Tower of London Key Ceremony

I collected my ticket to London today. I am going to visit Pieter & Anca! They got tickets for the Tower of London Key Ceremony and I am really excited about it!

The ceremony takes place every night without disturbanceFor the last 700 years, the Tower of London has locked its gates at 21:53, exactly seven minutes before 10 o’clock. The Chief Warder, dressed in a Beefeater costume, marches his way to the front gate from the Byward Tower. Carrying a lantern in one hand and the Queen’s keys in the other, the Chief Warder walks to Traitor’s Gate and hands his lantern to a nearby guard. As he locks it and aims his way to the other ones, all Beefeater soldiers salute to the Queens Key’s. Never has a small piece of metal demanded so much respect.

As the soldier locks up all the gates, he makes his way towards the Bloody Archway tower, where he is stopped by a sentry. As part of its tradition, the sentry and Warder hold an exchange:

Sentry: ‘Halt, Who goes there?’
Warder: ‘The Keys!’
Sentry: ‘Whose keys?’
Warder: ‘Queen Elizabeth’s keys.’
Sentry: ‘Pass Queen Elizabeth’s keys – Alls well!’

After the traditional exchange the Chief Warder lifts his hat and proclaims ‘God preserve Queen Elizabeth.’ The clock chimes for 10 o’clock as the other Queen’s guards raise their bonnets and say ‘Amen.’ The entire process takes no more than 7 minutes, making the Ceremony of the Keys one of the shortest in London.

Despite it being a near millennia tradition, the ceremony has gone on every night without disturbance. During World War II, when German bombs rained down on London, the ceremony still took place with the exception of a direct hit. Even then, the ceremony was delayed by one-half hour.

I am going to see this :-)