It Has Been 19 Months Since Prince William and Princess Kate Have Gone on a Royal Tour Together—What Are They Waiting For?

The last time the Prince and Princess of Wales went on a royal tour, they were the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, and traveled to three stops in the Caribbean to mark Her late Majesty’s Platinum Jubilee in March 2022. William and Kate’s visits to Belize, Jamaica, and the Bahamas—how shall we say?—was not received well across the board, some even labeling the tour as a disaster. They haven’t gone out on a royal tour since, one of the longest stretches (save for during the COVID-19 pandemic) that the couple haven’t hit the road together.

For context, William and Kate visited Canada and the U.S. less than three months after their wedding in 2011; they visited Singapore, Malaysia, the Solomon Islands, and Tuvalu in 2012 in support of Her late Majesty’s Diamond Jubilee Tour; they then went to New Zealand and Australia in 2014 with their newborn son, Prince George and, later that year, New York City; they traveled to India and Bhutan in 2016 and a return to Canada—this time with George and Princess Charlotte—later that year; they went on tour in Poland and Germany in 2017; then Sweden and Norway in 2018; Pakistan in 2019; Ireland in March 2020, just before the pandemic began; the Caribbean tour in 2022 and, then, crickets. (William and Kate did visit the U.S.—Boston specifically—in December of last year, but that wasn’t for a royal tour; they were visiting the city in support of William’s Earthshot Prize Awards.) It has now been 19 months since William and Kate have gone on tour, and royal reporter Catherine Meyer-Funnell writes in The Daily Express that this is likely because the couple’s three children George, Charlotte, and Prince Louis have all started school, meaning they feel the need to be at home more.

“It is also true that their last big royal tour to the Caribbean did not exactly play out as planned, with many criticizing it as a symbol of past colonialist sentiment,” Meyer-Funnell writes. “But it is now time for the Waleses to shrug off these concerns and see the world again, to nurture important links with the Commonwealth and promote themselves as the future of the Firm for all people to see.”

Though George and Charlotte have both been on tour with their parents—George going on his first at just nine months old, and Charlotte at 16 months old—Louis is five-and-a-half and has never been on tour with his parents (though what a sight it will be to see that when it does happen).

King Charles and Queen Camilla are beginning to travel a year into their reign, visiting France last month and, at the end of this month, Kenya—so the precedent is set.

“In the past, Kate and William have always played well with the public, whether at home or abroad, as their array of trips over the last decade or more has shown,” Meyer-Funnell writes. “Their image as happy newlyweds in Canada and the U.S., where they went just a few months after their wedding, was infectious, as the world had still not yet come down from the high of their glorious wedding day, which was televised around the world. The couple further enchanted the public when they brought baby George along with them to Australia and New Zealand nine months after his birth, an important move, as Princess Diana broke new ground for the royals when she took an infant William with her to the region in the 1980s. Charlotte tagged along, too, a few years later, cementing Kate and William’s status as hardworking parents trying to juggle their duties with family life, and when Charlotte was photographed having a tantrum in Germany, it made them appear even more relatable.”

Though Meyer-Funnell writes that “diplomacy and maintaining international friendships is, of course, the major reason for these visits,” she added “it cannot be overstated how seeing the Prince and Princess of Wales as normal and accessible future monarchs will help the Firm boost its standing in all countries they visit.”

So, yeah, it matters.

They likely still have the bitter taste of parts of their Caribbean tour in their mouths: “While they were their usual charming selves, an unfortunate image of them greeting Jamaican locals behind a chained fence was slammed as them showcasing their position as colonizers, as the local people made a stand for independence,” Meyer-Funnell continues. “One planned trip in Belize was called off due to protest fears, and everywhere they went, rumblings of reparations for slavery followed them. It seemed that the royals in this part of the world had come to be seen as, at best, outdated, and at worst a symbol of the tragic and painful history of racism and colonization that the Caribbean nations wish to put behind them.”

The reaction of the tour was mitigated swiftly by William while still on the tour; during a speech in Jamaica, William expressed his “profound sorrow” for the “appalling atrocity of slavery,” and the tour was a needed wakeup call that the couple probably needed going forward.

Now, as Prince and Princess of Wales, it seems high time for a return to the royal tour. Meyer-Funnell writes that “it is so vital for them to start touring the world again and promoting the Wales brand as an international one once more.” She added “If the royals want to stay relevant, they need to show themselves out among all their people, getting to know them and all the countries they represent.” And, Meyer-Funnell concludes, “With Prince George, Princess Charlotte, and Prince Louis in tow, the Wales clan would be a royal force to be reckoned with.”

We eagerly await that next royal tour announcement—whenever it may be (and hopefully sooner rather than later).