Forget Taylor Swift or Queen Bey – the hottest ticket of the summer has been snapped up quicker than you can say I fancy a Gay Gordon.
At only £100 a pop, the ‘Balmoral Experience’ was priced way too cheaply. As the gig went live, the Royal website crashed under the tidal wave of demand, selling out immediately. Which means that monarchists and nosey parkers (like myself) must try and pick up an expensive re-sale online, having missed the chance to peek inside a real monarch’s palace, one that’s actually inhabited for about six whole weeks of the year!
Not just a ‘visit’ to a set of rooms that doubled for a Royal residence in the Crown, but a chance to see the actual sofas where the late Queen and Prince Philip sipped G and T’s before supper and played cards before bed.
Queen Elizabeth II is pictured as she waited to meet with then-Prime Minister Liz Truss in Ballater, Scotland, on September 6, 2022
Queen Elizabeth II with her husband, the Duke of Edinburgh, at Balmoral, September 1976
At only £100 a pop, the ‘Balmoral Experience’ was priced way too cheaply
What unforgettable Balmoral ‘experiences’ were on offer? Crumpets with Camilla? Lunch with Fergie shucking the oysters? Hardly.
During July and August, lucky ticket holders will be able to travel hundreds of miles north to Queen Victoria’s special home in the Scottish Highlands – where they can shuffle in awe past priceless art featuring dead stags and rainy highland views.
They’ll have the chance to view a watercolour painted by the King, and walk along the actual corridor where King Charles met Rishi Sunak last September. (Not very exciting so far). The highlight must be the ballroom where Kings and Queens have danced highland reels through the centuries.
Plus, a display of garments worn by the late Queen, the Queen Mother, Camilla and Charles – can it get any more thrilling than staring at a ageing posh frock or elderly feather trim? Feeling peckish? Afternoon tea is £50 extra- a lot for cucumber sandwiches and shortbread.
Balmoral was said to be the late Queens’ favourite home – but visitors won’t be going for the luxurious décor.
Elizabeth was a frugal woman who clearly didn’t believe in spending money updating her many living rooms – the castle’s drawing room (open to Experience ticket holders) is packed with resolutely 1970’s décor, prissy sofas in tasteful greens – furniture that wouldn’t be out of place in a dentist’s waiting room in Harley Street (based on my own experience). Hyacinth Bouquet would have felt utterly at home.
Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip, in the study at Balmoral Castle, 26th September 1976
Prince Charles and his mother Princess Elizabeth looking out of a window at Balmoral in 1952
Balmoral was said to be the late Queens’ favourite home – but visitors won’t be going for the luxurious décor
Why have the Royals let commoners in at all? The income generated from a few hundred gawpers at Balmoral won’t amount to anything much at £100 a person – but maybe it’s the public’s perception that counts. The King must be conscious his family have dozens of palaces in all sizes, thousands of staff and one of the largest art collections in Europe.
In short, they’re sitting on mountains of STUFF – and the cost of upkeep is huge. As long as Charles is a standard bearer for frugal living and minimising waste (I know, it seems incongruous) – something must be done to show ordinary folk that they’re doing their best (just like everyone else) to make ends meet and cut costs.
Which must be why, after years of meetings, it has been decided to offer anyone prepared to cough up £100, not just an entry ticket and a chance to check the dusting and peer at the porcelain – but something far more special (and Royal) – the Balmoral Experience.
Prince Andrew was an early visionary when it comes to monetarising access to Royal living quarters – his Pitch at the Palace was a genius wheeze. I mean, who wouldn’t cough up for a chance to use a royal lavatory, stand around in a long corridor being looked down on by flunkeys in breeches, in the hope that some of the ‘glamour’ of the art work might flake off and make your brave little business plan appeal to an entrepreneur just passing through?
The Royals have so many palaces they usually visit them in rotation – the Queen loved Balmoral so much she went for six weeks every summer.
King Charles, on the other hand, doesn’t stay there at all unless he has to meet visitors – preferring Birkhall, his own house on the estate.
Queen Elizabeth II and The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh with their two young children, Princess Anne and Prince Charles outside Balmoral Castle, September 1952
Charles, then the Prince of Wales, and Diana, Princess of Wales, at Balmoral in 1981
TV series’ like the Crown have increased interest in all the Royal Palaces a thousand-fold. There’s no shortage of desperate fans who want to live a little bit of the dream
The Palace already offers tours of a handful rooms at £95-a-head for just a few months each summer. Although visitors can look through the curtains onto the famous Balcony, they won’t be allowed to go outside. God forbid they might wave their arms or cheer!
He also inherited a castle from the Queen Mother. Charles is also said to loathe Buckingham Palace – preferring to remain resident at Clarence House, his mini-palace further down the Mall, taking a limo to the other end of the road for State Banquets and formal meetings. His country home – Highgrove – is another bolt-hole, with the well-tended gardens open to the public.
It’s obvious most palace are under-used, to say the least. The UK has a housing crisis – but the Royals have completely the opposite problem. So why not sell off a few palaces, repurpose them – or, less controversially – accept paying guests?
TV series’ like the Crown have increased interest in all the Royal Palaces a thousand-fold. There’s no shortage of desperate fans who want to live a little bit of the dream.
It seems logical that Buckingham Palace – rather than Balmoral – would have been the place to open up as an ‘Experience’ – it’s huge, expensive and underused, and is undergoing a £369 million pound refurbishment – much of which is being funded by the taxpayer. A mausoleum with miles of dreary corridors with 1950’s electric fires and threadbare carpet, lines of priceless artworks with few visitors to enjoy them.
The Palace already offers tours of a handful rooms at £95-a-head for just a few months each summer, and – for another £75 – is opening a small section of the East Wing, featuring a spectacular yellow drawing room. Although visitors can look through the curtains onto the famous Balcony, they won’t be allowed to go outside. God forbid they might wave their arms or cheer!
King Charles III, Queen Camilla, Princess Anne, Princess Royal and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Akshata Murthy attend divine service at Crathie Church, Balmoral, in 2023
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak attends a service at Crathie Church, Balmoral in 2023
Prince Andrew was an early visionary when it comes to monetarising access to Royal living quarters – his Pitch at the Palace was a genius wheeze
It seems logical that Buckingham Palace (pictured) – rather than Balmoral – would have been the place to open up as an ‘Experience’
The Monarchy needs to move with the times – a modern ‘experience’ needs to deliver much more than a chance to admire soft furnishings? Why not offer ticket holders the chance to spend the night in Buckingham Palace? Or pay triple to be allowed onto the balcony for photos? Buckingham Palace could easily be turned into a theme park with a gift shop, a petting zoo in the stables and a carriage ride thrown in.
Following the huge success of the Abba Voyage experience in East London, I am surprised Charles has not thought of creating Royal avatars who could really enliven any visit to one of his palaces, by popping up in a drawing room or popping out of the undergrowth, shotgun at the ready.
Sadly, the Balmoral Experience sounds a bit like unsatisfactory sex – not very imaginative.