Recalling when Prince Charles charmed all on Fermanagh trip
WHILE millions of people all around the world on Monday saw the weight of his new duty – and the emotion of a son grieving his beloved mother – that was plain to see on the face of now King Charles III (right), many people here in Fermanagh were undoubtedly fondly recalling the King as the then relaxed and charming Prince of Wales when he recently visited Castle Coole in May, 2019.
The then Prince of Wales spoke and entertained the crowds at the garden party hosted in Castle Coole.
He was guided around the lawn of Castle Coole by Viscount Brookeborough, shaking hands with some of the Fermanagh people gathered there.
Later, the royal couple travelled to Lisnaskea for a walkabout and met with Fermanagh locals including butcher Pat O’doherty, and sampled the famous Fermanagh Black Bacon.
King Charles III is no stranger to these parts, having conducted several visits throughout his career as a working Royal.
Back in 2014, he visited Enniskillen Castle Museum where he and the Duchess of Cornwall (now Queen Consort) visited exhibitions and met with Aughakillymaude
Mummers.
Other noted visits to the area included in the aftermath of the Enniskillen Bomb in 1987 when the then Prince of Wales and his first wife, Diana, Princess of Wales, travelled to Enniskillen to meet with the families of those killed, and to speak with survivors.
If King Charles III and the Queen Consort are to visit the county again in the coming years, it is likely that people here will see a more formal figure than the relaxed and joking heir to the throne they had previously welcomed to the area.