Nearly seven years after their last official visit, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle will return to Australia. According to a spokesperson for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, the pair will visit the continent next month, for the first time since 2018. Children Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet will not join them on the trip, reports The Independent.
“Prince Harry and Meghan, Duke and Duchess of Sussex, will visit Australia in mid-April to take part in a number of private, business and philanthropic engagements,” a spokesperson for the couple confirms. “Further details will be shared in due course.”
Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex at South Bondi Beach on October 19, 2018 in Sydney, Australia.
Chris Jackson/Getty Images
The destination is a notable one. Australia was the scene of their first major official tour as a married couple in 2018, when they were still an active part of the British royal family. That visit—which also included Fiji, Tonga and New Zealand—marked one of the moments of greatest popularity for the couple, shortly after their wedding and coinciding with the announcement that they were expecting their first child.
Years after that trip, the couple acknowledged that that seemingly idyllic Pacific tour was also one of the most difficult moments of their time as active royals. In the Netflix documentary Harry & Meghan, Meghan Markle recalled the pressure she felt facing constant media exposure as she tried to adjust to her new role within the monarchy and began her first pregnancy.
Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex arrive at Man O’War Steps on October 16, 2018 in Sydney, Australia.
Chris Jackson/Getty Images
The first signs of that discomfort had already been made public in 2019, during TV special Harry & Meghan: An African Journey. In the show, journalist Tom Bradby asked her directly about her emotional state. “Thank you for asking, because not many people have asked me if I’m well,” the duchess replied then, visibly moved. In that same conversation she added: “Any woman, especially when she’s pregnant, is really vulnerable.”
For his part, Prince Harry has explained on several occasions that that trip made him aware of the impact that public pressure was having on his wife, an experience that would end up weighing on the decision of both to abandon their roles within the British royal family.
Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex visit South Melbourne Beach October 18, 2018 in Melbourne, Australia.
Pool
The Pacific tour has been noted by the couple as a turning point in their interactions with other royals. In his interview with Oprah Winfrey in 2021, Prince Harry claimed that that trip marked a before and after in his relationship with the royal family. “You know, my father, my brother, Kate and all the rest of the family, they were, they were really welcoming. But it really changed after the Australia tour. After our South Pacific tour,” he said.
“That’s when we announced we were pregnant with Archie. That was our first tour,” Meghan added. “But it was also…it was also the first time that the family got to see how incredible she is at the job and that brought back memories,” Harry concluded.
Britain’s Prince Harry (C-R) and his wife Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex (C-L) at Bondi Beach in Sydney on October 19, 2018.
DEAN LEWINS/Getty Images
For her part, Meghan recalled in that same conversation that the public glitz of that tour hid a much more grueling reality. “Those tours are…I’m sure they have beautiful pictures and it looks vibrant and all of that is true,” she said. “It’s also really exhausting and I was fried. And I think it just hit me so hard because we were making it look like everything was fine. I can understand why people were really surprised to see that there was pain there.”
In recent years, the couple has continued to travel abroad to support social and humanitarian projects, maintaining an unofficial version of traditional royal visits. In May 2024, for example, they visited Nigeria to participate in events related to the Invictus Games and meet with local organizations; a few months later they traveled to Colombia on an agenda focused on youth, culture and mental health. More recently, the couple made a brief humanitarian trip to Jordan in collaboration with the World Health Organization.
First published in Vanity Fair Spain
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