Camilla: We are off to Cuba (but Havana few doubts about the food)
THe Duchess of Cornwall confirmed yesterday that she and her husband will be the first royals to set foot in Cuba when they visit this spring.
But while Camilla said she was looking forward to hearing the Communist country’s music and seeing its architecture, she confessed she ‘wasn’t so sure’ about the food, in an uncharacteristic diplomatic slip.
Speaking on a visit to the Supreme Court in London with Prince Charles, the 71year- old royal said that the couple will undertake an historic official tour to the Caribbean country.
Baroness Hale, the Supreme Court’s president, spoke to the duchess as she and Charles, 70, toured the room where the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council sits.
Lady Hale said afterwards: ‘They are going to visit the Caribbean. They are not only going to the Anglo Caribbean, they are going to Cuba as well. She is very much looking forward to going to Cuba.
‘She said she loved the music and was interested in the architecture.
Revolutionary! Prince Charles ‘will become first royal to visit Cuba’
From the Mail, December 8 And she did make a remark about [how] she wasn’t so sure about the food.’
Cuban food is a blend of influences including Native American Taino, African, Spanish and Caribbean cuisines. Favourite dishes include tamales, made of a starchy dough steamed in a corn husk or banana leaf with rice and beans.
Barack Obama became the first US president to visit Cuba in 2016 but no British prime minister or member of the Royal Family has ever been. Overseas visits by Prince Charles are almost of statevisit status now that the Queen does not travel abroad. Trips are requested by the Foreign Office and reflect Britain’s policy aims.
The trip, which will be part of a large-scale Caribbean tour, would have been unthinkable a few years ago, as the country emerged from six decades under the dictator Fidel Castro and his family.
However Charles is understood to have met with the new Cuban president, Miguel Diaz-Canel, at Clarence House in November in a diplomatic breakthrough. Charles and Camilla have previously toured the Caribbean by yacht but are likely to fly between Cuba and several as-yet-unconfirmed islands in the region, possibly on the government’s Voyager plane. Camilla has long had a deep seated fear of flying but has conquered her nerves over the years due to the large amount of official travel she and the future king have to undertake. Clarence House has declined to comment on the trip.