It was pouring in Madrid. That May 22, 2004, the world in a Cathedral of Almudena, which hosted the State wedding of Don Felipe and Doña Letizia, before more than 1,200 guests and royal households from around the world. It is now the 20th anniversary of that state marriage passed through water. Carlos Herrera has recalled how he experienced that marriage: with Nelson Mandela, Rania of Jordan and Menchu Álvarez del Valle, Letizia’s grandmother.
“Sad” atmosphere inside the cathedral. “When Menchu came out, things changed. He gave a perfect speech, a fascinating read.” The journalist went to see her and told her: “Why don’t you come with me to work at the radio and we’ll do a section?” Carmen Enríquez, TVE correspondent in Casa Real for almost 20 years, invited to Herrera in Copesaid about the Queen’s grandmother that “she had a very powerful and very convincing voice. I think it would have been a great contribution from her,” he clarified about Carlos’ idea of signing the Asturian journalist.
“When I started at Casa Real the prince was 20 years old, he was very shy and when we asked him things he got a little nervous,” Carmen began. Together with Herrera, she has evoked the day of the state wedding of the Prince of Asturias and his then fiancée. “After the prince spent with his mother it began to pour in such a way that it was the end“, says Carmen. “When the downpour ended, the journalists took off their shoes, turned them over and an impressive amount of water came out, they got soaked.“. However, the rain left us with those “romantic” images of the bride in the car with the “window with droplets of water.”
“Was it an almost perfect wedding?” Carlos asked her. “Technically, yes. But the atmosphere in Almudena was gloomy,” Carmen acknowledged. “And Letizia’s grandmother, with her words, gave joy and enhancement to the story.”
The Queen’s grandmother, a leading broadcaster and journalist with a long professional life in Asturias, died in 2021 at the age of 93. She was part of the history of radio in the Principality. In 2019, on the stage of the Palacio Valdés theater in Avilés, she received the Gava Award in honor of her career in the audiovisual world.
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