It was 3.30pm when Leigh, Thony and James arrived at the back of the queue at the Millennium Bridge to see the Queen lie in state.
None of them identified themselves as royalists, but they had different reasons for coming.
We had never met before, but we would spend the next six hours getting to know each other very well.
As marshals passed us along the river, giving us bright yellow wristbands, I would be the 4,251st person in line.
Construction worker Leigh Cooling had traveled from Tadley in Hampshire and arrived with a small bag and a black cap.
“My nana and grandfather served in the army and I’m coming to pick them up today. I’m not a massive royalist but I appreciate what the Queen has done,” he told me.
The atmosphere was cheerful, people were laughing and chatting, and passers-by might not have guessed that everyone had gathered for a sad occasion.
We had been warned that we could be waiting in line for up to 30 hours, although it didn’t look like many people were prepared for an overnight wait, with some in heels, shorts and dresses.
“I bet we’ll be in before midnight,” said James Barber who stood behind me.
Look at the queen lying in state
As we slowly began to move forward, Leigh called to another man in the queue who had been sitting, Thony Llaavye.
As the four of us started walking towards Westminster, Leigh joked that we would be ‘the crew’ and from then on, we seemed to stick together.
James, who lives in Bicester, said he already had plans to be in London and decided to come to “pay his respects”. “It’s hard to describe, I just felt compelled to go,” he said.
Thony didn’t have much interest in the royal family, but he admired the queen and wanted to see her one last time.
Gin, lager and Wagamamas
It was almost 5pm and the queue had stopped, we were in Waterloo. Everyone was looking at Thony’s phone as it played the live feed from inside Westminster Hall.
“It’s going to be an awesome sight to see,” James said.
A break in the queue is perhaps one of the only points where you can go to the toilet or eat something, but there is no formal system, you count on your neighbor to save you space.
While Leigh drank a pint of beer from a nearby stand, James returned with a chicken katsu curry from Wagamamas.
It wasn’t just our crew who were getting more fuel, everyone started tucking into the snacks they had brought in their bags, while others drank Pimms and cans of gin and tonic.
Descending past Big Ben and towards St Thomas’ Hospital we realized that we were unlikely to be waiting more than a few hours.
Even though we knew where we were going, the people passing by the queue look bewildered. Some maybe in the long run and some were not fans of the royal family.
Security was tightened as the queue zigzagged
Image: Sunset in Westminster
Our conversations ranged from whether pineapple on pizza is acceptable to the war in Ukraine and our families.
As we approached the south side of Lambeth Bridge, our legs started to hurt. It had only taken us three hours to get from near London Bridge to the edge of the gardens next to the Palace of Westminster.
Security tightened and the queues began to zigzag, this was the longest part.
Although we temporarily lost Thony in the portaloos, we managed to regroup in the gardens. It was impossible to calculate how many people were behind us, but now we were shuffling.
After going through airport-style security checks under the bright lights, we knew we were close.
As we entered Westminster Hall the queue fell silent, that was when everyone came.
We walked up a flight of stairs and as we entered the lobby, everyone’s shoulders seemed to slump forward. It was impossible to miss the coffin, grand, royal and raised on a platform.
The only noise came from the guards shuffling as they changed.
As we descended in two lines, people bowed to the coffin, bowed their heads and wept. We didn’t leave for more than 10 minutes after arriving at the lobby.
Image: Leaving Westminster
“It was well worth the wait,” Leigh said as everyone nodded. “I have nothing to say,” added Thony. Everyone hugged each other before going home and they took our last picture.
Although we started that evening as strangers, we left with a memory that will only be shared by our “crew”.