre stage. You just know Little Miss Photo Shop would never allowed that to happen. If she’d been there she would have been bending over gurning at the little chap. While her sycophant enablers in the media would use the photo to praise her “natural” ability with children.
She would have frightened that poor child to death with her rictus grimace of a smile. He would have required therapy.
I love that she is fairly dismissive of Charles. Not what I’d want in a spouse, but for him, it’s perfect.
I’m sure that Sally Twiddle Smith is doing back flips over reading this. No calling Crocmilla a narcissist with a weak husband! But if the horseshoe fits….
damn, this made me like her a bit. For all her extensive faults, she seems personable and charming
She knows how to work a room. Experience and natural ability to make small talk is a requirement for royals. W and K do not have this.
If camzilla was in the army she would be a general by now. That witch sure knows how to launch a successful campaign, get rid of the wife, get rid of the youngest son, keep the king happy in his strops, show up Billy and bone for the lazy basds they are, and SMILE like the grinch when she’s doing it, yep, at least a general
So so so spot on Mary Pester! Her long term strategy capabilities are top notch. Now let’s see what she does with Bill and Cathy….
I was talking with a friend about this. The younger generation that was raised being always within sight of their parents really doesn’t have the same ability to comfortably chat with strangers. Of course, some do, but it used to be an expected thing, that you would make small talk with whatever people you found yourself with. Now it seems to be an insult to think that you would.
That’s an interesting observation. Plus, those of us in pre-cell-phone generations had to make polite conversation with the parents of our crushes before they passed the phone over. Lol: Way to practice social skills under pressure!
Lol, I once had a younger friend say to me ‘You talk to everyone!’ Guilty as charged. 🙂
As much as I hate to admit it, Camilla is doing a good job at the moment. She’s turning up, showing interest and acknowledging the public’s interest in her husband’s wellbeing. Life would have been so much easier for the KP staff if W had been doing the same over the past few months.
@Cerys you are right QC is showing Willy should be managing the interest in his wife’s wellbeing. She has kept calm and carried on with good humor and reassured people that everything at home is under control. Willy’s erratic behaviour, including downing tools then showing up half cut at events then dropping the real clanger of a No Show has provoked a maelstrom of speculation and concern about what has really happened to Kate. Also it has earned him critical notices from the Fail and Kate Mansey in The Times focused on his failure to show up and prove himself as heir. Like it or not QC is subbing for KC and gaining kudos whereas Willy looks inadequate and paralysed in a crisis which is a bad reputation for the next ruler to gain.
It’s Friday, can I be superficial for a sec?
What is with the awful black appliques on her coat? It looks like creeping death.
“why couldn’t Prince William do the same for Kate? ” because William doesn’t care for Kate. Not that Camilla does care about Charles otherwise she wouldn’t be flying around the world to go on holidays every two weeks BUT she at least knows how to control her public image.
Yes Yes Yes, the Queen, blah blah blah, something something the King, fine.
I wanna know. who is the suave little dude in the tux?!