Next year, King Charles will take regular overseas trips as he adapts to living with cancer.
During the spring and autumn of 2025, Charles will fly abroad as long as doctors sanction the travel.
Spring and autumn are the traditional periods for official foreign royal trips and the development comes after the King’s recent tour of Australia and Samoa, this autumn.
A senior Buckingham Palace official said the King’s trip to Australia and Samoa alongside the Queen was something he was “determined” to carry out and which was a “perfect tonic” for the head of state.
The King’s Garden is officially open!
— The Royal Family (@RoyalFamily) October 25, 2024
Tatalaina Aloā'ia le ‘Fa’asao o le Togālā'au a Lana Afioga i le Tupu’ (King’s Garden).
The special new garden is planted in a shape designed to represent a crown and contains native king ferns, English roses, and teuila (red ginger), the… pic.twitter.com/CkCSjfX1jf
King Charles to take regular overseas trips in 2025
The Palace official added: “We’re now working on a pretty normal looking full overseas tour programme for next year, which is a high for us to end on, to know that we can be thinking in those terms.”
While an update about the state of the King’s health or his treatment has not been given, the news that Charles will take on more overseas trips suggests his cancer is being managed successfully.
The King “genuinely loved” the tour and “genuinely thrived” on the Australian and Samoan programme which ended on Saturday, said the official, as it lifted “his spirits, his mood and his recovery.”
Wow Sydney, what a turnout! 🤩🫶 pic.twitter.com/ITC2zVImrh
— The Royal Family (@RoyalFamily) October 22, 2024
They added: “In that sense, the tour, despite its demands, has been the perfect tonic”.
He went on to say the monarch takes great strength from the Queen being there, not least because she “keeps it real”.
The visit to Australia was significant for Charles as it was his first to the country as King.
While in Samoa, he opened a major Commonwealth summit.
Commenting on Charles’ decision to undertake the tour, the official said: “I think it’s great testament to the King’s devotion to service and duty that he was prepared to come this far and he was incredibly happy and very, very determined to do so.”
The King has been receiving treatment as an out-patient for an undisclosed form of cancer since early February.
He initially postponed all public-facing duties, continuing to work behind the scenes, and returned to events with the public in late April.
King says he is ‘always devoted to this part of the world’ during Samoa farewell
Despite his diagnosis, the King has maintained a work schedule which has been an important part of his holistic approach to his cancer.
During the recent trip with his wife, he maintained a busy schedule for the benefit of the “mind and soul” while the doctor on the trip looked after the body.
The Palace official said about the large number of events the King attended during the recent tour: “It is also a great measure of the way that the King is dealing with the diagnosis.
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“And he’s a great believer in mind, body and soul, and this combination works very well on a visit like this, because he feels that sense of duty so strongly that to keep his mind and his soul engaged and then the doctor is here to make sure that his body is properly looked after, you’ve got what makes for very successful visit in in these circumstances.”
The royal couple took to social media to mark the end of their tour and, writing under their own names, said: “As our visits to Australia and Samoa come to a close, my wife and I would like to thank both nations for the warmest of welcomes and for the countless fond memories we will carry in our hearts for many years to come.
“Even when we are far apart in distance, the many close connections that unite us across the globe and through our Commonwealth family have been renewed, and will remain as profound as they are enduring.”
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