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Queuing has always been regarded as a quintessentially British activity. Brits love queues and they do them well.
Although it has only existed for around three days, the queue to see the Queen lying in state at Westminster Hall in the Palace of Westminster has become the most iconic of queues.
At the time of writing, The Queue is about five miles long and has been paused for new joiners after reaching capacity.
With people from all over the country travelling to London to pay their respected to Her Majesty, it is no surprise that some intrepid Channel Islanders have braved the treacherous journey, plagued by the possibility of delayed and cancelled flights, to cross the Channel and join The Queue.
One such brave explorer is Joanne Vandermerwe-Mahon, who decided last Thursday that she wanted to travel from Jersey to join The Queue.
She described feeling “compelled” to visit Her Majesty lying in state, as her mum had always regretted not going to see the Queen Mother after her death in 2002.
Joanne said: “The Queen has always been such a constant figure; I don’t think any of us were ready to see her go.”
Joanne called up her mum in Lincolnshire and invited her to meet her in London. Although her mum was “in the middle of a huge project” at the time, she abandoned everything to join The Queue.
Pictured: Joanne and her mum joined The Queue under Tower Bridge.
Joanne arrived in London on Thursday morning, and faced her first task: finding the end of The Queue.
This was easier said than done, she explained.
Joanne said: “I was following the live updates online, but the location wasn’t up-to-date and didn’t align with where I was should have been going.”
After bumping into some helpful police officers, Joanne thought she was in luck when they pointed her towards the end of The Queue. However, this turned out being “in the complete wrong direction”.
Joanne said: “They were trying to be helpful, but it cost me hours!"
She eventually found the end of The Queue located under “beautiful Tower Bridge”.
This is where Joanne found the first members of what she described as her “Queue Family”: a couple named Chris and Jo, and another “tall chap” who Joanne described as “very useful” in finding your way back to the group when people got separated.
Video: The live queue-tracker.
There was disarray at Embankment when people jumped The Queue, and Joanne and her Queue Family were momentarily separated. However, they found their way back to each other.
It was at this point that two worlds collided, when Joanne’s Queue Family met her real family as her mum finally arrived in London to join her in The Queue.
London Bridge was when things got serious, as people were finally given their wristbands.
All of their previous queuing had prepared them for this moment. There was finally concrete proof that they were officially in The Queue.
Pictured: Joanne and her Queue Family with their precious wristbands.
The excitement of the wristbands seemed to get the better of the queuers, as Joanne said that the pace began to get “really fast, almost a light jog.”
In fact, they were moving so fast that Joanne and her Queue Family were unable to actually put their wristbands on. They instead had to keep a tight hold to their real-life equivalent of Willy Wonka’s Golden Ticket.
“We were all looking out for each other,” Joanne said. “Especially because Jo is pregnant, and my mum is in her seventies!”
When The Queue eventually slowed down, Joanne and her Queue Family found themselves in a “lovely shady spot by the river”.
Joanne said: “All of the mums had bought snacks, which we shared as we chatted and all got to know each other better.”
Joanne left her Queue Family briefly to get everyone teas and coffees from one of the many free stalls that businesses had set up along the route.
But The Queue waits for no one.
Joanne found herself running after The Queue, leaving a trail of tea and coffee in her path until she was once again reunited with her Queue Family.
She said: “Overall, it was a lovely day out in London! We got to see all the sights and had the most amazing burritos from one of the food stalls stationed along the way.”
Although she was in The Queue for over six hours in total, Joanne said that everyone was so “absorbed” that it felt like a “time warp”, although she admitted that her “comfy shoes” had “saved her”.
The final leg of The Queue was the slowest part, with a zig-zag barrier formation as the final hurdle. Joanne described it as “painful” being able to see Westminster Hall “right there” but knowing you still had hours left to wait.
She explained that the last section of the route had a “whole different feeling”.
Joanne said: “There were Vicars and Chaplains stationed at the end of each line for people to talk to, and everyone was sharing their food, with ‘mini picnics’ taking place everywhere.
“The Royal Barge also came down the river at that exact moment, which was amazing!”
Pictured: "We got to see all the sights!"
At security, Joanne lost her Queue Family to the crowd and her brand-new bottle of perfume to the strict no liquids policy.
She had bigger things to worry about at this point, however.
Joanne realised that it wasn’t looking likely that she would make it to the airport in time for her flight back to Jersey that night and had to move it to the next morning. (In true Channel Island style, the flight was in fact delayed and Joanne would have been able to make it.)
Joanne and her mum’s time in The Queue had finally come to an end, and it was time for them to enter Westminster Hall.
Joanne explained that, in her “colourful life”, her mum had actually conducted services in Westminster Hall so had thought she was well prepared for that moment. However, “even her breath was taken away”.
The hall was “whisper quiet” and “really emotional”, filled with guests with “glassy eyes”.
Joanne described it as “absolutely magic”.
She said: “Everyone had waited so long for this moment. People in the queue were discussing what they were going to say to Her Majesty when they got their moment with her.”
Video: A live-stream of mourners visiting Her Majesty lying in state in Westminster Hall. (BBC/YouTube)
Joanne admitted that she had expected that it would feel “anticlimactic” leaving Westminster Hall afterwards, however she said that the atmosphere outside was in fact “safe and lovely”.
Joanne and her mum spent some time milling around the area at dusk, waiting to see if they could find any of their Queue Family but eventually gave up with no success.
Joanne said: “It was the saddest thing! We were separated from them so suddenly that I didn’t get anyone’s surnames or phone numbers, so we had no way to ever contact them again.”
However, it appears that nothing can break a bond formed in The Queue.
When Joanne turned on her phone after her flight back to Jersey, she had a message on Airbnb from Chris and Jo, the couple that had formed part of her Queue Family.
Joanne explained: “They had been giving me advice about wanting to list my house on Airbnb whilst we were queuing, and they had managed to track me down through that tiny piece of information!”
Joanne is “delighted” that the couple managed to reach out, and she is now trying to convince them that Jersey is a great place for their next family holiday.
But for now, Joanne has some rest to catch up on after sleeping for less than four of the last 48 hours.
She says it will then be time to “get back to being wife and mother” after her unforgettable adventures in The Queue.
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