King Charles III and Queen Camilla will travel to Sydney and Canberra next month for a five-day, activity-packed trip.
Having last visited as Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall in 2018, The King and Queen will visit Australia from October 18 to 22, the first tour by a British royal since the death of Queen Elizabeth II in September 2022.
It is expected to be a particularly emotional visit for His Majesty. It will be his first as sovereign since his accession to the throne and the first opportunity for the Australian public to see him in person since the death of his mother.
It will be the first visit to Australia by a reigning monarch since 2011, when Queen Elizabeth II made her last tour of Australia, and Charles’ 17th official royal visit.
The 75-year-old King, whose environmental awareness as a prince is well known, will include discussions on climate change and the Australian environment during this tour.
Due to his cancer diagnosis earlier this year, Charles was forced to cut the visit short, cancelling a tour of New Zealand and ending it instead by travelling to Samoa for a Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM).
Like Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall, the couple visited Australia in 2018 (above), but their tour as king and queen next month is the most eagerly awaited royal visit in decades.
Official portrait of King Charles and Queen Camilla for their forthcoming tour of Australia, in which he wears the Sovereign’s Insignia of the Order of Australia and the Queen wears the Wattle brooch given to Queen Elizabeth on her first visit as monarch in 1954.
Charles, who last visited Australia in 2018 with Camilla to open the Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast, first came to Australia in 1966 when he was 17.
She spent two semesters at Geelong Grammar School, on Victoria’s Timbertop campus, and has since expressed a deep affection for Australia.
Their children and their wives have visited, and Prince William and Kate’s 2014 tour included a trip to Uluru, which drew comparisons to Charles and Princess Diana’s iconic tour of the sacred site in 1983.
Prince Harry and Meghan visited Australia in 2018 and during their stay there they announced their pregnancy with baby Archie, staying there for 16 days.
Sydney
Charles and Camilla will land on 18 October and will be officially welcomed by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, alongside the Governor General, Her Excellency The Honourable Sam Mostyn AC.
During their stay in Sydney, the King and Queen are expected to stay at Admiralty House, the Governor-General’s official residence in Sydney, located in Kirribilli, with spectacular views across Sydney Harbour.
Royal aides have calibrated the King’s schedule during his stay to “protect and prioritise” his health and recovery, including fewer evening engagements and a “rest day” upon his arrival.
After landing, the royal couple will conduct a review of the Royal Australian Navy’s fleet of ships in port.
Charles and Camilla, who were on the Gold Coast in 2018 where they opened the Commonwealth Games, return in October, this time as Queen and King in a visit expected to draw large crowds.
They will also enjoy a community barbecue attended by guests including Indigenous Australians and others representing the nation’s cultural diversity.
The King will discuss cancer research with Australians of the Year 2024 Professor Georgina Long and Professor Richard Scolyer, while meeting local Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander representatives.
The Queen will meet children taking part in a Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition workshop during a visit to a library in Sydney.
Space has been publicly left on the Sydney itinerary for ‘surprises’ yet to be announced.
CANBERRA
In Canberra, King Charles and Queen Camilla will visit Parliament House, where they will attend a reception to meet with Australian political, sporting, arts and community leaders.
The royal couple will then take part in a solemn wreath-laying ceremony at the Australian War Memorial and visit the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander memorial, “For Our Country”.
The following day, they will tour the Australian National Botanic Gardens at Black Mountain in the ACT to meet with staff and volunteers to discuss the global impacts of climate change.
The official announcement of the tour on the royal family’s Instagram account says that after touring Australia, the King and Queen will visit Samoa for the CHOGM meeting.
They will also visit the CSIRO headquarters next door, where the monarch will speak to scientists researching the impact of the bushfires and the resilience of the environment in recovering from the devastation.
Queen Camilla will meet family and domestic violence advocates and representatives of the anti-poverty charity GIVIT, which helps distribute donations to a range of organisations.
On the late Queen Elizabeth’s final visit in 2011, her 16th to Australia, she stayed for 10 days and toured Canberra, Brisbane, Melbourne and Perth.