SYDNEY – Britain’s Prince Charles and Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, commenced on Monday their six-day tour of New Zealand with visits to a war memorial and a community center where the prince requested a reggae song be played for him over the airwaves.
The couple arrived in Auckland on Sunday for their third joint visit to the country and their second since 2015.
On Sunday they touched down at the Royal New Zealand Air Force base in Whenuapai, northwest Auckland, where they were met by Governor General Patsy Reddy.
Monday saw them start with a wreath-laying ceremony for fallen soldiers at Mt Roskill War Memorial where the prince and duchess spoke to servicemen and women.
The royal pair then visited a youth community center where Charles requested Bob Marley’s “One Love” to be played by the center’s radio station RYZ FM. A video posted to Clarence House’s Twitter account shows the prince nodding along to the reggae track.
He was also gifted a T-shirt and helped print one himself, and he later spent time with a social enterprise turning recyclable materials into new products.
The duchess, meanwhile, made Christmas decorations with the youth and was gifted a lei garland made of chocolate bars, their Twitter account showed.
The pair then headed back to Whenuapai air base to present the Queen’s Colour as recognition of the New Zealand Air Force’s achievements.
Their visit, which ends on Nov. 25, will also see them travel to Northland to meet with young entrepreneurs and visit the Waitangi Treaty Grounds, as well as Kaikoura and Christchurch in the South Island, before they head to Tuvalu and the Solomon Islands.
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